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Reuters: Russian forces launch invasion of Ukraine with strikes on defence
MOSCOW/KYIV, Feb 24 (Reuters) - Russian forces fired missiles at several cities in Ukraine and landed troops on its coast on Thursday, officials and media said, after President Vladimir Putin authorised what he called a special military operation in the east.
Shortly after Putin spoke in a televised address on Russian state TV, explosions could be heard in the pre-dawn quiet of the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv.
Gunfire rattled near the capital's main airport, the Interfax news agency said, and sirens were heard over the city.
WSJ: The Latest News on the Russia-Ukraine Crisis: Live Updates
Russian troops and tanks pushed into Ukraine and airstrikes hit the country's capital and more than a dozen other cities early Thursday after President Vladimir Putin said he ordered a military operation to "demilitarize and de-Nazify Ukraine" and bring its leaders to trial.
Ukrainian officials said an initial wave of strikes targeted military installations, airfields and government facilities across the country. Ukraine's border service said its troops came under attack all along the country's frontiers with Russia and Belarus as well as Crimea. Heavy shelling targeted the city of Mariupol on the Azov sea. Air-raid sirens sounded in Kyiv after 7 a.m. and the city's airport came under attack. Ukraine's military said it shot down five Russian warplanes and one helicopter. Russia denied any of its aircraft were hit.
CBS: NATO officials say Russian attack on Ukraine has begun
Russia has begun attacking Ukraine, NATO officials confirmed. The late-night attack began moments after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that he had "decided to conduct a special military operation" to protect eastern Ukraine's Donbas region. CBS News correspondents reported hearing loud blasts in the capital city, Kyiv, and in the eastern city of Kharkiv.
A Ukrainian government spokesperson said early Thursday that "cruise and ballistic missile strikes are underway at the control centers" in Kyiv.
BBC: Ukraine conflict: Russian forces invade after Putin TV declaration
Russian forces have launched a military assault on neighbouring Ukraine, crossing its borders and bombing military targets near big cities.
In a pre-dawn TV statement Russian President Vladimir Putin said Russia did not plan to occupy Ukraine and demanded that its military lay down their arms.
Moments later, attacks were reported on Ukrainian military targets.
Ukraine said that "Putin has launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine".
Russian military vehicles were said to have breached the border in a number of places, in the north, south and east, including from Belarus.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:09AM (25 children)
I wonder how many news sites are down today.
and I wonder about the reasons.
(Score: 3, Informative) by takyon on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:10AM (17 children)
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-60503037 [bbc.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:33AM
yes, it's now available here as well.
(Score: 5, Informative) by mcgrew on Thursday February 24 2022, @03:39PM (15 children)
You expect Trump's puppet master to be any more truthful than he is? BTW, Trump called Putin a genius for invading. THE HEAD OF ONE OF AMERICA'S TWO MAJOR PARTIES IS ALL FOR RUSSIA INVADING UKRAINE!
WTF??
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 3, Funny) by DeathMonkey on Thursday February 24 2022, @05:00PM
Trump, displaying his knowledge on the Ukraine situation:
Fox News host corrects Trump after he mistakenly thought US troops were landing in Ukraine as Russia launched its attack [businessinsider.com]
Things would be going so much better now if he were still in charge!
(Score: 5, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 24 2022, @05:44PM (12 children)
I believe the slogan on the flyover state T-shirts and ball caps was "Better Russian than Democrat."
I wonder if any of those people understand the balance of payments in the federal budget and what would happen to their jerkwater "bread basket" states if they were cut off from the "Democrat" tax base cities and made to pay their own way on the open market for all the federal services they receive from tax income on the grain that MegaAgCorp produces in their neighborhood?
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 5, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Thursday February 24 2022, @06:06PM
Better American than Republican
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:39PM
Good plan. Let's cut 'em off. Toss 'em out. Hear 'em cry!
Please.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 25 2022, @05:09PM (1 child)
Silly question. Maybe the bread basket states standard of living goes down a little. How do you propose that New York, Chicago, and LA are going to feed themselves? Your highly populated cities exist only because the rest of us are willing to feed you. Maybe it's time all the agricultural states got together, and started jacking prices up. $50 loaf of bread, anyone? $80 gallon of milk? You should start paying your way, and stop relying on government subsidies to feed you.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday February 26 2022, @02:18AM
Free market, capitalist sources of food. When the flyover states are no longer protected by the same Federal government as the coastal cities, they will both be dealing with global market forces to find sources and buyers of food.
Somehow, I doubt that Nebraska would be getting paid as much for its corn if it weren't in the same country as New York, Chicago and LA.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Joe Desertrat on Saturday February 26 2022, @01:05AM (1 child)
I bet you could get most of them to vote for a constitutional amendment banning any state from receiving more tax dollars than it pays in.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday February 26 2022, @02:22AM
Resident voters, hell yeah, you could sell that with two 30 second spots on talk radio. Fortunately for them, their elected representatives usually figure out how these things work pretty quickly - as soon as their lobbyists educate them about it. Lobbyists love flyover states, much easier to manipulate.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @12:52PM (5 children)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday February 26 2022, @01:10PM (4 children)
Yes, the miracle of flowing money as opposed to hoarded dragon's gold. But without the federal redirection of tax dollars through the breadbasket, they wouldn't even get that one smell of the money as it passes through town on the way to provide the things that money can buy.
If they weren't all brainwashed since the New Deal against welfare (including all the ones on disability, unemployment, SNAP, etc.) they much more than the evil city dwellers would benefit from UBI - money direct to the people instead of the lobbyist employers.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @03:30PM (3 children)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday February 26 2022, @04:56PM (2 children)
Smell of money is infinitely better than never seeing any money at all - like, oh say, Malawi or Yemen.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @05:37PM (1 child)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday February 26 2022, @05:50PM
Oh, but it has been sold so convincingly: smell of money means jobs, infrastructure, all kinds of intangible benefits to the locals while MegaCorp reaps the profits. Incentivize MegaCorp to build in your town by building roads, water, police, fire, and hospital services for them, they'll use the locals for cheap labor as long as the megabucks are rolling in from the rape of the local natural resources.
Interesting twist: we all think of farmland as a renewable resource, but the way large scale farming has been practiced for the past 150+ years, it isn't [theguardian.com].
So, when that topsoil is all gone, there will still be roads and hospitals and semi-safe to drink water, hopefully. Better off than the people in places that never got a smell of money... sometimes.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 25 2022, @06:45PM
https://twitter.com/Balshone/status/1497178406617759745 [twitter.com]
(Score: 2, Insightful) by DannyB on Thursday February 24 2022, @03:28PM (6 children)
Fox News won't be down. You can count on that. Russia has said Tucker and Josh are its best spokespeople.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:47PM (5 children)
This was modded as "Troll"?!? What's trollish about this? You do know that Russian media has heaped effusive praise on Tucker Carlson [mediaite.com] for his pro-Russia propaganda talking points, yes?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:29PM (2 children)
Come on dude, you have to ask yourself: Why do I hate Putin so much? See, YOU are the problem, not Vlad.
The (sad) irony here is that these flyover dumbfucks proudly wearing "Better Russian than Democrat" t-shirts consider themselves "real Americans." If the Republicans take the Senate back, I can't wait for all the "House un-Russian Activities Committee" hearings: "Are you now, or have you ever been a member of a party beholden to uphold the Constitution?"
"I'm sorry Senator Hawley, but in my naïve youth I was enamored with liberal democratic ideals and institutions."
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:43PM (1 child)
I have here in this briefcase a list of many anti-Russians and anti-Russian and anti-Putin sympathizers! Or synthesizers.
(SN crowd expected to be too young and naive to get the reference.)
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 25 2022, @12:57AM
The part that blows me away with McCarthy's hearings was that, unknown to him, it was the KGB themselves who gave him his list. To give it legitimacy, most of the people on it were low level members of the US Communist Party, but it also included several prominent anti-communists, such as General Marshall, who the USSR wanted to discredit. By focusing attention on the State Department it distracted people from their spies in the military, the CIA, and the Department of Education, and when the whole thing inevitably thing blew up the backlash discredited any other attempts to catch those operatives. Frankly it was a brilliant piece of espionage.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 25 2022, @03:14AM (1 child)
Speaking as someone who quit watching Faux News years ago, I now see where Runaway gets his news. He used to quote RT near every day.
(Score: -1, Troll) by foundling on Friday February 25 2022, @05:41AM
Runaways. As someone always says, he's an ignorant moron, Ruskie shill, and practicioner of animal husbandry (taken way too literally!).
(Score: 3, Insightful) by engblom on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:21AM (19 children)
I feel sorry for Ukraine and the Ukrainian people.
Russia has learned a lesson: West is too greedy to actually use proper sanctions (as sanctions also hurt those enforcing them to some degree). We see it over and over. Each time Russia is doing something bad, usually a handful of persons are not allowed to travel to West nor to have money invested in West, that's all. Now we see the result of this: an invasion of a sovereign country.
The only thing that could stop Russia would be some real sanctions, not some condemning and some light restrictions for a handful of men. Without this I am afraid Russia will not be satisfied with only Ukraine, they will attack other countries too.
(Score: 5, Informative) by quietus on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:48AM (3 children)
You're wrong -- European trade with Russia has been hard hit [europa.eu] by the sanctions. Imports into the EU are at half the 2012 level, exports have declined from €120bn in 2012 to about €75bn now (now being 2020).
(Score: 3, Interesting) by engblom on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:09AM (2 children)
Did you read those graphs yourself? Already before Russia attacked Crimea in 2014 the export begun going down. The effect of sanctions are hardly visible in that graph. The export went from €117bn, at the highest peak in 2012 (and it begun even going down during 2012), to €79bn, which is the lowest peak during 2020. That it went down in 2020 we can probably blame Covid for. The export was not halved as you claim.
Are you an employed Russian troll?
(Score: 5, Informative) by quietus on Thursday February 24 2022, @02:14PM (1 child)
If you just had scrolled down to this image [europa.eu] in that article -- see that crater there, in 2013-2014, where the imports crater from index 180 to 100?
To put the numbers into perspective, these are the numbers of another BRICS member [europa.eu], over that same period of time.
Might I point out that you're the one using the old accusation of the West being greedy and unprincipled, typical for Russian and Chinese nationalists/neo-Marxists? Also, modding yourself up is not stylish.
(Score: 3, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Thursday February 24 2022, @06:15PM
Russian stocks crash 33% and ruble plunges to record low [cnn.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:12AM (2 children)
You under-estimate the effectiveness of tickling people to death with soft pillows.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @06:22PM
Well of course they do...
NOBODY expects the Spanish Inquisition!!!!
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Friday February 25 2022, @03:20AM
Better watch out for Mike Lindell. He's trying to start a pillow fight.
When life isn't going right, go left.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by FatPhil on Thursday February 24 2022, @12:43PM (5 children)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 3, Insightful) by engblom on Thursday February 24 2022, @01:00PM
Yes, I agree. The invasion begun already in 2014. The new thing is that this is a full invasion comparing to the one in 2014.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @04:27PM (1 child)
You mean the US backed coup in 2014 that overthrew a democratically elected government, and installed an extreme far-right regime that threatened to ethnically cleanse Ukraine of all people of Russian descent which led those threatened in Ukraine's Crimea to ASK Russia to intervene (Crimea was part of Russia until given to Ukraine in 1954, so of course was mostly populated by people of Russian descent)?
'Pappa' George Bush gave assurances to Russia that NATO would not be expanded to their borders. The US immediately went back on that promise. Russia then asked to join NATO, which would have neutralized the threat, but were rebuffed-- the US did not, and does not want peace. Peace would negatively impact the profits of weapons manufacturers... and, that would negatively impact bribes ^H^H^H campaign contributions.
Shitty that people of Ukraine must suffer for a dick waving contest by US and Russia. Also shitty is how ignorant most of the commentary here is.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 01 2022, @11:25AM
>Crimea was part of Russia until given to Ukraine in 1954
And before that it was an autonomous region until 1945, so Russia "had it" for less than nine years. Before that it was truly part of Russia only until the fall of Russian Empire in 1917, at which point many nations regained their freedom.
There's also the issue of forceful colonization during soviet times, when they would emigrate local populations to Siberia and replace them with Russian colonists. Now these colonists and their children are a convenient excuse for a war.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:46PM (1 child)
As long as it is a slow, one country at a time approach, the west will stay asleep. Make some noises and turn over, but stay asleep.
Putin knows, you don't just start rolling over country after country. Play the long game. Wait years in between each successive country.
Get the GOP on your side. Divide the US with nonsense that half the population believes.
They will take us over without firing a shot, while Fox News cheers them on.
To transfer files: right-click on file, pick Copy. Unplug mouse, plug mouse into other computer. Right-click, paste.
(Score: 2) by captain normal on Friday February 25 2022, @03:26AM
Vald doesn't have very many years left for such a plan. He's near 70.
When life isn't going right, go left.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @06:14PM
Ooh, an "invasion of a sovereign country". Like Syria? Libya? Or even Mexico's Texas?
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by loonycyborg on Friday February 25 2022, @08:29AM (4 children)
I disagree about the way Ukraine went about the solving Donbas crisis. Outright invasion isn't something what I would personally go for nonetheless wouldn't oppose it either since I don't really see a difference between Ukraine attacking own people and Russia attacking Ukraine in retaliation. USSR internal borders never made much sense so no new countries should have been formed from SSRs without letting individual regions switch allegiance if their dominant nationality doesn't match the country well enough. If attacking people in Donbas is acceptable then it was also acceptable for Soviet Army to prevent dissolution of USSR with force.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 25 2022, @05:18PM (1 child)
Careful there - you'll be branded a Russian shill. But, you're right. Virtually no one in the West has said anything about the ongoing fighting in the Donbass region. It just didn't matter, when their fair-haired boys seemed to have the upper hand.
In a year or two, it would be interesting to see an accounting of all the billions invested in Ukraine since about 1995. The US stands to see about $10 billion flushed down the toilet. I have no idea how much Europe has invested, but down the toilet it goes. I hope like hell that Koch and Soros lose a hundred billion between them.
(Score: 2) by loonycyborg on Sunday February 27 2022, @12:27AM
Money are abstractions, they have so much of it they don't care how they burn it. If their proxies die they don't care either. Potential loss doesn't mean anything to them, only extra chance to make ridiculous theater. They apply sanctions that target common man first because it's about breaking the entire people, not just its government.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @12:58PM (1 child)
The civil war was part of that retaliation in the first place. Wouldn't have happened if Euromaidan hadn't happened.
(Score: 2) by loonycyborg on Saturday February 26 2022, @08:21PM
All three are parts of same campaign: Russia vs NATO proxy war.
(Score: 4, Informative) by quietus on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:23AM (11 children)
In a video call, Russian president Putin called it a "special military operation" with as aim the "demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine". His speech was rife with references to the history of Ukraine and the threat of NATO, claiming that negotations in the past 30 years have only resulted in "lies and blackmail".
The United States is the big culprit in all of this, according to Putin, having abused their powers after the fall of the Soviet Union: everywhere the West has installed "order", blood has been spilled.
Putin called the extension of NATO a "permanent threat to Russia", "a matter of life and death", and "a real threat to the continuing existence of our country".
According to the Russian president, the operation has as its purpose to "protect people who have been subject in the past 8 years to humiliation and genocide by the Kiev regime "
Putin concluded his message with threatening language.
(Source [kremlin.ru], rapid translation from another translation)
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:58AM
ubi solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant
(Score: 3, Touché) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 24 2022, @02:10PM (5 children)
Ready for any outcome? MAD means nobody is really ready for any outcome.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by quietus on Thursday February 24 2022, @02:53PM (4 children)
It is strange that he openly threatens nuclear warfare, and I can't place it. If Polish air defense brings down a MIG at the Ukrainian border, is he also going to threaten nuclear attack? Or is he going to order one?
Merely the possibility will drive a hard stance of the whole West against Russia for years to come. I suspect all kinds of opponents of Putin suddenly have no more money worries, and we're gonna see a whole string of uprisings within Russia's sphere of influence.
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday February 24 2022, @04:19PM (3 children)
Vladimir Putin appears to threaten nuclear attack against West in chilling TV address [mirror.co.uk]
"Whoever tries to impede us, let alone create threats for our country and its people, must know that the Russian response will be immediate and lead to the consequences you have never seen in history."
wink-wink-nudge-nudge
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday February 24 2022, @05:55PM
Just as a blast from the past:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o861Ka9TtT4 [youtube.com]
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @06:20PM
Perhaps he was alluding to the "never before seen" sanctions Biden and his vassals were threatening over the past month.
(Score: 2) by Fluffeh on Friday February 25 2022, @12:30AM
I think you meant:
wink-wink-nuke-nuke
(Score: 2) by legont on Friday February 25 2022, @12:20AM (3 children)
Putin also called the US an empire of lies and directly compared the US to Nazi Germany. Specifically he blamed Soviets for not attacking Hitler preemptively and primissed not to repeat the mistake.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 25 2022, @02:11AM
Ah it must be the super-extra-secret Molotov-Ribbentrop-Roosevelt pact that we never got told about. That explains everything ...
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @01:07PM (1 child)
In comparison, the US was right on the nose about Russia's intent to invade the Ukraine. Funny how those completely unreliable Western sources got this one right.
If the Soviets had resisted Germany aggression from the start, there would have been no Second World War (at least not one started by the Germans, the Soviets are a different story). They probably could pick up East Prussia too. Just invade and keep East Prussia when Hitler started his campaign. That would nip it in the bud and end things there.
(Score: 2) by legont on Wednesday March 02 2022, @05:08AM
As per your last paragraph, that's exactly what Putin is doing now - resisting American aggression. That's not my opinion, but what he, basically, said.
He wants to prevent WWIII.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by janrinok on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:24AM (5 children)
Quote from BBC TV News:
(Score: 2) by janrinok on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:14AM (2 children)
I cannot say whether the BBC report is accurate - I can find no other source to verify the claim.
(Score: 2, Redundant) by Runaway1956 on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:58AM (1 child)
Yeah, it's impossible for any of us to distinguish fact from fiction. I heard a little while ago that Ukraine had killed 50 THOUSAND Russian troops. I think the reporter simply mis-spoke while translating, but the number was actually spoken, and obviously false. That old 'fog of war' thing has never been solved.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @06:31PM
Orwell's "Homage to Catalonia" is a good account of how geopolitics and the news function. Worth a read if you haven't already.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @06:22PM
Not surprising they are rather close with Russia; the West tried to coup them in 2020 using Covid-19 as a pretext.
(Score: 2) by gawdonblue on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:58PM
So there's a "Coalition of the Willing".
Well that makes it OK,then.
(Score: 3, Informative) by quietus on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:26AM (108 children)
Poland is planning to call NATO Article 4, asking for immediate council among the NATO members. They want to promote Ukraine immediately to a NATO member. Lviv, in the West of Ukraine, near the Polish border, is being bombarded -- a city which once belonged to Poland.
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:31AM (104 children)
If NATO inducts Ukraine into itself, then the shit is really going to hit the fan. As is, we can expect to see a very limited war. Soon as Ukraine becomes NATO, there will be no limits.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by quietus on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:35AM
Or if the military of Estland, Letland, Lithuania gets involved -- all of these have regions which Russia can put a historical claim on.
(Score: 4, Informative) by janrinok on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:47AM (102 children)
Ukraine cannot currently join NATO - where on earth do you get your information from?
That is your viewpoint from the US. Ask a Ukrainian how 'limited' it will be. How secure do you think that Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania feel at the moment? They are former Soviet Republics and they are supported by NATO. Do you advocate just turning a blind eye to Putin or should we be taking punitive action? Then what will happen in another decade when Russia views another country as its own property?
(Score: 1, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:56AM (101 children)
Lemme think a moment. Are Estonia, Latvia, or Lithuania persecuting ethnic Russians inside their borders, just because they are ethnic Russians? Are any of those nation intentionally rattling Russia's chains? Did any of those nations threaten to turn over Russian military bases to NATO? Do any of those nations have neo-Nazi troops incorporated into their military?
You raise a valid concern, but I don't see anyone aside from Kiev intentionally pissing on Russia, again and again.
(Score: 0, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:43AM
Shouldn't they be? According to FatPhil, they are all assholes, carpetbaggers, and the equivalent of Yankee reconstructionists. Or, the other way around. These nations were paid good money to join NATO, on the basis of falsified audits of military strength. Whores. But the main thing is, Runaway's understanding of all this is definitely defective, or paid, or both. There were Nazi collorationists in most of the countries, and quite likely they have gone to ground, much like traitor Trump supporters in America of late, or Runaway1956 himself? Not indicted for storming the Capitol? Because he wasn't there, or just didn't know how to take selfies?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by maxwell demon on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:45AM (94 children)
Is Ukraine?
Is Ukraine?
Did Ukraine?
Does Ukraine?
If any of those, please provide evidence. From non-Russian sources.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:54AM (93 children)
Yes, to all of your above questions.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/25/ukraine-adopts-law-enforcing-use-of-ukrainian-in-public-life [theguardian.com]
(Score: 5, Informative) by maxwell demon on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:17AM (91 children)
Sorry, your source doesn't provide what you claim.
What it does describe is a law that says that you have to learn the Ukrainian language, and use it in official communications. Now that law as described definitely is bad, but it is a far cry from persecuting someone because of their ethnicity.
The source doesn't even touch on any of your other claims.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:24AM (5 children)
*rolleyes*
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:31AM
Runaway, just run away, you are full of shit
(Score: 5, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:35AM (2 children)
What, aren't you from the US of A where every immigrant is instructed to "speak American" by monolinguals?
(Score: 1, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:42AM (1 child)
Actually, no. These days every business has a translator or six - mostly the anchor babies born 20 to 30 years ago.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:58AM
Right, a translator. So every official business document needs to be written in English then. Or do you do your taxes in Louisiana Creole or Texas German?
Prescriptive monolingualism in officialdom is common throughout many countries. Take France, for example - many regional languages such as Breton and Occitan are dying out because it was discouraged for centuries to communicate in languages other than "French".
Expecting Ukrainians to communicate in Ukrainian isn't unusual.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by khallow on Thursday February 24 2022, @12:57PM
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @11:39AM (4 children)
Living in a european country with 3 official languages. (Belgium)
I can ensure you that if the majority (Dutch) would abolish the two minor languages it would be very bad. (French, German) Yellow vests and "canada style occupations" would be the least that will happen. (We don't have a gun culture, so unarmed mobs)
Many years ago someone noticed an elavator in a gov building in Brussels only had signs in 1 of the 3 official languages, that created a big political mess.
He makes claims, you ask evidence, he gives you evidence that I certainly can understand to have a dramatic impact and you dismiss it ...
A single language law is not sufficient for persecution, but that's clearly a law that basks in anti-russia sentiment. Such a sentiment is usually not restricted to a single act as this law.
Is it sufficient reason to invade Ukraine? Ofcourse not, but it's more than on par with our reasons for going into Syria, Iraq, Libanon, .....
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday February 24 2022, @12:45PM
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:33PM (2 children)
By that standard we should invade Quebec over their language laws.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 25 2022, @05:28PM (1 child)
Fool. Quebec invaded Canada over Canada's repressive language laws. No matter where you go, the road signs remind you that Quebec forced you to adopt their language.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday February 26 2022, @01:18AM
You say that like it's a bad thing.
Societal bilingualism is actually a positive - it's what separates Canada from monolingual philistines (of which I am one) in the rest of the Anglophonie such as Australia, the USA and England. Canadians, New Zealanders and the Irish should celebrate their struggles in learning respectively, high school French, Maori and Irish Gaelic.
Did I mention that French-speaking women in Quebec City are smoking hot?
(Score: 5, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 24 2022, @12:40PM (75 children)
The disturbing thing to me is the similarity to Germany at the start of WWII: a weak pretext for invasion which can apply to many further invasions in the near future.
The iron curtain states stagnated economically under the USSR, they provided some natural resources to Russia, but... Russian culture was successfully imposed there. Even in Germany, the second language learned by 90% of the population was English in the West and Russian in the East. I believe many of the other member states of the USSR saw a significant increase in their ethnic Russian population.
It's somewhat understandable that the non Russian populations flexed a bit after 1990. If Russia really wants to help ethnic Russians they would encourage immigration. To me Russia seems more to be using ethnic Russians in Ukraine as a pretext to recapture control of Ukraine's natural resources.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DeathMonkey on Thursday February 24 2022, @05:03PM (6 children)
We even have a bunch of apologists calling for Appeasement. [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 24 2022, @05:41PM (5 children)
Call it appeasement, call it what you will - if it is a net win for everyone outside Russia, and Russia accepts it, then it's a logical course forward - as long as it doesn't amount to paying a hostage taker, encouraging them to take more hostages in the future - in other words, Russia has committed a certain amount of expense, if the "appeasement" is less than that committed expense, it makes future repeats of this scenario also a losing proposition - not to mention the appeaser's patience is likely to wear thinner.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday February 24 2022, @07:43PM (3 children)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:12PM (2 children)
Ukraine is at where it's at - if "appeasement" in the form of some beneficial energy sales contracts or whatever - convinces Russia to return to a non-genocidal behavior in Ukraine, then that's a win for Ukraine.
Of course, Putin's whole M.O. is being a loose cannon nutjob, so taking any kind of deal would be severely out of character for him.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:17PM (1 child)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 24 2022, @08:27PM
Well, the AlJazeera coverage listed a recent history of Russia's steps toward this invasion, with each step promising to never take the next, and then taking it anyway. If there were incentives at each step of retreat, and by not staying retreated they lose those incentives, that might be more effective than a bunch of "condemnation in the strongest terms."
I'm reminded of my first (only) divorce. Ex-wife-to-be had a lawyer through her employer, a little research told me the absolute cheapest lawyer I could get would cost me $2K, so... I put $1K on the table: "when you move out and the divorce processes through the court, I'll give you $1000. If you get unreasonable, make me feel I need to get a lawyer, the first thing that happens is that $1K disappears - never to be seen again - and then we see what my lawyer thinks is fair." Every now and again through the process she'd get weird about her idea of fair division of this or that, usually trivial stuff, and the question: "is it worth $1000 to you?" settled the matter every time, usually immediately - always after she had a chance to ask her lawyer about it.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 25 2022, @01:02AM
Appeasing an aggressor is always paying off a hostage taker, and it always encourages more. This is the third time Putin has pulled this stunt, and he's won every time.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Saturday February 26 2022, @04:38AM (17 children)
Jesus H Christ you speak some shit. Yes, Putin should not have invaded... there were other avenues that could have been explored... but this was a US-engineered crisis (including a civil war) building since Obama including a coup against a DEMOCRATICALLY elected government. These ghouls want to fight Russia to the last Ukrainian, and haven't wanted to let up even when Zelensky wanted to turn down the heat... though Zelensky doesn't have his own independant powerbase so he's being swept along by other forces. In Syria the muscle in the revolution-attempt was islamofascists, and in Ukraine it was literal neonazis. It sounds so hyperbolic that must be propaganda right? The Russians forced embarrassment with a resolution in the UN about not funding neonazi groups... the only two nations that didn't sign it were the USA and Ukraine. Just absorb what that means. BTW, there are US neonazis going to Ukraine for training, but that's another issue. Congress then banned funding the Azov Battalion (after having previously explicitly allowed funding them)... and Right Sector just splintered away and became the political face in a Sinfein/IRA kind of relationship. That's just ONE of the ways the US has been using Ukraine to poke Russia.
Sure, Russia needs more democracy, but so does Ukraine let alone the USA. If actual people had the say they should none of this would be happening. BTW, I have a Ukrainian grandfather (and last name), a Crimean Russian grandmother, and my partner has a brother who studied and spent time in Ukraine, and in Moscow for the last five years or so... although he's not from either country.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday February 26 2022, @12:54PM (3 children)
Is it the US, or is it all of NATO? The strategy of keeping people divided against themselves is classically attributed to the British using Lawrence of Arabia's intelligence to divide the middle east.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by quietus on Saturday February 26 2022, @02:52PM (1 child)
Err ... not a nitpick, but the Sykes-Picot agreement was negotiated behind the back of TE Lawrence (and severely traumatized him, if you read Seven Pillars of Wisdom thoroughly). That agreement was not based on any intelligence by him (or by any other British intelligence), it was just the result of a colonialist agreement between career bureaucrats of two nations that thought they were the summum of human civilization, France and Britain.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday February 26 2022, @04:48PM
I'm in no way saying the TE Lawrence endorsed the agreement, just that his transfer of knowledge from the Bedouin to the British Empire informed the Brits how best to keep the sandmen down, by setting them against each other. Like Oppenheimer's work informed the world how to make atomic bombs - he didn't tell them what to do with them, he just gave them what they needed to build them. Lawrence may have been even less aware of how his transfer of knowledge would affect the people he learned about than Oppenheimer, but without the things he learned about the tribes and cultures the "new world order" would likely have been less effective at keeping the Bedouin down.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @01:25AM
Both the Germans and French were in favour of Minsk, and of course the Russians, and the people of Ukraine (they voted for it TWICE)... though for some mysterious reason their Minsk/peace candidates always seemed to swing to refusing negotiations, or being outright hawkish launching new offensives. Russia just decided to go over the Ukrainian leaderships head and negotiate directly with the top ie the US, with results being the same. Thinking from the US (or at power elites) perspective: reintegration of the breakaway areas would have strengthened the political will for mending ties with Russia further. Continuing the war (which made it impossible for Ukraine to join NATO) was against the US's interest also. Therefore the desired outcome was clear - war with Russia. Donbas is a mined-out poor area anyway - if Putin takes it he loses international credability, gets sanctioned, and that expensive dirty Texas shale-oil starts really making coin. And if Putin is stupid enough to try taking all of Ukraine and somehow succeeds the billionaires who've been buying up farmland worldwide get a bite of the apple too (Ukraine being a breadbasket). This scenario will sure help sell a lot of weapons too. It looks to me like whatever helps make the first part of the proclamation "you will own nothing and be happy" become true gets the green light.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @01:29PM (1 child)
Indeed. You could have just shut up at this point.
Given the huge public turnout for the Euromaidan revolution, it was the right call. And now, Russia is the country overthrowing a DEMOCRATICALLY elected government. The Ukraine had an election in 2019 which removed the guy who came in after Euromaidan. So sorry, they're doing the very same crime that they're using as a pretext for the invasion - probably smirk about that one a lot.
It's interesting all the perverse, ridiculous excuses used here. Russia is attempting to remove a democratically elected government because the Russian democratically elected government got removed before. They're invading because of Ukrainian neo-nazis and fascists even though Russia has just demonstrated once again that it's worse on that front (and Russia created those Islamofascists BTW by supporting the Assad regime for decades). They're invading because of NATO even though the very invasion is why so many of Russia's neighbors wanted to be part of NATO.
Your bullshit runs thick today! Russia never delivers more democracy. This is not their first rodeo. They won't deliver democracy to Ukraine much less the US.
Again, whose fault is it that this war is happening? Russia invaded not the Ukraine nor the US. I hope some day you realize the profound cognitive dissonance you exhibit here. You can make all the excuses you want, but Putin invaded an innocent country which was doing nothing to Russia - he crossed the line.
One thing about all the US-engineered crises that get whined about here, Russia has access to the same bag of tricks. But if they dared use those tricks, it'd backfire on Putin, destabilizing his regime and putting him out of a job. The US can get away with encouraging democratic/populist revolutions because it has them every four years. There's no additional instability possible. Russia can't because any such revolutions would spread to Russia as well.
Now, that Russia has crossed the line, it's time for more of those crises. Putin has shown he's way too dangerous to democracies everywhere with this action. As I noted above, this is not the first time he's put down a democracy.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Saturday February 26 2022, @10:31PM
Stupid comments as always... simple to throw down but for some reason I usually bite because I find it entertaining for some weird reason.
So large demonstratiosn are a legitimate excuse to overthrow a government. You must agree that eg. China shoudl have couped Trump during the black lives matter protests. Does that help you to get a grip on your schitzophrenia for at least a moment?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @01:36PM (10 children)
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @12:32AM (9 children)
That's a single aspect and certainly doesn't require an invasion, BUT because you can't keep two ideas in that schitzophrenia-addled head of yours let me remind you - NATO membership was specifically prevented by that civil war, and Ukraine (backed by the US) was trying to end it quickly for this reason. That left Putin with a couple of options - retreat, lose face (he's already unpopular due to covid and other factors), and open the door to US-backed factions in his own country OR escalate, and lose face and trade internationally for a crummy poor mined-out region. It seems he chose neither... he has raised the stakes. A VERY dangerous game, yes, especially when there are also psychopaths sitting on the other side of the table. The Ukrainian people are a pawn in this game, and noone with any power on either side cares one bit... otherwise they would have acted differently, though it must be said Putin has tried negotiating about this for years. Perhaps it's because he feels weak, or perhaps he actually cares about Ukrainians (even if it's only because powerful Russians have Ukrainian family ties).
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @01:27AM (8 children)
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @02:27AM (7 children)
For the altzeimic : NATO was an anti-USSR/Warsaw Pact alliance. It should have been dissolved, but the US wanted to keep up arms sales, boots on the ground, and wars in and around Europe under its ageis (as we have seen in Kossovo/Bosnia and Herzegovina/Serbia, Libya etc...). If Europeans sort out their own problems US **ahem** **billionaire** interests might not be taken into account. Regarding Putin, one must remember Yeltsin hand-picked Putin as a gift to Washington... everyone was getting nervous about Yeltsin drinking himself to death after all. Everyone believed Putin would be another puppet... he was just the dumb guy facing reporters and taking hits for eg. the Moscow mayors corruption. Everybody expected him to allow a continuation of the biggest raping of wealth and natural resources in human history to continue. Putin became a "demon" when he ousted the ex-commies-now-oligarchs (who appreciated the capitalist freedom of giving up all pretenses, and just openly stealing). Unfortunately Putin kept some of the existing oligarchs who saw which way the wind was blowing. Putin also installed some new ones, though he actually nationalised some stuff again. Still, there's no denying he cultivated his own flavour of corruption, but at least Russia was getting fair market price for Russian resources, and average Russians stopped starving and freezing quite as much. Of course to the US this was UnAccCeptable!!!! He started getting demonised around this time. And since there has been a new undeclared cold war, and when Putin responds to some attack or other (apparently you often call those attacks a subcategory of "whataboutisms") he seems to quite deftly respond, even though he commands lesser resources. This is great because although theft from Russia is off the table for the moment, theft from US taxpayers is open season, and whole suburbs and yacht fleets are being purchased on the taxpayers dime while waving Putins mug around. Unfortunately Putin wasn't really a big enough justification for such gargantuan theft, at least at first... so Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Somalia, Yemen etc... had to fill in... but for a while now all that anti-commie propaganda is reaping the ching ching again. Kaloo Kalay!!! Champaign showers and glasses all 'round!!! You must feel soooo... loved?! Is that what your voices are saying?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @02:58AM (6 children)
And well, that's what it's doing now.
And yet here we are with Russia doing that invasion thing that NATO was meant to counter. Looks like someone had a bit of foresight there.
Gosh, I didn't realize that every bit of bullshit could be blamed on Washington. Would that mean that Washington can change their minds and pick a new Russian leader? Because this would be a great time for that.
I guess you weren't around for the USSR then. But then given that Putin was former KGB, maybe that should have been our expectations. It certainly has played out with a pretty big raping of wealth and resources.
In other words, Putin seized the wealth of his opponents and gave it to his allies. Classic kleptocracy behavior.
Well, that's the point of propaganda. No point to making Putin look like a loser. As to the new undeclared cold war, well, I'm blaming Putin especially since he's now invaded the Ukraine.
FTFY. Russia wouldn't have gotten this shitty, if he were trying to make it better.
This reminds me of your silly accusation [soylentnews.org] that the entire western media was completely beholden to the US military industrial complex. It's a profoundly stupid narrative that has nothing to do with reality.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @03:18AM (5 children)
You're saying the US media (constricting under fewer and fewer banners) is NOT beholden to your own oligarchs ie. the ones that keep the lights on? I suppose funding individual propaganda... I mean "news segments"... has no editorial bearing at all (and its certainly a dispicable practice be it arms manufacturers, drug companies, plastic surgeons, whoever...). Hell... now direct propaganda by the government has been made legal all the three letter agencies just go on TV with little pushback or criticism, or else take the revolving door and become a host or contributor.
These upstanding individuals sure have your best interests at heart.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @05:02AM (4 children)
(Score: 2) by Pav on Monday February 28 2022, @07:12AM (3 children)
Perhaps for people in schitzophrenia-land with a weak grasp of cause and effect.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday February 28 2022, @07:27AM (2 children)
(Score: 2) by Pav on Monday February 28 2022, @08:57AM (1 child)
:) That's some Jobs level reality distortion... You should apply for a board position at Apple. They're missing some of that "magic" these days.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 05 2022, @03:33AM
(Score: 2) by Pav on Saturday February 26 2022, @04:56AM (49 children)
The actual reason for the invasion is that Ukraine is inside the mountains, and it's flat to Moscow. It's an invasion route used so often that it's how Ukraine got its name. A country belonging to an anti-Russian alliance inside the mountains with only flat militarily indefensible land right through to Moscow was geopolitically unacceptable, kind of like an independant Panima canal, or a Cuba/Dominican Republic/Puerto Rico area strong/independant enough to endanger that naval choke point (eg. Cuban missile crisis). Again, Putin should not have invaded, but in my view the US didn't want the separatist crisis permanently stopping Ukraine from joining NATO, so they wanted to engineer a crisis given that Putin would lose either way (he'd look weak if the Donbas fell, and he'd lose internationally if he invaded Ukraine).
(Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @01:34PM (48 children)
Sounds like there's a ready solution here. Get rid of Putin. He's weak, right? Then replace him with a strong Russian democracy that doesn't have to worry about neo-nazi overthrown geography.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Saturday February 26 2022, @10:38PM (47 children)
Well, considering how many invasions the US has done for exactly the same reason, and I never said Putin should have invaded either... just that Russia actually has serious legitimate reasons to be worried from a security standpoint. I guess that's hard to grasp from one pixel schitzo land.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @10:43PM (46 children)
(Score: 2) by Pav on Saturday February 26 2022, @11:27PM (14 children)
I'm going to repeat it for... I don't know how many times... for the slow, the mentally infirm, the khallows of this world. Putin I'm sure had other options, and this invasion is a crime against humanity. BUT... my partner put it to me this way while checking if I was OK a few minutes ago... (my city is being flooded right now... another story). BTW, I went to the effort of rephrasing her argument slightly specifically so you could relate to it better. I hope you appreciate the effort. Ahem! If I saw a crazy gibbering khallow cleaning his dirty fingernails with a knife I would be somewhat careful in negotiations, even if he was pissing on my lawn at the time and therefore prooving his dexterity. It would negotiate carefully even if the neighbourhood psychopath was cheering me on from over the fence, throwing me sticks and stones for self defense, and encouraging me not to give an inch in negotiations.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @12:24AM (13 children)
This is really the only thing you needed to say. As long as we're in the Whataboutism mode of "X does it too", we're implicitly approving said crimes against humanity.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @12:37AM (12 children)
OK, lets de-escalate so everyone can pull down/ vote out etc... their own corrupt leaders worldwide. Movements in that direction have been happening all over. How dangerous. I think we need another war.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @01:14AM (11 children)
Include Russia in that.
We already got that as a result Of Russia. Perhaps you ought to start following your own advice?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @01:29AM
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @01:32AM (9 children)
I most certainly include Russia in this. I am no fan of Putin (I have trouble getting past your voices it seems). Putting Russia under heavy threat and the world on a nuclear hair-trigger is just dumb though, but I'm sure all the important people have plans for that eventuality.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @02:09AM (1 child)
The thing that gets forgotten in this sort of thing is that tyrants are high maintenance security-wise. They're always under heavy threat. We can never fix the putting Russia under heavy threat thing, until we get rid of the Russian tyrants that are causing the problem.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @02:32AM
See that finger you're pointing at Putin? Give him a kill counter in that extra creative brain of yours. Then turn 180 and point it at the US and do the same. THEN click the US kill counter and drag it to the "whataboutism" trash bin. Now you can keep your conditioning without cognative dissonance.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @02:37AM (6 children)
I'll take this change in tune at face value, but the Putin road show is just warming up. You'll get plenty of shenanigans to further inform your opinions on the players involved. Take a hard look at who's lying, who's invading, who put the world on that "nuclear hair-trigger", and who made this whole mess happen.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @03:05AM (5 children)
Change in tune? I think you must have been hearing your OTHER other voice (ie. I haven't changed my tune).
Regarding nuclear hair triggers, who scrapped the nuke treaties? Hmmmm... Also, whos weapons industry is private owned, and constantly has a hawkish presence in the media, and lobbies lawmakers on foreign policy matters?? Hmmmmmmm...
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @05:26AM (4 children)
Indeed. You have hundreds of posts on this subject over the past few weeks. It's only in the last day that you say anything negative [soylentnews.org] about Putin at all ("Putin should not have invaded") though with the frequent dirge about how badly Putin gets treated by western media (indicating that war crimes just aren't that big a deal for you).
I wonder how many people Putin has to kill before you see his true colors? Well, it looks like he'll have plenty of opportunities in the next few weeks.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Monday February 28 2022, @07:04AM (3 children)
That is because he didn't do anything particularly stupid regarding this situation until a few days ago, and he has acted with restraint over the last few years considering the security of his country has been getting threatened. You've been saying plenty stupid... but luckily you don't have any power over this situation.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday February 28 2022, @07:29AM (2 children)
In other words, you didn't notice. I'd check those sources you claim to use.
No such threat has occurred. You're wasting our time with those empty accusations.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Monday February 28 2022, @09:15AM (1 child)
Putin wants to send over some spetznas guys to keep a bead on you in case you look like doing anything shifty. If you think that's any kind of threat you're just being melodramatic. This is purely for the security of the peace loving people of the world.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 05 2022, @03:32AM
So any point to that post or should we just chalk it up to bad brain chemistry?
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @12:22AM (30 children)
There are of course many many more aspects to this very (intentionally?) complex situation. For a primer outside of US-centric media maybe try The Grayzone [youtube.com] or Jimmy Dore [youtube.com]. Al Jazeera [youtube.com] have many reporters who lean many different ways on this, so they're valuable to watch. To get a Russian centric version try RT [youtube.com], or Ben Norton on Multipolarista [youtube.com]... It's very useful to get the whole scope, because it makes propaganda more obvious from all sides.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @12:26AM (29 children)
My impression is that the situation gets more complex as the desire to ignore the immorality of the situation increases. It's very complex indeed for states like China.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Sunday February 27 2022, @12:39AM (28 children)
I know it's hard to hear anything other than the voices, and you don't even want to try... but... just take your meds.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday February 27 2022, @05:15PM (27 children)
As I noted, it's only the people dodging the morality of the situation who talk about how complicated it is.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Monday February 28 2022, @07:06AM (26 children)
Because you lack morality or intelligence you probably won't understand this reasoning, but someone with more patience put it thusly on a video I recently watched:
"This could have all been avoided entirely if a young post Soviet Russia had been allowed into the EU & into NATO as they once requested but were denied a place at the negotiating table. From which Russia & Russian leaders quickly realised that they were the targets of NATO rather than potential allies. It was inevitable that Russian policy would become progressively more inward & nostalgic & it would only take the actions of a powerful & nostalgic leader to push for former nationalist glory if given the chance.. The ousting of a popular & democratically elected pro Russian leader in Ukraine by a US backed coup 10 years ago set the wheels in motion for the paranoia around Ukraine becoming a part of NATO. As did also the US ripping up a written agreement with Iran, showing that the word of the US could not be trusted.. Putin has made a choice to invade the Ukraine, but the situations that fed his paranoia could all have been avoided by a less arrogant & aggressive US foreign policy. And now after decades of meddling, invasion, & sanctions of countries globally by the US, & of ripping up agreements or abandoning allies where convenient, Russia now has plenty of allies to form an economic block if indeed a new Cold War is the result. Again this didn't have to be the case either..
The biggest question is if this escalates, will countries such as India side with Russia, a long time ally, knowing how US treats its loose allies, given India's tensions with China which will obviously side with Russia. Or will we see a multipolar situation of increasing tension of competing interests & allegiances, potentially leading to an actual world war? And of course like all world wars or potential world wars, this is happening immediately after or on the cusp of a global financial crisis. History repeating itself.. One way to stop it is to admit Russia into the EU & NATO, immediately ending any notion of Russia being a target. But unfortunately the world is controlled by warhawks & oligarchs obsessed with old notions of "greatness", and few functioning brain cells in the part of the brain that governs common sense & logic, dominated instead by reptilian brain reactions of attack & revenge.."
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday February 28 2022, @07:51AM (25 children)
With good reasons for the refusal - such as Russia remaining to this day the reason why NATO exists. It's not a negotiating table either. Russia always has had plenty of access to that. It's spectacular how brazenly they ignored the negotiating table in recent months.
Duh. They don't make them Russians completely stupid.
Utterly retarded bullshit. It's no more inevitable than that you'll get a red car. This was a conscious choice which has failed for Russia.
Oh look, one of your sources now says that Yanukovych was a Russian stooge. And that US backed coup was also massively backed by the Ukrainian public. I see the emphasis on "US backed" as a signal that the author is just parroting Russian propaganda at this point. The US just backed the right side. Russia backed the wrong side. It's that simple. When your "popular & democratically elected" leader bans protests, then he needs to go.
A written agreement that the subsequent president was not required to respect (I'll note also that there appears to be Iranian violations of that treaty with continued work on nuclear weapons development). Meanwhile, I notice that the author neglected to mention Russia's brazen violation of the Russian-Ukrainian Friendship Treaty in 2014 (it's not presently in force being canceled in 2019).
Sure they do. But why would their allies form that economic bloc? Aside from some resources, Russia doesn't have much to offer. And some of those allies are pretty dangerous, like China. Russia might not last long in an economic union with China.
US treats its loose allies pretty well actually. I guess this author just didn't notice.
I know how to fix this! Let Russia invade the Ukraine unopposed and establish a precedent for opportunistic warfare. What could possibly go wrong?
Fuck that. Russia's actions make Russia the big target in Europe. This threat is always why NATO existed.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Monday February 28 2022, @09:18AM (24 children)
I think we've established what variety of schitzophrenic you are.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday February 28 2022, @04:34PM (23 children)
Once again, as I've noted before, the real problem here is Putin. Tyrants have excessive security requirements. You fix that by getting rid of the tyrant, not by invading innocent countries. No amount of whining about the irrelevant flaws of other countries matters.
If Russia had a real democracy with a leader with normal security requirements, NATO would just devolve into a MIC club. But as long as it has a real purpose, a obviously hostile Russia, no progress will be made against disbanding or defunding NATO.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Wednesday March 02 2022, @07:28PM (18 children)
Schizophrenic is an accurate description for people who start losing the ability to organise ideas, lose the ability to determine what is and is not real, and in some flavours of the disease develop paranoia. Russia tried to join NATO and the EU after the fall of the Soviet Union, and they were refused a place at the table making it plain that Russia was an enemy rather than a potential ally. That's just an undeniable historical fact. The paranoia that came out of that on the Russian side was dangerous but also JUSTIFIED BY FACT (unlike yours). You on the other hand don't seem to realise treating someone as an enemy, even if unjustified, eventually makes them your enemy regardless sooner or later, reenforcing your belief that your schizophrenic gibberings were completely justified.
I realise pointing this out is a compete waste of time on my part, but for some reason I find it enjoyable and therapeutic.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday March 04 2022, @12:28AM (17 children)
This is an illustrative post. You start with your description of schizophrenia, and then SQUIRREL! You're back to defending Putin without further mention of what was supposed to be special about that schizophrenic thing.
Here's my take on that. This is like the third megathread where you've introduced random red herring into the discussion (see here [soylentnews.org] and here [soylentnews.org] for the other examples). I think this illustrates well the "losing the ability to organise ideas" (like going from taxing carbs to Plato, or from UBI support among US voters to Germany getting backstabbed by someone somehow). "lose the ability to determine what is and is not real" like the claim that we should ignore the entirety of western media because it's beholden [soylentnews.org] to the MIC and hence, fake news? Moving on, I suppose your insistence that NATO's year 2000 rejection of Russia counts as paranoia.
In other words, if we're going to psychoanalyze people based on their posting history, you got some pretty weird symptoms.
Well, now we see with Russia's invasion of an innocent country, that NATO's rejection of Russia back when was just a good call. Given how quickly afterward that Putin settled into his squalid schemes (including the occasional bizarre assassination or war), it sure looks to me like the demand to join NATO was made in bad faith - to undermine NATO.
And you're going to claim that a two decade old rejection by the NATO club somehow justifies this brutal invasion now? Pull my other finger.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Saturday March 05 2022, @01:16AM (16 children)
I was being kind by calling you a schizophrenic (not a choice), but you insist on being called stupid and inconsistent (a choice, at least in many cases). Have it your way.
You think I've been defending Putin. I have said many times that it's a criminal invasion... but if you're stupid then you seem like a beta nuthugger who need to pick a side, and is untroubled by principles. This would mean that a consistency of values wouldn't trouble your evaluations, and therefore you wouldn't be able to comprehend my defending Putins limited involvement in Donbas, to condemnation of his invasion... and an actual nuanced understanding (backed by experts in international relations) that NATO deserves condemnation for this PREDICTABLE result (and it was predicted by many people), and should have never moved east, let alone to Ukraine.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 05 2022, @02:32AM (14 children)
Because you have been defending Putin, that's why I think so.
And then come up with excuses for why that criminal invasion is justified. Like not being invited to the Big Boy's NATO club, twenty years before.
I comprehend it just fine, your defense is just morally indefensible.
A synonym for "nuanced understanding" here is "naked justification". If it really was a "PREDICTABLE result" that Russia would invade other countries, then they don't belong in NATO. Period.
NATO hadn't moved to Ukraine. I bet it'll be a lot easier to justify that move now!
(Score: 2) by Pav on Saturday March 05 2022, @08:11AM (13 children)
Listen moron (which seems to be what you want to be called now) : you can't make yourself more safe my making other people less safe. Especially in the nuclear age. I can't put it more simply. If you can't understand why that's a thing then I can't help you.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 05 2022, @04:43PM (12 children)
Nonsense. Putin's security concerns are a glaring counterexample. Make Putin and his like so unsafe that they're no longer in power in Russia, and that will make a lot of people safer in the long run - inside Russia as well as outside.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 05 2022, @05:06PM (11 children)
(Score: 2) by Pav on Tuesday March 08 2022, @07:22AM (10 children)
You DO realise it's the Ukraine (or rather the Ukrainian ultra right) that are refusing peace. One of the Ukrainian peace negotiators was assassinated by the ultra-right because he took his job too seriously. The ultra right accused him of treason while the majority of the Ukrainian government called him a hero. The ultra right want armageddon, and they're not just in Ukranian (which people are only just starting to realise) so you'd better hope they haven't slipped the US chain too far.
In choosing zero sum escalation over deescalation one suspects the powers that be don't actually desire safety for anyone anyway, but rather the contents of as many bank accounts as possible. One imagines you'll be wishing for more/better food, fuel and heating soon, let alone decent healthcare.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday March 08 2022, @07:15PM (9 children)
Yet another of your ridiculous red herrings, not only irrelevant to the topic, but conflating both the whole of the Ukraine with the "ultra right" and the "ultra right" with those actually involved in the assassination. On top of that, we're missing the Russians who are notorious for assassinations. It wouldn't be hard for them to kill this guy or bribe the guy who is taking credit for it.
I bet Europe and the US will have much less trouble with that than Russia will.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Wednesday March 09 2022, @11:31AM (8 children)
I'm not the one living in a country that already has had ultra-right nutcases attached to Ukraine wanting to bomb media, assassinate Beto O'Rourke etc... NPR just interviewed a Ukranian city mayor with a mass murdering WWII nazi framed on his wall... right in front of your face... and you still deny it like a cultist. He was probably greased into office on a snail trail of your tax dollars too. I guess this is some kind of recycling of Operation GLADIO?
The US will have much less trouble than Russia? We'll see, though your betters seem to think you're going to get the shit kicked out of you... gold is at an all time high.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday March 09 2022, @03:49PM (7 children)
I find it interesting how hypocritical you are here. What again is your excuse for the war in Ukraine? You're just another nazi with a different fuhrer, willing to excuse the deaths of thousands (or more) of people only because you hung a label on them.
So what? Your point would be just as bullshit, if you had a portrait of a mass murdering WWII nazi on your wall.
What part of the word, "irrelevant" do you just not get? I already made clear a zillion posts ago that the "But they're nazis!" excuse doesn't go anywhere with me. Yet here you are pushing that button like it still works. That tells me you have nothing else.
Your mental illness is not my problem.
Don't be a dumbass. On each of those things you mentioned ("more/better food, fuel and heating soon"), the US is self-sufficient. The Ruble still has lost a third of its pre-war value (and probably is up to its present level only because of central bank shenanigans).
And there's that war. Even if the Ukrainian government were to buckle and surrender tomorrow, Russia will lose in the long run. Either they take over and suffer from a long term asymmetric warfare or they leave a government in place and eventually lose out to NATO or the EU (which won't honor forced treaties).
(Score: 2) by Pav on Thursday March 10 2022, @06:09AM (6 children)
...or a black flag behind him? Apparently you're a newborn who doesn't know history... the short term outsized ultility of violent dangerous ideologues in coups and proxy wars, and how long term they usually slip the chain and/or bite the hand... **shrug** And unlike certain other ideologies this one has deep roots in your society (and mine... I've known a few). But you do you.
Self sufficient? You say that like it's a thing. Sure, it gets you some transportation advantages but that's it. In your neoliberal utopia he world will compete for your oil, gas and grain... and your betters will sell it to the highest bidder, not a penny less. At least half of your countrymen are already scraping by. There's going to be mass profiteering. This might even have something to do with the push to get people to stop hanging out at home and get back to work (and onto the roads). Hell, they even caffenated and wheeled out Biden to spread the message.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday March 10 2022, @03:24PM (5 children)
Didn't happen in the short history of the Ukraine since 2014. For example, they had an election in 2019.
Indeed, self-sufficient is a thing here. Even in the world of low cost global trade, it still costs money to ship this stuff out of the US and hence, there's incentive to sell locally. In your hypothetical future of high oil prices, trade is similarly affected, meaning that premium to sell locally has gone up.
As to the rest of your post, vague conspiracies about getting people back into the workforce are worthless. When one abandons concrete evidence just about anything could be possible.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Friday March 11 2022, @02:21AM (4 children)
Welllll... unless you count the the american guy who felt part of a nazi international (and he may very well be) who wanted to spread knowledge of IEDs. Or the european nazis who've also been going to Ukraine for years for training. What for?
And it's funny that you mention the election... BOTH Poroshenko and Zelensky campaigned on a normalisation of relations with Russia ticket. Poroshenko (in a Trumpian billionaire get-things-done way) said he'd get on the phone to Putin and sort things out in an hour. The Ukrainians have been sold out long before this.
You're getting set to lose hard too, and not in the beta-who-joined-the-wrong-team kinda way... more in a not-important-to-your-betters kinda way ie. no matter what happens on the other side of the world. This is just another opportunity for you to become one of those who lose all their stuff... and actually believe you deserved it. Monopoly end-game.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday March 11 2022, @05:57AM (3 children)
Why would I count a small number of crazies? As to spreading knowledge of IEDs, I suggest the world's militaries as a far more efficient and prevalent source of such knowledge than some american guy.
So no evidence that anything untoward happened? Seems par for your posts. I'll note to the contrary that this demonstrates that democratic voting actually worked since Poroshenko didn't get elected indefinitely unlike some Russian leader I could name.
Cool story, bro. But what does that have to do with real life?
(Score: 2) by Pav on Friday March 11 2022, @06:13AM (2 children)
Time will tell the tale...
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday March 11 2022, @06:15AM (1 child)
(Score: 2) by Pav on Friday March 11 2022, @06:47AM
Hopefully the following weeks, months and years will be more interesting than devastating for the world.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 05 2022, @03:37AM
No, you were just hurling schoolyard insults. And you have yet to do that exercise of matching my words to schizophrenia symptoms. Protip: it's not going to work.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Wednesday March 02 2022, @08:55PM (3 children)
...and because I know your scatterheaded state I'll reiterate - Putins invasion beyond Donbas is criminal... but it's in a context of consistently treating Russia like an enemy, and moving a military alliance that refused to admit Russia to its border.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday March 04 2022, @12:31AM (2 children)
In other words, it was a good call to keep Russia out of the NATO alliance. Seriously, it's bizarre that you're pushing this. Russia's nuttiness and violence is exactly why the NATO alliance exists.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Saturday March 05 2022, @01:02AM (1 child)
Bizarre to keep Ukraine out of NATO? You've just proved you're an idiot... but I guess you're nuthugging the architects of US decline. Two Australian Prime Ministers have long been against NATO expansion... y'know, the guys who were the architects of the actual rise of a nation. Another prime minister has come out more recently to say the same thing. If you want to look at people from the US... George Tennet(sp?) the architect of the USSR cold war containment strategy said moving NATO east was a huge mistake. John Matlock, Mearsheimer, currently... even Kissenger if you bend that way. But you think it's bizarre... oh lord and master of the discipline of international relations in your own head. 1) Ukraine is going to be leveled (if Western Ukrainians don't give up, and they won't), and 2) There is a very small chance Russia may use nukes if its backed into a corner. A very small chance multiplied by a catastrophic, possibly world ending consequence.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday March 05 2022, @02:34AM
So your entire post is based on a incorrect reading of my post. Try again.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @01:47PM
Hmmmmm, that low sounds an awful lot like the laws he supports about forcing immigrants to learn English and use it in official communications down in the southern border states. I wonder why it is government persecution in Ukraine, but not in Texas?
(Score: 2, Offtopic) by legont on Friday February 25 2022, @12:27AM (2 children)
There are videos of Ukrainian minister of education shaming 5 years old children for having Russian names.
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 25 2022, @12:40AM (1 child)
Well why didn't you say so? That's different, Now I'm suddenly worried about the Mexican army that will roll across the southern border because of the way Mexicans are treated in Texas. Trump was right about that wall! His genius wasn't that he was trying to keep immigrants out, it was the Trump(R) Maginot Line to keep the Mexican tanks out. I guess that man really was playing 4D chess after all . . .
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday February 25 2022, @05:31PM
No worries. The Federales are busy selling off their weaopns to the cartels. 30% (or more?) of the weapons that Mexico imports end up in cartel hands.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by istartedi on Thursday February 24 2022, @03:53PM
So, basically a lot like that hotbed of fascism, France. [wikipedia.org].
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday February 24 2022, @10:18AM (1 child)
Of course, they are or some equivalent offense. Russia will find whatever pretexts it needs to do what it wants. You should have learned this from the lessons of appeasement of Nazi Germany. The only genuine obstacle is consequences.
I find it telling that you even think persecution of ethnic Russians is a thing, much less a reason to invade the Ukraine.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @02:11PM
The Poles remember Katyn Forest.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @01:51PM
Vlad1956 and Putin are both liars.
(Score: -1, Spam) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:19PM
"nazi" is an anti-White Jew slur, you ignorant Goy slave.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday February 25 2022, @10:09AM
The Russians have claimed that, and it's not entirely baseless. We have hundreds of thousands of Russians who are stateless with our borders, and they don't have the same rights that citizens have.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 3, Interesting) by mcgrew on Thursday February 24 2022, @03:49PM
Yes, as soon as this mess started I looked up Ukrainian history. A couple hundred years ago it was a sovereign country; its own language, culture, the works. Then both Russia and Poland invaded, Russia taking Eastern Ukraine and Poland taking western Ukraine. In 1910 Ukraine was granted independence, and in the 1990s a vote was held, with well over 90% of Ukrainians voting to NOT be part of Russia.
Fuck Poland. Some unintended consequences take century to come about.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 24 2022, @09:16PM (1 child)
what kind of pos modded this "troll"?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 26 2022, @01:39PM