My family is Russian, my wife’s Ukrainian. I am disgusted by my Russian relatives. They have a lot in common with my cousins from South Africa - deeply racist, nasty fuckers who have not a shred of empathy or compassion for any but their own, and believe they should rule over the inferiors. The last visit I made “back” to Russia was enough for me. Listening to those assholes justify Russian interference in Uraine, the theft of Crimea, the black invasion of Donbas and the corruption of Yanukovytch — all leading up to the claim that Ukrainians have been “mesmerized” by the “Jew Nazi cocaine addict” Zelenskyy. Ugh.
These revisionist histories are nauseating. NO, Matt. The US did not cause the war. And Putin was not offering peace. He was offering surrender so his invasion would be met with NO resistance. No NATO. No arms. Demilitarized and neutral. Yup. A country that could be taken in a week. THAT was his plan — are you actually that stupid or do you just pretend you greasy fuck?
I guess your in laws must be reasonably affluent - a dacha with running water and indoor plumbing.
Please spare us Part II. Apologias for genocidal mass murdering tyrants don’t interest intelligent people.,
Though, in situations not on line, I can be as foul mouthed as you, but keeping up your diatribe does nothing to advance your arguments. I don't think I would have wanted you as my banker. Honey will get you further in my book. At 88, I still go out and work my construction hands to make a few bucks to desperately try to keep up with inflation, not having a seven figure retirement income. Maybe you got it from us working yokels.
I got it from building skylines. Oh I worked construction as a youngster, but when you can figure complex equations in your head and design new securities in your sleep, that’s a waste of effort. So I figured out how to securitize everything to bring capital to markets that normally were hostage to the banks. I retired at 42. I’m 70 now. I never took a penny from anyone.Like BASF used to say, I just made things better. I get foul mouthed when people try to justify what Russia is doing - just as they have always done. It’s a miserable country filled with miserable people - and stupid. They all believe if only the Tsar knew the injustice they suffer he would fix it!! LMFAO. HE IS THE INJUSTICE.
The Tsar is the little father, his boyars are the ones screwing the peasants over, if only he knew!! This is the biggest trope in Russian history-the Cossacks said screw that noise, we’re doing it for ourselves-that’s what being Ukrainian is about.
In fairness, those four and five-year-old kindergarten kids could grow up to resent Russians and create problems due to the lack of re-education and military training the 20,000 children abducted to Russia are getting. The ICC thinks it's wrong but Russia needs fresh blood if it is to survive its current demographic and economic downward spiral.
Matt didn’t write this. I also wasn’t enamored with the writer, but he has the right to voice his views. It’s okay to state your feelings about what was written, just adjust your aim.
Matt did write this article, just not Matt Taibbi. Well written and very interesting to a uniformed reader such as myself. I would be fascinated to see Russia some day.
Outside of affluent Moscow and St Pete, Russia is mostly a dirt-poor shithole filled with racist, ignorant “rednecks”. Imagine a whole country of 1930s Appalachian inbred, violent morons. AND I AM RUSSIAN. I have been there many times, but swore off it after 2017. It’s God’s shitstain on the Earth, that brings nothng but subjugation, paranoia, misery and death to the planet.
One of my cousins there studied in the US - has a medical degree from Tulane. His parents live in a ramshackle house with no indoor plumbing. He tried to emigrate to get out of that pismire, but was arrested. No one has heard from him since, and if they ask, they get a good beating.
Please, go!!! It’s a WONDERFUL LAND OF MILK AND HONEY!!!!
Heidi -You are right. I am aware things change, but we were in those "shit hole" towns in Russia. The population seemed to be thriving, the markets well-stocked with local produce and meats, the buildings in good repair. I actually live in a shit hole town in New Mexico. Google Espanola, New Mexico. If I weren't nearly 84, a widow, and didn't have a bunch of stuff, I would be looking at moving. Not to Russia, of course, but out of a true US shit hole town.
Thriving?? Inflation has been running at almost 20% across the board in Russia. It has become a net food importer and now has to import refined petroleum products thanks to Ukrainian sanctions. 35% of ALL Russian houses have no indoor bathrooms and still use outhouses. Markets may seem full - no one can afford beef or chicken any more. Local produce is plentiful in summer but dont try winter or spring. Smaller towns are getting utterly detonated - some 4 million people are likely to have their townships dissolved in the next 6 months as their economies have been crushed by the war effort.
Whole regions have seen their municipal services - never great - stopped entirely. No road repairs, no trash collections, road signage gos unrepaired or replaced. Gas lines are getting unmanageable and people can’t get to market or work. Ultilities are leaving cables unrepaired and copper wires get cut down and sold for scrap.
Russia has reversed its climb up and is now fully regressing down the development ladder,
The worst US town is a freakin ShangriLa compared to Russian small towns.
My husband and I went in 2011. The trip was incredible and fascinating. One of the best trips we ever took. Putin was just about to replace Medvedev. We were not ushered around but we had come on a tour. Advisable because our ability to translate Cyrillic was too slow for subway stops lol. Though we did ride the subway on our own.
We had some guides on the ship plying the Volga river from St. Petersburg to Moscow. Moscow was booming (not with drones or bombs). It actually reminded me of Paris. That is, Paris before the more recent woke attitudes rendered it as unseemly as San Francisco or Portland. We had lunch with some Russians in their Stalin-built apartment. They did not speak English. That was difficult. But they had a dacha even though they were probably middle class. There were dachas of all different classes along the Volga. Some almost shacks, others like US cabins in the woods, still others like royal hunting lodges.
When one of the US tourists asked the guide if Putin would be elected, she said casually that "he will if he wants to be". That at least is honesty, unlike what has been dished out to us here in the land of free speech.
The Devil is in the details…. Like the darkness of Dostoevsky to Solzhenitsyn I believe one can still paint Russia in the dark tones of Mother Earth as in Van Gogh’s early works like ‘ The Potato Eaters’. May the light shine on it brightly in our lifetimes and end this death quest.
Absolutely! I was not suggesting such...Dostoevsky bridges romanticism to reality....I am referring to real darkness.....as in blindness and ignorance.
The author’s name is also Matt. He’s a typical Russian apologist.
Oh, look how nice Russian life is… while the men are off trying to exterminate Ukrainian men, women and children in their homes and gardens, bombing their kindergartens and hospitals. But— OH! -_ the West said that Putin didnt have the right to tell another country how to surrender to them!!! So it’s THEIR fault!!
Matt B.M.D. writes: "I don’t know whether to laugh or cry... [Trump]'s got no idea what we’re doing there. Do any of us?"
Yes, I know exactly what "we're" doing there. Billions are being made, stolen, and skimmed in the hope of making, stealing, and skimming trillions more, first from Ukraine, and then from a "decolonized" former Soviet Union, while massive disinformation campaigns re: Nordstream, Storm Shadows, and French, British, and US ops against Russia are taking place.
All this is happening out in the open much as Fred Anderson outlined in his seminal text Crucible of War. The US colonies wanted Indian land. The Brits wouldn't sanction the violation of existing treaties, so Washington et al went ahead and set out to grab the land anyway. The British Empire, the Japanese Empire, the German Empire etc. did exactly the same across the globe.
Ukraine has 13 trillion in natural resource assets, the former Soviet Union has 75 trillion more, all of which actually belong to US corporate speculators. The US means to get them, Trump or no Trump, no matter how many Ukrainians and Russians have to die to achieve that "goal."
For the future of Ukrainians in this US victory - look to native Americans. Their blood and that of victims of corporate exploitation by the US and others is written on every page of our history right up to the present.
Thank you for writing the comment I've written so many times in so many places I've taken to referring people to the 2019 Rand Corporation report instead. It describes the U.S uniparty's corporate-sponsored plan to take control of Russian wealth, something it tried and failed, thanks "the monster Putin," to do back in the 1990s. By 2019 the Rand plan was well underway (it started with the U.S. planned and financed 2014 coup in Ukraine) to "weaken Russia" by provoking it to either invade or allow U.S. (NATO) nukes on its borders (remember when Krushchev tried that in our hemisphere?) and then turning the Russian people against Putin.
Yes, regime change 101. The American way. We've done it so many times in so many ways, or tried to, I've lost count. Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan. Libya, Syrian, and now Venezuela— I hope Columbia is watching its back. And as we expand NATO for the purpose of taking Russian resources under our control (in the name of "freedom"), our own country literally goes to hell. Here in the U.S., the top 10 percent do half of all the spending—everyone else is broke and/or in debt—on products mostly made in China, yet another BRICS member nation (alongside Russia, India and many other nations that want no part of the unipolar West). Multipolarity is the future—not that most Americans can even define the term. Anyone who doesn't see how the rest of the world is exiting from globalist unipolarity to protect themselves from relentless sanctions and coups is . . . yeah, reading only corporate-sponsored Western propaganda.
Such a long essay and so blind to what's really happening in Ukraine. It's not about land or minerals, it's about the punishment, subjugation, and erasure of a people who refuse to be reabsorbed into a cruel dream of empire regained.
Five short paragraphs, four of five two sentences each is a "long essay" for you, which I suppose says something? about your actual interest in the topic and/or your attention span.
Unfortunately your front of the cereal box, "analysis" offers little of substance. For a more polished version of your own argument, but sadly equally devoid of actual evidence, you might crib from the Jamestown Foundation's better developed claims of post-Soviet Union "imperialism" https://jamestown.org/program/osce-declares-decolonization-of-russia-as-necessary-for-peace/
They even have maps. Arguing against the well-documented history of charter company imperialism from the first English plantations in Ireland, through French charter company imperialism on the west-African coast, etc. etc. etc. to the present is your choice.
What's wrong with Russia and Ukraine, btw, will take a bit longer than my original long essay, but I'm good with that if you want to go there some other time.
Seems to me there are several operative interests. Putin wants empire/control, America wants minerals/ influence, Ukrainians want self- determination. I find the whole situation a puzzle. I don't know why our participation is in the national interest, but I also know Ukraine gave up their Russian-made nukes on the US promise of defense. Bad decision all around imo.
Crucible of War was a very revealing book, glad to see it referred to.
The rest of what you say is pretty accurate- I get tired of people saying we’re obligated to bring freedom and democracy to the world, when so often it’s nothing like it.
We have a few commenters here who seem anxious to send people off to die for this “cause”, although I bet none of those same commenters are ready to volunteer for it.
One of my American colonial history profs declared that if we understand Anderson, we understand the American Revolution. Ken Burn decades after Anderson is now reviving the same analysis in his new series "The American Revolution" because Burns observes so few today recognize the foundational roles greed, avarice, and disregard for the law and the rights of others play in stealing other people's stuff. Hear Burns repeat Anderson's analysis himself with Theo - all dressed up in American exceptionalist bunting. New White House Ballroom - Winning! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VpBgRubnV8
You live in a bizarre fantasy world, my friend. The US has never taken squat. Like Trump said about Iraq “we should have taken the oil.” We didnt even take it in northern Syria - used it to finance the Kurds,
The one living in a bizarre fantasy world, one of anti-Russian bigotry, is you. The USA and NATO provoked this war because of their recklessly foolish insistence on pushing NATO east into Ukraine, in flagrant violation of the promises they repeatedly made to Russian leaders at the end of the Cold War. You should read and listen to Jeffrey Sachs and John Mearsheimer who know far more than you do about the whole situation.
Coz Donald Trump and Colin Powell say so? The exploitation and theft does not depend on wars, btw, but rather on the ability to subvert or coerce corrupt local authorities into signing away the target nation's crown jewels. China is doing that throughout Africa, Asia, and is targeting Central and South America.
The principle is: "if we don't steal it some other big animal will. So..."
You are old enough to remember when Russia tried to put a Military base in Cuba. Kennedy had his finger on the red button. They even had us doing drills in school..They had made a deal not to expand NATO & they reneged. Why did NATO need to be there?
I disagree actually. You might not like his profane style but there is plenty of name calling and profanity here all around.
Some of the disagreement is probably generational, and some cultural.
I was interested to hear what the young author (Matt) had to say, but am not at all clear why, since he agrees that it was Russia who started this unprovoked and murderously unjust war, he thinks it is up to Lockheed Martin and Raytheon to stop it. Their business is war but they are not responsible for stupid political policies and decisions.
I am also interested in NYKIndependent's views. His descriptions of the Russians sound quite realistic to me, as though he knows them a lot better than anyone else commenting here. The upper class and nobility either fled or didn't survive that revolution, and what was left was a country of illiterate peasants and vicious ideologues.
So barbarism is the natural state of Man, America would do the same, and we need to close our eyes and hope the ugly parts don't last too long. None of us has a responsibility to try to stand in the way of brutality with silly laws and "norms." Just relax, it's natural.
For what it's worth, a local husband/wife couple, one Ukrainian/one Russian, that runs a food import business are taking it in stride, no side picked. The husband's view seems to be that this is another round of human history.
For what it's worth, Russians have been cowed into saying they "aren't political" under Putin's long reign. Now that Putin has broken the social contract, exchanging stability for being apolitical, Russians wake up to gas lines and global enmity. Just another round of failed military conquest.
This is true-what Putin is doing is no different from the past 350 years of Russian history in the Ukraine region, he just has tanks and ballistic missiles. Ukraine refusing to accept Belarusian puppet status with the Maidan in 2014 was the current tipping point.
Lol. Calm down. You don't get to decide who and what gets published here and your opinion isn't any more important than anyone else's. I don't care about your relatives or where they came from and I certainly don't care about your feelings towards them. Go write that shit in your diary if you need to get it off your chest. This isn't your personal blog. The invasion and war is a lot more complicated than evil Putin attacks virtuous Ukraine for no good reason. Understanding the causes of something isn't the same thing as supporting them. Getting angry and shouting people down for asking questions or having the wrong opinion is not what "intelligent" people do. Even though you self insert yourself into that category and pretend to speak for them. I'm very curious to hear from regular Russian people and I resent being denied that and fed obvious propaganda from our government and their media lackeys. Billions of our tax dollars are being sent to Ukraine and this war could easily spread into something much larger so I don't think we should be restricting information or suppressing opinions based on anyone's feelings or personal prejudices.
Incredibly enough, humankind has certain universal values of “right” and “wrong.” Invading a far smaller country for having the temerity to exist, for the sole goal of absorbing its territory, stealing its children and erasing its history is pretty universally “wrong.” It literally mirrors the goals of the Third Reich.
I didn’t force anyone to respond to me, I addressed myself to the author. I found his “personal” view repulsive - the “far off ‘war’ is some sort of hideous rationalization of a genocidal attempt to accomplish those terrorist, imperialst imperatives.
Oh, sure, Dr. Matt “humanizes” the Russians! They aren’t awful people!! They’re just like you and me!!! Except do you think Americans would sit back and take it if FOUR MILLION of our men perished and were multilated in a war of choice and conquest? HELL NO. We wouldn’t sit still for 40 THOUSAND. And we got our leaders to STOP with massive protest and uprising. Russians sit back and chew their “shaslik” and trundle off to feel all warm about a nationalistic bit of theater that tells them of the wondrous justice and decency of the Russian people. Their deep moral virtue!!!
You all pretend to be culturally-aware moral historians. You are vapid useless idiots of the latest bloodthirsty regime under the gold onion domes.
Kenny, I don’t claim to decide anything. Let me know who is holding a gun to your lil head to make you read this, and I will tell them to stop.
The Ukrainian War did not have to happen. The disgraced Joe Biden made the "minor incursion" comment during a press conference on January 19, 2022, telegraphing consent for the invasion that occurred one month later.
The facts of the debate are complex. Many argue that Russia has reasons for its past aggression. The US and NATO repeatedly violated the terms of the agreement on the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The Eastern Bloc would be freed, and NATO/US would not extend its borders towards Russia. Secondly, over 85% of the population of the two eastern oblasts (Donetsk and Luhansk) speaks Russian and is aligned with Russia. Since 2014, the Donbas region has operated as a breakaway region. Tens of thousands have died fighting for independence. Ukraine and Crimea were previously republics in the Soviet Union. In 1954, Nikita Khrushchev transferred Crimea from the Russian SFSR to the Ukrainian SSR; however, the people identify with Russia, and Russian was the most widely spoken language up to 2014, when Russia seized the territory.
The point is that I do not see this as a one-sided argument. However, Ukraine also has arguments. Invading a neighboring country violates contemporary norms and existing treaties with Russia. Secondly, Russia's attacks have targeted civilian infrastructure.
A US COUP??? LMFAO!!!! Because a US diplomat said “Yats is our guy” now we have the US somehow getting millions of Ukrainians out in the streets for WEEKS demanding the corrupt Yanukovych - who reversed every promise, every platform that got him elected (pro-West) for payoffs from Putin just weeks before the ratification of the EU Association Agreement.
The revolt against Russia’s dead, corrupt hand was organic, troll. This line is like saying France overthrew the Brits in America. Actually - France did far more to help the colonies than we ever did to help Ukraine’s rejection of their traitorous puppet..
There was absolutely no such agreement about NATO’s growth anywhere ever in any treaty or written and negotiated document.. That is attributed to a STATEMENT not an agreement by James Baker, and it is often misconstrued. He was not speaking of the whole of NATO only about military infrastructure in West Germany. And later in the same meeting he clarified that he was making NO SUCH PROMISE.
As the Cold War ended, the U.S., U.K., France, and West Germany negotiated with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev over reunifying Germany inside NATO.
The USSR’s main concern was that a unified Germany in NATO would move the alliance closer to Soviet borders.
⸻
Key statement often cited as a “promise”
James Baker – U.S. Secretary of State (February 9, 1990) In a meeting with Gorbachev, Baker said:
“NATO’s jurisdiction would not move one inch eastward from its present position.”
This referred to NATO troops and infrastructure in East Germany—not to Central and Eastern Europe generally.
Later that same day, Baker qualified this, saying NATO’s expansion policy outside Germany would depend on broader security arrangements agreed upon with Moscow. No such agreement was ever reached
Yes, no need for the profanity. Also no need for the back and forth in the comments about poverty, crime, and drugs ... The issue is the war. The author said:
"For anyone still indignant, and angrily aware that far more than 1 million young men on all sides have been killed or maimed in a war Russia alone chose to launch ... the war could end tomorrow if Lockheed Martin and RTX (Raytheon) America stopped fueling it."
Umm, yes, the US has sent arms, but the driving force in the support of Ukraine has been a fearful--a very reasonably fearful--Europe. And Dr. Matt, GET A GRIP; countries have joined NATO because they also were fearful of Russia. Putin attacked when he did because Europe was weak, not because it was strong and threatening.
An aside to the woman in Española; Santa Fe is a few miles to your south. Taos is a few miles to your north. You are responsible for your own choices in life.
Well said, John. This myth that the war is a product of the MIC is nauseating. What, is Ukraine supposed to fight back with sticks and sharpened stones?? Note to Russian trolls: RUSSIA has a MIC as well, owned outright by Putin’s oligarchs. Fully 50% or more of the entire budget of Russia is going to fund the war. Honestly, (profanity is sometimes necessary, John) shove this moronic narrative up your asses. EVERY DAY Russia is sending missiles and drones into apartment buildings and private homes JUST TO TERRORIZE the people. If it takes a $500,000 interceptor to save 50 or 100 lives, well, I hope we can take it out of Russia’s frozen funds.
Europe knows what Russia is about. We can read Putin’s speeches. No he isn’t lamenting the good old days, he wants to MRSA - Make Russia Soviet Again. What an apt acronym. Russia is just like a nasty and persistent bacteria infection.
The flip side of nationalist chauvinism often sounds like this. Basically the same stuff, only self directed. Auto-chauvinism. (Although it’s still really Other-directed, because it’s meant to distinguish oneself from the rest of one’s “own” people.) We are the worst people, a bunch of genocidal ignorant racist a**holes, throw in lots of f-bombs to signal righteous fury. As tiresome as the usual kind of chauvinism.
Truth. Ukraine was offered an implicit “deal”-become a complete puppet state like Belarus with Putin’s tool Lukashenko or get invaded. It’s funny how Putin lovers in the West profess to have zero knowledge of the situation in Belarus or said regime’s complete vassal state relationship to Russia, and completely hem and haw if asked if that is their preferred outcome.
That’s intense. We can tell you’re angry. But it’s almost never as simple as one side being purely evil and the other being a helpless underdog. As an American myself, it’s hard not to notice the surge of anti-Russian sentiment that built up around 2014–2018. “Russiagate” turned out to be overstated or misleading, and it’s also difficult to ignore that U.S. defense contractors are, in different ways, supplying or profiting from both sides of this conflict.
But the way you’re expressing your point comes across more fucky and greasy than any thoughtful critique of “Russian apologism” I’ve seen.
“Almost never” maybe, but in. This case, it is absolute. Do a little reading about Russia’s “cognitive warfare.” Far more that the US or even China, Russian propaganda and manipulation are literally everywhere. That is why people like you believe that it is possible to have “thoughtful” discussion around this issue. Remember what the goal of the invasion was, Barret. Not war, but total domination. It was suppose to be thre days to take Kyiv, install a puppet regime, and enslave the entire nation. What is there to be “thoughtful” about? Do you not understand that the justifications are PRECISELY THE SAME as those given for EVERY Russian aggression?
US Defense contractors have always been the armorers of freedom. Without them we would be subject to the same depredations as any weak nation. Be thankful they make the world’s best, as well as the most overpriced, weapons. At least we see some value for money.
My anger and disgust with Russia has NOTHING to do with Russiagate. That was a Hillary/DNC psyop on the gullible left. Maybe it helped turn some normally pacifist lefties into rabid warmongers because they hate Trumo so much. It certainly made them willing to try to turn us into Russia to stop his election.
So what is your plan, Richie Rich? It looks like this war will be won on the battlefield with Russia deciding who gets what. The whole thread is a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing.
Comments rarely (ever?) signify anything of great moment and yet I enjoy them immensely. They are often thoughtful, insightful, interesting, funny. Occasionally they are piercingly honest and moving. They provide an anonymous space for human nature to exhibit. They are useful as a way for old people to engage.
“Ukro-Nazi” is the very SOUL of Russian word vomit.
As for English and other languages, you need a lot of work. No English speaker writes like that. Perhaps Iranian?
The notion of “Nazis” in Ukraine is the essence of Russian propaganda bullshit. Just like I said in my original post…you fascist Orc scum with your preposterous “Jew Nazi” sewage about Zelensky - it would be funny if it weren’t followed up with your wholesale murder of innocent women and children in Ukraine.
Next usually come the tropes about biolabs, Zelensky being a coke addict and buying beach houses in Mallorca or such. Funny, yesterday my wife’s cousin wrote an email about three friends who were hit by a Russian drone in a kindergarten in Kharkiv. They ALL are Russian-speakers. The shrapnel in the spleen of the four year old child certainly is Russia’s idea of “protecting ethnic Russians and Russian speakers” - by doing what Russians do- KILLING them.
ONLY Russia started this war. “Self defense?” From a country that had two dozen ancient MIGs and zero modern armor?? That was DECADES away from even a glimmer of joining NATO, which made clear there were no such plans. What was the defense from, Boris Stupidinov? Tell me what Ukraine POSSIBLY could have done to Russia anywhere NEAR as bad as killing a million of your stupid cow “soldiers”? They had no means, no support, no intention and no notion of attack - nor did anyone else.
Only your deep stupidity and incompetence in the invasion gave Ukraine the time and space to be armed by the West to push you back. And if Biden were not such a coward, it would have been OUT in 2023.
No, the only Nazis are the Wagner boys and their acolytes - they are still Russia’s most capable force, even with Proghozin murdered - what an idiot. He spoke the truth about Putin and Russia. He should have finished the job.
Well, sure if Iranian or Russian secret police set up a coup in Canada or Mexico of a similar nature, how long do you think it would take us to invade? And your point is right--the US has built a track record of invading countries whose government it doesn't approve of. I am no fan of Putin, but just in terms of geopolitics, what else could Russia do? Sign over its sovereignty to Apple or Google?
That's not how open forums work, Heidi. Make your case. Be sure to throw in how the USSR, UK and USA guaranteed Ukraine's geographic boundaries in the Budapest Accords.
If you think this even is a question, you have no business saying anything, really. Not that Americans were known for being either intelligent or informed of anything happening further than the nearest Disneyland, but the "oooh, evil Americans had provoked the Russian bear" crowd make even those look almost intelligent.
So, NATO is a defensive alliance to protect “liberal democracies” in Europe from Russian aggression. It’s charter does not include offensive activities.
“The Alliance is purely defensive in purpose: none of its weapons will ever be used except in self-defence, and it does not consider itself … the instrument of aggression. “
Sweden and Finland did not join NATO before the invasion of Ukraine. They chose to believe Russia would not unilaterally attack its neighbors and preferred to be free of alliances that would oblige them to defend a neighbor, along with other liabilities and obligations. They both judged those would
“CIA activities?” WHat does that mean? WHat was the FSB doing???
The definition of “listening” is non-aggressive. LOL
NATO’s 1999 Kosovo air campaign halted Milošević’s ethnic cleansing of Albanians, averting a Rwanda-scale genocide under the emerging “Responsibility to Protect” norm—defensive action against a non-NATO aggressor, not unprovoked offense. Amazingly enough sometimes defense involves violence.
CIA listening posts along Russia’s borders? Standard great-power intel gathering—Russia runs its own spy networks near NATO states, from Arctic cables to Baltic outposts. It’s deterrence, not invasion prep, idiot.
Maidan? A mass Ukrainian uprising against Yanukovych’s corruption and EU reversal at the tip of Putin’s dick, , not a “CIA coup”—no evidence of orchestration, just U.S. support for democracy amid Russian meddling.
Realpolitik: NATO checks Russian revanchism to safeguard Europe; every hegemon plays hardball. Ignoring that invites weakness. As we learned with Biden’s jelly belly appeasement.
Or the overthrow of Libya, and lots of activity in former African colonies like Burkina Fasso. NATO is a set of brigands trying to impose central bank dominance on the world. This is what the Russian sanctions are about. How offensive is it also for EU to starve their own people and deindustrialize while afflicting their own people with millions of unassimilable jihad-adjacent military aged men, and we criticize Putin? How intensely evil is the climate hoax deployed as the excuse to strip mine the wealth of the people and leave them with digital totalitarianism so they cannot respond to being reduced to serfdom? EU / NATO is embarked on plans directly hostile to US, Russian, and indeed human interests. But they sure want to get us into a nuclear exchange to prop up their failing monarchist elites and rescue them from the wrath of their victims.
Defending against the aggression of the Soviets and now the Russians is globalist neo con war mongering. America should let silly little countries be taken over and save money. And my trailer home needs a new roof instead of sending money to those Albanians or whatever they are!
Libya was a NATO operation. The allegations were the same as when NATO went on offense against Serbia; that unless they acted right away a "genocide" would occur. So they overthrew Gadaffi and a genocide occurred. But NATO did not care because they got what they wanted, destabilization of Libya, and the US used the gathered weapons to arm ISIS. Hillary and Obama were surely participants, but so was NATO.
Check your history. Libya was a UNITED NATIONS action, to of protect civilians undertaken by a multi-national coalition including NATO The narrative that the intervention was a covert mission to destabilize Libya and arm ISIS by NATO/US is not borne out by the public record. The UN mandate (Resolution 1973) authorized action to protect civilians, and the coalition/NATO campaign did not have the mandate to impose regime change. What is true is that the follow-through—post-conflict state-building, arms control, governance—was woefully inadequate, which contributed to chaos, weapons proliferation and extremist footholds. THAT was all Hilary. Thus the operation’s failure is less an example of a deliberate destabilization plan and more of a strategic planning failure and inability to manage the aftermath. It was NOT an imperialist genocidal putsch to steal territory and children
Your Russian arrogance is amusing. FINALLY Trump is putting the screws to your economy - as revenues dwindle from China and India your rictus smile will turn to dust. No one in Ukraine wants to capitulate to Russia - while they support negotiations they do not support surrender.
If you believe ruining Russia’s economy and laying waste to its future is worth 20% of Ukraine, good luck to you. There will be no “destruction” of Ukraine. They STILL have not conscripted a single male 24 or under.
You can take your kopeks, Andy, but I don’t see how you’ll spend them in the tomb.
You might as well be Russian. My wife’s distant family certainly has many fighters out killing Russians. She is a blonde, blue-eyed, tall fit warrior who graduated Summa and PBK from an Ivy, then went on to become the most accomplished professional in her field of commerce and scholarship. Tough as nails. If they are like her, your vatniks are in DEEEEEEEP trouble.
NATO membership = offensive missile sites disguised as defensive that could pre-emptively take out Russian nuclear missile sites. What that does is eliminate the balance of nuclear deterrance.
There are 300 degrees of unprotected flight paths to the US from Russia over non-NATO members. MAD is thoroughly intact.
The missile-defense sites in Europe (Aegis Ashore, ships, radars) are designed and deployed to defeat limited short- and medium-range threats (regional ballistic missiles), not to eliminate Russia’s strategic nuclear forces. Russia’s strategic trajectories to North America generally use polar/Arctic routes, and Russia retains multiple, dispersed, survivable nuclear forces (silos, road-mobile ICBMs, SSBNs and MIRVed warheads) that cannot be “pre-empted” or neutralized by the modest missile-defense footprint NATO has in Europe. Not to mention the distance to far-eastern silos using polar routes. The technical and political realities mean mutual-assured destruction (MAD) remains inviolate.
We all can debate, discuss, call each other names, etc but ultimately it doesn’t matter. All the large powers, US, Russia, China and especially nuclear powers don’t give a damn what their populations want or think. None of them are democracies really. They all play at elections to give the veneer of democracy except for China, they are autocratic, but at least they’re honest and don’t pretend. The billionaires, the MIC of each country, they are the ones that determine what happens in this world not voters. All politicians are either bought or making piles of money. That is the same in Ukraine, Russia, America and China. The rest of the world knows this, except for Americans, who continue to delude themselves.
I don't think that any war is moral in the modern era, if at any time? I view war as about power, money, land mass, safety, preservation of civilizations, and on and on. I get your point, though.
War is always fought by the hoi polloi on behalf of entities seeking money and power....this has always been the case, IMO.
The current conflict in Ukraine features scores of dead Ukrainian Slavs who are sacrificed on the alter of Western political interests.....same for the Russian Slavs being sacrificed.
One context to consider is from a historical perspective....Russia was always considered the red headed stepchild of Europe....the extreme anti Russian attitude has always served as a mechanism of desire by European powers that wanted to destroy Russia and rob its natural resources.....this is still the case, but unfortunately for the Europeans, their "leaders" have gutted their productive industrial bases and stolen their wealth...Europe has no means to destroy Russia, barring nuclear conflagration. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia suffered through the last decade of the 20th century and have now rebuilt....during that period the "West" destroyed their productive bases and implemented a culture destroying bureaucracy (the EU) and drowned the member countries in debt. I don't see the West getting out of this scenario unscathed....it would make a lot more sense to just trade freely with Russia and the global South.....lets face it, war is a horrible waste of precious, limited resources both natural and human.
Oh hre we go, again with the “history” lessons from a Putin troll. No one wants to rob Russia or destroy it. The US had the chance to do that in 1945 and instead (sadly) allowed Stalin to pretend he was entitled to a place at the big table. Truman’s big mistake - we are still paying for it in blood. I love the way you guys incorporate any modern development into your revisionist narrative. Just go back to your bolt hole “Guiseppe” Ivanovich.
Not really worth a lot of effort, but resorting to ad hominem does little to advance your side of the argument. I'd suggest you might want to read Scott Horton's Provoked if you want a detailed background on this issue.
Afghanistan is another interesting history lesson. Russia invades. We champion the Taliban. Rambo III sings their praises to the public. Russian leaves. We invade, changing our mind 180 degrees about the Taliban.
The US invasion of Iraq was dumb and strategically inept, and was done under false justifications. Nonetheless, it was not done for straightforward territorial expansion.
I'm not even going to bother contesting the view that America, and the expansion of a purely defensive alliance that only came into existence in response to Russian threats of aggression and has never taken any territory from anybody, somehow make Putin's invasion of Ukraine rational and defensible, or bear any responsibility for it. My real reaction to the article is relief that I live in a country where I can talk about anything I like at the dinner table.
Of course, I didn't need the article to remind me or confirm just how lucky we all are in comparison with the literally billions of people who, because of their oppressive leaders, don't feel comfortable doing this.
In the 1980s, ethnic cleansing in Europe was no more acceptable to the west than apartheid had been in South Africa. NATO sent no troops but used its air power in a limited way to protect the victims of Serbia's ethnic cleansing program, not to acquire Serbian territory or threaten the existence of the Serbian state or its government. The aggressors were the Serbs, not their victims and defenders, and this was NATO's first-ever military action, the only other one in its seventy-plus year history being the role it played in Afghanistan following the September 11 attacks on the USA (according to Wikipedia, NATO's other roles have included “relief efforts, counter-piracy, enforcing no-fly zones and naval blockades”). It's a defensive alliance all right.
So, if we strip away the propaganda from your post, what's left is the following: despite being a "purely defensive alliance", NATO chose to attack a country that wasn't threatening any of its members in any way.
Using the guise of protecting the victims of the Serbia's ethnic cleansing program doesn't change the fact that NATO acted as an aggressor. Especially since this particular ethnic cleansing program was neither the first, nor the only in the former Yugoslavia. Recall Franjo Tudjman's ethnic cleansing program, which was perfectly acceptable to NATO and even encouraged by some NATO members.
Likewise, NATO choosing a bombing campaign over boots-on-the ground operation has nothing to do with the fact that it was acting as an aggressor against Serbia.
As for this being "the first-ever military action", doesn't it sound like a hooker describing her first day on the job?
Ah! I see now. This has nothing to do with NATO: you're a Serb apologist who's never accepted that Yugoslavia's refusal to grant ethnic minorities the autonomy they wanted, and deserved, guaranteed the country's fragmentation. And you still bear a grudge against NATO for having sided with Belgrade's victims. In Colin McEvedy's words, “The two northernmost of its [Yugoslavia's] constituent republics, Slovenia and Croatia, were fed up with a union they saw as Serb-dominated, eastward-looking and repressive: they wanted autonomy, and an opening to the west. It would have taken a very tactful Yugoslav leadership to have held the South Slavs together at this juncture: Belgrade's decision to maintain the union by force ensured its collapse.”
I have no interest in rehashing ethnic antagonisms with you, or in indulging attempts at revisionist history about Serb terror campaigns against Muslims and Croats in Bosnia, and against Albanians in Kosovo. NATO was neither aggressor nor villain in this chapter of a story of ethnic squabbling all too endemic in this part of the world.
P.S. I'm a retired reference librarian whose career consisted of connecting people with the most reliable reference sources possible. Librarians don't do propaganda. You're clearly engaging in a bit of projection here.
Librarians don't do propaganda - right... In reality librarians are the original "disinformation experts". Why? Because they have little - if any - knowledge about the subject matter, yet they believe themselves capable of "connecting people to the most reliable reference sources possible". Just like "disinformation experts" of Covid era. And their "most reliable reference sources"? Why, whatever the government says must be reliable. Even when it's clear to the subject matter experts that the government spreads disinformation. And propaganda.
As for me being a Serb apologist... Well, you're wrong about that as well. I have no more love for Serbs than for Croats or Albanians. All - and I mean ALL - of them committed atrocities after the breakdown of Yugoslavia. And there were attempts at ethnic cleansing by all sides, and there were victims of all ethnicities.
Outsiders shouldn't meddle in ethnic conflicts other than to separate the sides as much as possible and keep them from each others throats. And yes, that requires boots on the ground, not indiscriminate bombing. And the real peacekeepers - maintaining neutrality - won't be popular with either side.
NATO may have been formed as a "purely defensive alliance" against the USSR and the Warsaw pact. It stopped being one when both were broken down. But, as any bureaucratic structure would do, NATO went searching for a new enemy to justify its existence. Plus the usual mission creep and bloat.
So it is very much about NATO. It has outlived its usefulness, as bombing of Serbia, "relief missions" and "no fly zone enforcement" show.
You're still serving up Serbian apologia here, and your equally irrelevant side-excursion into “mission creep” does nothing to obscure NATO's purely defensive purpose: it just isn't an alliance bent on aggression and conquest, except in the paranoid fantasies of an authoritarian for whom aggression is first nature.
You clearly haven't the slightest notion of what librarianship is all about, much less what librarians themselves know and believe. They certainly aren't spokespeople for governments, or any other kind of institutional authority, including legacy media. Last November, America's ideologically captured legacy media assured readers and viewers that the country's presidential election was going to be very close, but that Harris (for whom they were plainly rooting) would probably win it. My sources, in contrast, predicted Trump would win 312 electoral votes, exactly what he ended up with. But what could I, a librarian, possibly know about information source reliability, despite having spent years interacting with information providers and giving them feedback on the limitations of their products?
As for librarians' knowledge of the vast subject matter libraries embrace, that obviously varies from individual to individual and could never be complete. In my own case I have, in addition to the usual graduate degree in information science, a philosophy M.A. and a reading background in literature and intellectual history that would leave yours in the dust, I assure you (how up to speed are you on Husserl's phenomenology of internal time consciousness; have you read much Marcel, Heidegger or Jaspers lately?).
In terms of wide familiarity with subject matter I was by no means exceptional among my former colleagues; there are eight thousand books in my home library alone, and the reference library where I worked had millions. Strictly speaking, none of this is relevant to one's ability to navigate the information commons, of course, which is a skill librarians have in spades and that improves with experience. I mention the subject expertise for your benefit, since you're plainly winging it here and have zero understanding of what professional librarians actually do (reading of reviews, book selection, preparation of special indexes, experimenting with new information products, etc.) when they don't happen to be sitting at an information desk serving library users.
Incidentally, there's no such thing as 'disinformation' or 'misinformation.' We tend to say we're misinformed as a shorthand for saying we've been given information that's inaccurate or unreliable in some other way, but everything that comes to our attention is information: ontologically, 'disinformation' and 'misinformation' are null sets. What we're normally concerned to know about information is its truth status and relevance, and these are matters that can only be settled by empirical investigation. 'Disinformation' and 'misinformation' are labels in the censor's arsenal: they pretend we already have answers to questions we haven't even been allowed to ask yet, and that authoritarians at both ends of the ideological spectrum seek to prevent us from asking.
Librarians have the opposite impulse: since the public's judgment can be no more reliable than the sources that inform it, ensuring public access to the widest range of sources possible ('official' and otherwise) is their apolitical, non-ideological, non-propagandistic aim.
Mark, intervening in a foreign conflict is not "defensive" in nature and only a brainwashed lunatic could possibly suggest that. NATO was not attacked, and yet, it used military force against a nation that did nothing to attack NATO. This is, by definition, in violation of your claim of NATO being a defensive alliance.
Britain wasn't attacked in 1914 or 1939, so I guess the Brits weren't really intervening in a foreign conflict to defend Belgium, France and Poland after all. The shelf ranges of history books that agree these were Britain's reasons for entering those conflicts were written by brainwashed lunatics—or at any rate big fibbers.
Canada wasn't attacked in either world war, yet fought in both; so I guess Canadians too are just pathologically aggressive. How lucky for Ukraine it doesn't share a border with Canada! Oh, wait... it shares one with Poland, another aggressive NATO member. Ukrainians are doomed—unless maybe they can persuade Mother Russia to save them from their misguided anti-Russian resistance and associated follies. Save us from ourselves, Vlad! We don't know who our friends are.
So whenever the west comes up with logic to attack a nation that never attacked it, that’s defensive. Iraq was a defensive war, as was Afghanistan, as was Libya, as was Vietnam. After all, we were defending the French and the south Vietnamese democratic nationalists, right?
Your use of the word 'logic' for this kind of fallacious, slippery slope argument isn't just fraudulent, it suggests you've never opened a book of logic in your life and wouldn't know Modus Ponens from Modus Tollens, or any other rule of inference. If you're going to post here, please at least don't commit fraud... and don't insult people's intelligence either. Nothing in what was previously said about the specific circumstances of Britain's and Canada's entries into two world wars commits anybody to any view about the behaviour of other nations in other circumstances in other wars.
Do you even know what a counter-example is? The existence of one black swan suffices to show that the categorical claim, “All swans are white,” is false. We don't need to produce any more non-white swans: one is enough. The WWII example already cited sufficed to show that your claims about what categorically (“by definition”) qualifies as aggression and defense among nations and alliances are false; no additional historical counter-examples are needed, from Iraq, Vietnam, or anyplace else. One pinprick let the air out of a balloon that you made a very easy target.
For the record, preemptive action has always been an option open to defense—frequently a necessary one, if the defenders are to survive—something that's been known since antiquity. There's no rule that says defenders threatened by aggressors have to passively wait until they're attacked before taking measures to ensure their safety; that's not a requirement for accurately calling oneself a defender.
I thought that "dinner with the friend" was illuminating, certainly the most interesting part of the piece. The American left (Dr Matt) has it's point of view, quite unlike the Russian friend's, or in fact the friend's wife. I find it hard to regard any American perspective on this conflict as altogether accurate. What a tangled web we humans weave!
Tedious and repetitive. Trump has been significantly more willing to negotiate with Putin than Biden, but that's apparently gotten him exactly nowhere. Despite Bivens' claim that Trump won't give in to Putin's demand that NATO stop expanding towards Russia, what actually appears to be true is that Putin won't seriously negotiate because he expects to defeat Ukraine on the battlefield. And maybe Putin is right, but that's not Trump or the West's fault.
Consider the lies from the West to Russia and I suspect that after Minsk 1 and Minsk 2, the Russians are a bit skeptical of what the West is trying to sell them......also, Russia has been consistent in their conditions for suspending the SMO. The real victims here are the Ukrainian population whose interests are ill served by the corrupt state installed after Maiden. If you have any interest in the backstory I recommend Provoked by Scott Horton.
Nothing is Trump's fault to cult members. None of the policies of his own government are Trump's fault. None of the directives Trump leads are his fault. The sanctions that he bragged about just this week are not his fault. Trump is an eternal victim. Cry me a river.
Re the war, no one has clean hands, except maybe Trump.
The average American probably has a lot more in common with the average Russian person, than we have with the average person from most other countries. The evil that exists within our government helped create and spur on that which exists in the Russian government. I think the US .Gov (and the West, in general) made a lot of mistakes after the Berlin wall came down - and most importantly, we showed that we couldn’t be trusted to keep our word.
Also, about 20,000,000 Russians / Soviets died in WW-2 - let that sink in.
Yeah, me too. And 20m is very much on the low side of estimates. I'm not sure whether it includes the 4m Ukrainians killed during the Holodomor (two periods, actually). Might have something to do with their current truculence.
As for WWII, I rarely hear it mentioned that the U.S. provided vital food and military aid to keep the Soviet Union afloat vs. Nazi Germany. Russians don't like to acknowledge that, and most Americans don't even know about it.
Russia has so much potential, great people. Unlike countries like Sweden, Britain, Portugal and Spain, they just can't seem to get past their imperial history.
It was a complicated alliance, one where the Russians always seemed to cut the better deal. The “alliance “ with Russia was not comparable to that with Britain.
Stalin's desperate alliance with the West began after Hitler broke the Molotov Ribbentrop alliance to divide Poland and began Operation Barbarossa to take all of the USSR. "Did you really want to talk about history, or were you just making chitchat?" - Not Phil Conners in Groundhog Day
Ah yes the mystical “ Holdomor” which has been challenged and debunked. Watch movies by Oliver Stone on Ukraine and read the Famine history that occurred both in Russia and in Ukraine( then part of Russia). Nazi and UK spread narratives- works when your goal is to vilify and break up Russia for its resources - heh just like today (right Cookies Nuland?)
No serious historian “debunks” the Holodomor, Carol. And “break up Russia for its resources “ is laughable. My conclusion is that your name is not “Carol”.
The average American had more in common with the average German in WWII than the average person from most other countries. Isolationism worked then and is working now among a few uninformed and entitled. Let the Russians have Ukraine and torture as much as they want as long as it ends all the fuss.
Trump promised to end the war, teasing that he would get tough with Putin, not eliminate all aid to Ukraine but sell weapons to countries concerned about war crime and illegal invasion of a neighbor.
Europe is clearly the most violent, domineering continent on the planet. The two world wars proved that, as did hundreds of years of colonial conquest around the world. Why the United States continues to involve itself in European affairs is a question all Americans should be asking. If the Europeans aren't civilized enough to keep themselves from one another's throats, why should we be constantly rushing to their "rescue"?
We know why..All the bankers live there..When they are not at their vacation homes in the USA..$$$ Wars are started by governments & governments are run by donors..
I’m not informed enough on all the details & background of this conflict to judge. However, I do know our LEADERS have lied to us too many times to accept anything they’re telling us in general or this war in particular.
Remember, Comrade: the war started because the mad imperialist Putin woke up bored one morning in February 2022 and thought, "You know what is problem with Mother Russia? Not big enough! Dmitri, send in the tanks!"
War propaganda has (yet again) rotted people's minds.
Interesting point of view but NATO expansion is a poor excuse for an illegal annexation of the Crimea and a brutal attack on a neighbor. Putin has imperial ambitions but a reach that barely extends past his borders. You argue that US defense contractors are responsible for prolonging the war. Putin is solely responsible for that. I suppose you believe that Ukraine should simply surrender or that the West should repeat the Munich mistake and simply hand Czechoslo-Ukraine over to Putin.
You are the sort of Massachusetts neighbor that makes it such an odd state to live in. Belief is more important than reality. The military industrial complex is the root of all evil. As a doctor you would be better qualified to comment on why Beth Israel is driving patients to its wholly-owned subsidiaries and making it difficult for patients to keep their PCPs.
He has repeatedly said in public that the breakup was ""The greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century." for Russia. He thinks the invasion points into his country need to be held by his army. Is that "imperial" depends on your point of view.
If you look at the context of this and similar statements, it has nothing to do with the loss of territory. Putin is talking about how much suffering the breakup caused.
More than 2 million people were forcibly uprooted from the Central Asian republics and had to relocate, mostly to Russia. Oftentimes with nothing but the clothes on their backs. Older people lost their hard-earned pensions because they couldn't document employment in the former Soviet republics. Families ended up split between countries. And so on.
I know that, but that doesn't mean "imperial" or at least any more imperial than many other big countries, say USA, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia... I hate to be defending the likes of Putin, but geopolitics, especially the ever present desire by the West to take everything that's not nailed down kind of leads Russia to act the way it does. I remember in Moscow they had this big snow machine that had two horizontal arms that gathered up snow, which went up into a conveyor, to an end dump truck to be carted off. You know what people called this thing? Capitalist, because it gathers everything up! So that might be an informal indication of what it looks like from a Russian point of view.
I believe that he followed that up with something to the effect of "but only a fool would seek to recreate it." This oft-repeated quote is very much taken out of context.
Right-when a tyrant with a large army says he is not going to invade, we are supposed to believe him? Ask the Ukrainians. Thanks for your contribution Neville.
So if America fell apart like the Soviet Union and then one day we had a president who remarked that this was the worst geopolitical catastrophe of the century, would these same idiots be claiming that is evidence of imperial ambitions?
Not comparable. Russia is has always been imperial and open about it expanding by invasion and conquering. The US had an imperial period in the late 19th century (manifest destiny) but has retreated to economic hegemony of late.
Don’t read the Times because it is so woke and pretentious. Restoring the USSR is equivalent to restoring the Russian empire and by definition Imperial. Putin is clearly trying to return to a greater Russia larger than ethnic Russia. You can quibble about words but the intent has been clearly stated. For example:
“Both Russians, and Ukrainians, and Belarusians are heirs of Ancient Rus, which was the largest state in Europe. Slavonic and other tribes across a vast territory — from Ladoga, Novgorod and Pskov to Kyiv and Chernihiv — were united by one language (which today we call Old Russian), by economic ties, by the rule of princes of the Rurik dynasty, and after the baptism of Rus — by one Orthodox faith.”
TeeJae's got it right. It used to be the Russian Empire, so in the sense of trying to restore it, maybe. But it's historical. Ukraine actually means "borderland" and was where the Rus originated (Kyiv) so the two are tied together. I'm not really in favor of big countries--sometimes I think the US itself would be better off breaking into smaller ones, especially with the current polarized situation, so I don't think Russia has some divine or historical right to be big, but it is, anyway.
So, is it our mission to make sure Russia is not restored to its previous empire? Is it worth fighting a war over? I think it's more about the West having unobstructed access to their mineral wealth, and nothing about freedom, democracy, etc. I also think the idea that Russia wants to take over Europe or something like that is far-fetched.
No one in the US really cared much about Ukraine, except maybe the Bidens before Putin invaded. If we cared about mineral wealth we would invade the Congo. The whole mineral deal came from Trump wanting to get something in return for all the support given. After WW2 Britain and France owed huge sums “borrowed” from the US. The loans magically turned into gifts because of the Soviet threat. Same with a lot of other countries. The “evil US” is a stereotype that has been wrong more times than not. Russia’s stereotype is Stalin, who Putin admires.
The West was after Russia’s resources all the way back to the Russian Empire and the Tsars. I don’t know what you’re talking about with “Russia’s stereotype”— do you mean from the West’s point of view, or from Russia’s point of view?
Don’t know what you are referring to. Prior to 1917 Russia was mainly an agricultural country. Napoleon did not seek resources. If you argue that Hitler was part of the “West” he sought oil but was more interested in ethnic cleansing. No one else cared. Plenty of other resources to fight over in the Middle East and Africa.
Oh please. Ukraine invading Russia is absolutely ludicrous. What next, Finland’s territorial ambitions? Or perhaps Estonian paratroops landing on the Kremlin? Siberian tigers uplift by genetic terrorists?
There were no foreign troops in the Ukraine. And for better or worse the Monroe doctrine and the difficulty of projecting power from Europe/Asia into the Americas has made Cuba a special case. Note that America hasn’t attacked Cuba since 1962 despite Russian advisors and Cuban troops in conflicts all over the world. I could see your point if Ukraine was arming and training separatists in the former USSR republics.
Putin having imperial ambitions is a propaganda meme that has absolutely no basis in reality, Russian geopolitical policy, or Putin's own personal ambitions. This is made up entirely out of hysteria and fear. There is no evidence whatsoever to back this up.
You mean they are not just a bunch of "greasy" hicks? ... Not just Appalachia with a Russian accent? Get outta here! How are we supposed to hate if we persist in humanizing our "enemy"?
1. If I could "Like" this article thousands of times, I would! 2. I wish I could have visited Russia with you and your family; as I've always wished to visit. But other places, other wars, came and went on their own (and my) time. 3. As a now-senior American military and combat veteran, I've met and known some interesting Russians, and ironically a few Ukrainians - when it, too, was Russia. I liked them all - for their droll humor, their cynical worldview, their beautiful women, and their friendship. I look forward to reading your remaining notes. My biggest fear is, as Le Carré wrote, "... in the fight for peace not a stone will be left standing." (... в борьбе за мир не останется камня на камне.) Бог с тобой.
No. Putin and Russia could end it tomorrow. Stop and go home. What are they fighting for?? What is their goal??
IT ALWAYS MATTERS who started it Suzie. No one is FORCING Ukraine to fight on, my dear. They want to save their country. Ukrainians dont get shot by their commander if they retreat from the front. Russians do.
That being said, the behavior and actions of Zelensky, the EU and the Biden administration from the run up to this war, (including the Maiden revolution), and after Russia invaded, cannot go unmentioned. It has been odd, to say the VERY least and they have far from the purest motives in both their prosecution of it and their total lack of interest the last three years, in any meaningful way, of finding a way for it to end .
Im confused. The Maidan was a protest uprising against the continued infiltration of Ukrainian politics and society by Russian operatives and propagandists. The people had ENOUGH of the corruption and oppression of Russian revanchists, like Putin. This has NOTHING to do with the US or anyone else. The only input the US had was to support the Western-leaning pols to give them some resources to combat Russian influence. Trying to paint its as the US “engineered” ANYTHING is ludicrous. It’s not up to the West to end the war — that’s up to the combatants. If Ukraine does not want to surrender 20% - or ANY - of their country to Russian invaders, well, we are OBLIGED to help them - we signed an agreement to do precisely that when they gave up 1,300 nuclear warheads. I bet they regret not keeping a few to remind Russia that MAD is more than a phrase.
The travesty the Biden group crated was not giving Ukraine what it needed to finish the 2023 counteroffensive. They had Russia in chaotic retreat, but ran out of munitions and had no air support to cut Russian logistics behind the lines. 20 F-16s, 100 ATACMS and a bunch more HIMARS likely saw Russia pushed back to the border. THAT was our mistake — too little, not too much.
Ukraine is starting to completely lay waste to Russia’s energy complex. Oil refining, oil storage, gas transmission, and thermal electric generation. All are getting SLAMMED. A couple more months. Be strong,
You are Russian. Do you think there is any scenario you could possibly conceive of where Putin would actually hold up a white flag and surrender? I don’t.
And as this war now only continues to escalate things can go all sorts of wrong in all sorts of unimaginable ways.
Bringing the two together - now - with no clear victor - is, to my mind, the only way to avoid far graver and unthinkable consequences for the wider world for not having done all in our power toward that end.
It may seem distasteful, even repugnant for you to think of doing that, but the alternative is simply far too great a risk to take IF a way out can be forged now.
Just a tiny pointer, the Maidan happened under Obama...though genocide Joe was vice president....John Kerry was secretary of state. Read Provoked by Scott Horton for more details.
I’ve been reading a Substack author named Andrew Korybko who is Russian and has been excellent with his reporting on the “Special operation” as he calls it. Lately though he has slipped and called it a war. If anyone wishes to become more informed on the region I’d say give him a read. The CIA was the reason this whole thing started. They had like 20 “secret bases” in Ukraine and one was even dug underground into Russia. These assholes made it so Putin had enough. Instead of him coming out and blaming the US he went in to force them out leading to this shit show. You also cannot leave out the Brits in this. Boris Johnson and his buddy who have large stakes in defense contractor who is selling them arms to defend themselves. Ukraine isn’t above board here either with the corruption as oligarchs there are snapping up mansions in Switzerland. There’s fuckery going on all around and now it’s just a money making endeavor even for Zelensky. Look up his Wife’s spending habits as shopping sprees. This needs to end.
Victoria Nuland did not deny the presence of Ukrainian biolabs:
"Nuland did not deny this: at all. She instead — with palpable pen-twirling discomfort and in halting speech, a glaring contrast to her normally cocky style of speaking in obfuscatory State Department officialese — acknowledged: 'uh, Ukraine has, uh, biological research facilities.'”
I believe Toria Nuland (who helped engineer the CIA coup in 2014 overthrowing Yanukovych, the democratically elected leader of Ukraine in UN-proctored elections) was quite excited when Russians took some of those "non-existent" biolabs:
You seem to advocate Biden's eradication of Russian language, culture and ethnic Russian Ukrainians from Ukraine. Is Stepan Bandera (or Hitler) your Hero, as he was named "Hero of Ukraine" by Yushchenko (after he lost the election with less than 7% of the vote)? I believe Zelensky was elected with >70% of the vote running on a "Peace with Russia" platform? But elections are for democracies...
Oh, yeah, RIGHT. Nuland got 1.5 MILLION Ukrainians out in the street to protest Yanukovych who took Putin’s cash and flipped from pro-EU to Russian Nazi. PLEASE STOP. You make my head hurt. Eradication of Russian..BLAHBLAHBLAH. Bandera is a minor figure, please stop the Russian garbage. Yanukovich fled Ukraine. Where did he go? Brussels? London? New York?? NO HE WENT TO RUSSIA.
This endless repetition of Putin’s talking points is so boring, friend. No one was radicating “ethnic Russians.” Everyone there has the same DNA freak.
He might be but he doesn’t only write about Russia and I’ve had discussions and debates with him where he had his mind changed. I’ve called him out on his bias sometimes and he’s always been nice to me and trust me I’m no pro Russia guy. I’m as Right as they come but I’m not blind either.
I get what you’re saying and I can see it and I’m guessing it’s possible he is a sanctioned writer for them because I’ve seen people really go at him for it but as far as that part of Europe he gives news you ain’t seeing anywhere. It was only $60. He has been nice to me and he was just real sick and didn’t elaborate what happened so maybe he got out of line and they poisoned him. The Ukraine is a fucked up situation with plenty of fault to go around.
The Russian people have never experienced decent leadership in their entire history. From monarchy to communist dictatorship. A visit to St. Petersburg was eye-opening. Dour, withdrawn people in the streets. Ugly buildings-prison like. Our tour bus picked up two young military looking males likely KGB, so conversations were duly truncated. I marveled at the artwork, but could not wait to get the hell out.
Countries familiar with Russian dominance joined NATO because they never want Russia to visit them again. In Putin's February 21, 2022 address, he echoed imperial ambitions, lamenting the collapse of the Soviet Union and framing Russia as the rightful heir to a broader Eurasian civilization. If Russia fears the NATO alliance, these countries made the right choice.
Honestly,fuck you Dr Matt.
My family is Russian, my wife’s Ukrainian. I am disgusted by my Russian relatives. They have a lot in common with my cousins from South Africa - deeply racist, nasty fuckers who have not a shred of empathy or compassion for any but their own, and believe they should rule over the inferiors. The last visit I made “back” to Russia was enough for me. Listening to those assholes justify Russian interference in Uraine, the theft of Crimea, the black invasion of Donbas and the corruption of Yanukovytch — all leading up to the claim that Ukrainians have been “mesmerized” by the “Jew Nazi cocaine addict” Zelenskyy. Ugh.
These revisionist histories are nauseating. NO, Matt. The US did not cause the war. And Putin was not offering peace. He was offering surrender so his invasion would be met with NO resistance. No NATO. No arms. Demilitarized and neutral. Yup. A country that could be taken in a week. THAT was his plan — are you actually that stupid or do you just pretend you greasy fuck?
I guess your in laws must be reasonably affluent - a dacha with running water and indoor plumbing.
Please spare us Part II. Apologias for genocidal mass murdering tyrants don’t interest intelligent people.,
Jesus Christ - take a pill. The “greasy fuck” comment just destroyed any persuasive value in your comment.
Too harsh for an apologist for people glide bombing kindergartens and hypersonic missil-ing hospitals? Doing double taps to be sure and get the EMTs?
Though, in situations not on line, I can be as foul mouthed as you, but keeping up your diatribe does nothing to advance your arguments. I don't think I would have wanted you as my banker. Honey will get you further in my book. At 88, I still go out and work my construction hands to make a few bucks to desperately try to keep up with inflation, not having a seven figure retirement income. Maybe you got it from us working yokels.
I got it from building skylines. Oh I worked construction as a youngster, but when you can figure complex equations in your head and design new securities in your sleep, that’s a waste of effort. So I figured out how to securitize everything to bring capital to markets that normally were hostage to the banks. I retired at 42. I’m 70 now. I never took a penny from anyone.Like BASF used to say, I just made things better. I get foul mouthed when people try to justify what Russia is doing - just as they have always done. It’s a miserable country filled with miserable people - and stupid. They all believe if only the Tsar knew the injustice they suffer he would fix it!! LMFAO. HE IS THE INJUSTICE.
The Tsar is the little father, his boyars are the ones screwing the peasants over, if only he knew!! This is the biggest trope in Russian history-the Cossacks said screw that noise, we’re doing it for ourselves-that’s what being Ukrainian is about.
In fairness, those four and five-year-old kindergarten kids could grow up to resent Russians and create problems due to the lack of re-education and military training the 20,000 children abducted to Russia are getting. The ICC thinks it's wrong but Russia needs fresh blood if it is to survive its current demographic and economic downward spiral.
Matt didn’t write this. I also wasn’t enamored with the writer, but he has the right to voice his views. It’s okay to state your feelings about what was written, just adjust your aim.
Matt did write this article, just not Matt Taibbi. Well written and very interesting to a uniformed reader such as myself. I would be fascinated to see Russia some day.
Oh, Tommy, please go!!
Don’t wait!!!
It’s a WONDERFUL place!!
Uninformed?? You mean IGNORANT??
Outside of affluent Moscow and St Pete, Russia is mostly a dirt-poor shithole filled with racist, ignorant “rednecks”. Imagine a whole country of 1930s Appalachian inbred, violent morons. AND I AM RUSSIAN. I have been there many times, but swore off it after 2017. It’s God’s shitstain on the Earth, that brings nothng but subjugation, paranoia, misery and death to the planet.
One of my cousins there studied in the US - has a medical degree from Tulane. His parents live in a ramshackle house with no indoor plumbing. He tried to emigrate to get out of that pismire, but was arrested. No one has heard from him since, and if they ask, they get a good beating.
Please, go!!! It’s a WONDERFUL LAND OF MILK AND HONEY!!!!
Here you go again..... this tirade is getting old.
Heidi -You are right. I am aware things change, but we were in those "shit hole" towns in Russia. The population seemed to be thriving, the markets well-stocked with local produce and meats, the buildings in good repair. I actually live in a shit hole town in New Mexico. Google Espanola, New Mexico. If I weren't nearly 84, a widow, and didn't have a bunch of stuff, I would be looking at moving. Not to Russia, of course, but out of a true US shit hole town.
Thriving?? Inflation has been running at almost 20% across the board in Russia. It has become a net food importer and now has to import refined petroleum products thanks to Ukrainian sanctions. 35% of ALL Russian houses have no indoor bathrooms and still use outhouses. Markets may seem full - no one can afford beef or chicken any more. Local produce is plentiful in summer but dont try winter or spring. Smaller towns are getting utterly detonated - some 4 million people are likely to have their townships dissolved in the next 6 months as their economies have been crushed by the war effort.
Whole regions have seen their municipal services - never great - stopped entirely. No road repairs, no trash collections, road signage gos unrepaired or replaced. Gas lines are getting unmanageable and people can’t get to market or work. Ultilities are leaving cables unrepaired and copper wires get cut down and sold for scrap.
Russia has reversed its climb up and is now fully regressing down the development ladder,
The worst US town is a freakin ShangriLa compared to Russian small towns.
I was referring to NKYIndepents comments, I fully agree with you.
Indeed. Dude sounds like Victoria Nuland.
🤣🤣
Word
Out of curiosity, why are you reading?
For god's sake, keep your puerile resentment to yourself.
How much are you getting paid?
Paid by whom?
I’m a retired banker trying to scrape by on seven figures in retirement income. I don’t need money from anyone for anything.
Retired bankers do hookers and blow, they don't hang out on substack
I know I shouldn't, but I can't help myself. Does that make you an oligarch? Maybe even a russian oligarch?
My husband and I went in 2011. The trip was incredible and fascinating. One of the best trips we ever took. Putin was just about to replace Medvedev. We were not ushered around but we had come on a tour. Advisable because our ability to translate Cyrillic was too slow for subway stops lol. Though we did ride the subway on our own.
We had some guides on the ship plying the Volga river from St. Petersburg to Moscow. Moscow was booming (not with drones or bombs). It actually reminded me of Paris. That is, Paris before the more recent woke attitudes rendered it as unseemly as San Francisco or Portland. We had lunch with some Russians in their Stalin-built apartment. They did not speak English. That was difficult. But they had a dacha even though they were probably middle class. There were dachas of all different classes along the Volga. Some almost shacks, others like US cabins in the woods, still others like royal hunting lodges.
When one of the US tourists asked the guide if Putin would be elected, she said casually that "he will if he wants to be". That at least is honesty, unlike what has been dished out to us here in the land of free speech.
The Devil is in the details…. Like the darkness of Dostoevsky to Solzhenitsyn I believe one can still paint Russia in the dark tones of Mother Earth as in Van Gogh’s early works like ‘ The Potato Eaters’. May the light shine on it brightly in our lifetimes and end this death quest.
Darkness is the essence of Romanticism. Dostoevsky vs. the Hallmark Channel.
There is nothing romantic to my eyes about the Potato Eaters, about poverty and the starvation of spirit. Realism as reported by NYKIndependent.
Absolutely! I was not suggesting such...Dostoevsky bridges romanticism to reality....I am referring to real darkness.....as in blindness and ignorance.
Sorry! This discussion has gotten so complicated that I think maybe I don’t understand your comment.
The author’s name is also Matt. He’s a typical Russian apologist.
Oh, look how nice Russian life is… while the men are off trying to exterminate Ukrainian men, women and children in their homes and gardens, bombing their kindergartens and hospitals. But— OH! -_ the West said that Putin didnt have the right to tell another country how to surrender to them!!! So it’s THEIR fault!!
Honestly it makes my fuckin blood boil.
You're so full of CIA and NATO propaganda, you can't think straight.
Matt B.M.D. writes: "I don’t know whether to laugh or cry... [Trump]'s got no idea what we’re doing there. Do any of us?"
Yes, I know exactly what "we're" doing there. Billions are being made, stolen, and skimmed in the hope of making, stealing, and skimming trillions more, first from Ukraine, and then from a "decolonized" former Soviet Union, while massive disinformation campaigns re: Nordstream, Storm Shadows, and French, British, and US ops against Russia are taking place.
All this is happening out in the open much as Fred Anderson outlined in his seminal text Crucible of War. The US colonies wanted Indian land. The Brits wouldn't sanction the violation of existing treaties, so Washington et al went ahead and set out to grab the land anyway. The British Empire, the Japanese Empire, the German Empire etc. did exactly the same across the globe.
Ukraine has 13 trillion in natural resource assets, the former Soviet Union has 75 trillion more, all of which actually belong to US corporate speculators. The US means to get them, Trump or no Trump, no matter how many Ukrainians and Russians have to die to achieve that "goal."
For the future of Ukrainians in this US victory - look to native Americans. Their blood and that of victims of corporate exploitation by the US and others is written on every page of our history right up to the present.
Thank you for writing the comment I've written so many times in so many places I've taken to referring people to the 2019 Rand Corporation report instead. It describes the U.S uniparty's corporate-sponsored plan to take control of Russian wealth, something it tried and failed, thanks "the monster Putin," to do back in the 1990s. By 2019 the Rand plan was well underway (it started with the U.S. planned and financed 2014 coup in Ukraine) to "weaken Russia" by provoking it to either invade or allow U.S. (NATO) nukes on its borders (remember when Krushchev tried that in our hemisphere?) and then turning the Russian people against Putin.
Yes, regime change 101. The American way. We've done it so many times in so many ways, or tried to, I've lost count. Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan. Libya, Syrian, and now Venezuela— I hope Columbia is watching its back. And as we expand NATO for the purpose of taking Russian resources under our control (in the name of "freedom"), our own country literally goes to hell. Here in the U.S., the top 10 percent do half of all the spending—everyone else is broke and/or in debt—on products mostly made in China, yet another BRICS member nation (alongside Russia, India and many other nations that want no part of the unipolar West). Multipolarity is the future—not that most Americans can even define the term. Anyone who doesn't see how the rest of the world is exiting from globalist unipolarity to protect themselves from relentless sanctions and coups is . . . yeah, reading only corporate-sponsored Western propaganda.
Such a long essay and so blind to what's really happening in Ukraine. It's not about land or minerals, it's about the punishment, subjugation, and erasure of a people who refuse to be reabsorbed into a cruel dream of empire regained.
Five short paragraphs, four of five two sentences each is a "long essay" for you, which I suppose says something? about your actual interest in the topic and/or your attention span.
Unfortunately your front of the cereal box, "analysis" offers little of substance. For a more polished version of your own argument, but sadly equally devoid of actual evidence, you might crib from the Jamestown Foundation's better developed claims of post-Soviet Union "imperialism" https://jamestown.org/program/osce-declares-decolonization-of-russia-as-necessary-for-peace/
They even have maps. Arguing against the well-documented history of charter company imperialism from the first English plantations in Ireland, through French charter company imperialism on the west-African coast, etc. etc. etc. to the present is your choice.
What's wrong with Russia and Ukraine, btw, will take a bit longer than my original long essay, but I'm good with that if you want to go there some other time.
You are joking , right? Trump even said he has made a deal with Ukraine to pay us back in resources..
Seems to me there are several operative interests. Putin wants empire/control, America wants minerals/ influence, Ukrainians want self- determination. I find the whole situation a puzzle. I don't know why our participation is in the national interest, but I also know Ukraine gave up their Russian-made nukes on the US promise of defense. Bad decision all around imo.
Crucible of War was a very revealing book, glad to see it referred to.
The rest of what you say is pretty accurate- I get tired of people saying we’re obligated to bring freedom and democracy to the world, when so often it’s nothing like it.
We have a few commenters here who seem anxious to send people off to die for this “cause”, although I bet none of those same commenters are ready to volunteer for it.
One of my American colonial history profs declared that if we understand Anderson, we understand the American Revolution. Ken Burn decades after Anderson is now reviving the same analysis in his new series "The American Revolution" because Burns observes so few today recognize the foundational roles greed, avarice, and disregard for the law and the rights of others play in stealing other people's stuff. Hear Burns repeat Anderson's analysis himself with Theo - all dressed up in American exceptionalist bunting. New White House Ballroom - Winning! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VpBgRubnV8
You live in a bizarre fantasy world, my friend. The US has never taken squat. Like Trump said about Iraq “we should have taken the oil.” We didnt even take it in northern Syria - used it to finance the Kurds,
The one living in a bizarre fantasy world, one of anti-Russian bigotry, is you. The USA and NATO provoked this war because of their recklessly foolish insistence on pushing NATO east into Ukraine, in flagrant violation of the promises they repeatedly made to Russian leaders at the end of the Cold War. You should read and listen to Jeffrey Sachs and John Mearsheimer who know far more than you do about the whole situation.
Coz Donald Trump and Colin Powell say so? The exploitation and theft does not depend on wars, btw, but rather on the ability to subvert or coerce corrupt local authorities into signing away the target nation's crown jewels. China is doing that throughout Africa, Asia, and is targeting Central and South America.
The principle is: "if we don't steal it some other big animal will. So..."
It's always about the money..
Sure. That’s what I was fed 25 minutes outside of St Pete. CIA and NATO propaganda. I didn’t realize rabochiye were all CIA operatives.
Youre so full of shit it leaks out your fingers.
You don't know what you're talking about, asshole.
Yay Davel
I'm guessing you're voting for Zohran Mamdani ... lol
Your blood, like your mind and soul, is foul and contaminated.
War is hell.
You are old enough to remember when Russia tried to put a Military base in Cuba. Kennedy had his finger on the red button. They even had us doing drills in school..They had made a deal not to expand NATO & they reneged. Why did NATO need to be there?
A sick, profane, hysterical tissue of stupid, uninformed bullshit from a braindead cretin.
Kinda hard to discern to whom you refer...
Let me make it clear: to whoever the raging coward NYKIndependent.
Got it. And he has truly met his match...
I disagree actually. You might not like his profane style but there is plenty of name calling and profanity here all around.
Some of the disagreement is probably generational, and some cultural.
I was interested to hear what the young author (Matt) had to say, but am not at all clear why, since he agrees that it was Russia who started this unprovoked and murderously unjust war, he thinks it is up to Lockheed Martin and Raytheon to stop it. Their business is war but they are not responsible for stupid political policies and decisions.
I am also interested in NYKIndependent's views. His descriptions of the Russians sound quite realistic to me, as though he knows them a lot better than anyone else commenting here. The upper class and nobility either fled or didn't survive that revolution, and what was left was a country of illiterate peasants and vicious ideologues.
You are no more informed than that sick cretin and would be better keeping your ignorance to yourself than parading it in public forums.
Sure thing.
Are you the aging hippie on the raft?
Oh, Paul, you are such an enlightened expert in all things.
Justifying mass murder and the bombing of kindergartens seems your strong suit.
Cretin?? Parading ignorance. The troll doth protest too much.
At least I'm just a parading ignoramus and not a sick cretin too. Relief.
Don’t jump to any conclusions there, Sport.
Anyone who even remotely defends the Orc baby killers takes the title from Epstein himself.
Literally, metastasized testicular cancer is too gentle a fate for your ilk.
So the thing I find the author correct about is that America would do the same if it felt the need... or at least the american war machine.
The world is brutal and ruled by the vicious
So barbarism is the natural state of Man, America would do the same, and we need to close our eyes and hope the ugly parts don't last too long. None of us has a responsibility to try to stand in the way of brutality with silly laws and "norms." Just relax, it's natural.
You're entitled to your opinion about the war and about you speaking on behalf of "intelligent people" not wanting a critique of positions they hold.
Speaking for myself, I thought Matt's piece informative and based on his own openly subjective experiences. I look forward to more.
Yes, I thought it was interesting too. He tried to write honestly, without any attempt to hide his own perspective as to fault.
For what it’s worth a friend of mine whose Russian (grew up there) his views of the war and what precluded it mirrors Matt’s guest’s views
For what it's worth, a local husband/wife couple, one Ukrainian/one Russian, that runs a food import business are taking it in stride, no side picked. The husband's view seems to be that this is another round of human history.
For what it's worth, Russians have been cowed into saying they "aren't political" under Putin's long reign. Now that Putin has broken the social contract, exchanging stability for being apolitical, Russians wake up to gas lines and global enmity. Just another round of failed military conquest.
This is true-what Putin is doing is no different from the past 350 years of Russian history in the Ukraine region, he just has tanks and ballistic missiles. Ukraine refusing to accept Belarusian puppet status with the Maidan in 2014 was the current tipping point.
Lol. Calm down. You don't get to decide who and what gets published here and your opinion isn't any more important than anyone else's. I don't care about your relatives or where they came from and I certainly don't care about your feelings towards them. Go write that shit in your diary if you need to get it off your chest. This isn't your personal blog. The invasion and war is a lot more complicated than evil Putin attacks virtuous Ukraine for no good reason. Understanding the causes of something isn't the same thing as supporting them. Getting angry and shouting people down for asking questions or having the wrong opinion is not what "intelligent" people do. Even though you self insert yourself into that category and pretend to speak for them. I'm very curious to hear from regular Russian people and I resent being denied that and fed obvious propaganda from our government and their media lackeys. Billions of our tax dollars are being sent to Ukraine and this war could easily spread into something much larger so I don't think we should be restricting information or suppressing opinions based on anyone's feelings or personal prejudices.
Incredibly enough, humankind has certain universal values of “right” and “wrong.” Invading a far smaller country for having the temerity to exist, for the sole goal of absorbing its territory, stealing its children and erasing its history is pretty universally “wrong.” It literally mirrors the goals of the Third Reich.
I didn’t force anyone to respond to me, I addressed myself to the author. I found his “personal” view repulsive - the “far off ‘war’ is some sort of hideous rationalization of a genocidal attempt to accomplish those terrorist, imperialst imperatives.
Oh, sure, Dr. Matt “humanizes” the Russians! They aren’t awful people!! They’re just like you and me!!! Except do you think Americans would sit back and take it if FOUR MILLION of our men perished and were multilated in a war of choice and conquest? HELL NO. We wouldn’t sit still for 40 THOUSAND. And we got our leaders to STOP with massive protest and uprising. Russians sit back and chew their “shaslik” and trundle off to feel all warm about a nationalistic bit of theater that tells them of the wondrous justice and decency of the Russian people. Their deep moral virtue!!!
You all pretend to be culturally-aware moral historians. You are vapid useless idiots of the latest bloodthirsty regime under the gold onion domes.
Kenny, I don’t claim to decide anything. Let me know who is holding a gun to your lil head to make you read this, and I will tell them to stop.
The Ukrainian War did not have to happen. The disgraced Joe Biden made the "minor incursion" comment during a press conference on January 19, 2022, telegraphing consent for the invasion that occurred one month later.
The facts of the debate are complex. Many argue that Russia has reasons for its past aggression. The US and NATO repeatedly violated the terms of the agreement on the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The Eastern Bloc would be freed, and NATO/US would not extend its borders towards Russia. Secondly, over 85% of the population of the two eastern oblasts (Donetsk and Luhansk) speaks Russian and is aligned with Russia. Since 2014, the Donbas region has operated as a breakaway region. Tens of thousands have died fighting for independence. Ukraine and Crimea were previously republics in the Soviet Union. In 1954, Nikita Khrushchev transferred Crimea from the Russian SFSR to the Ukrainian SSR; however, the people identify with Russia, and Russian was the most widely spoken language up to 2014, when Russia seized the territory.
The point is that I do not see this as a one-sided argument. However, Ukraine also has arguments. Invading a neighboring country violates contemporary norms and existing treaties with Russia. Secondly, Russia's attacks have targeted civilian infrastructure.
There was a US coup in 2014
A US COUP??? LMFAO!!!! Because a US diplomat said “Yats is our guy” now we have the US somehow getting millions of Ukrainians out in the streets for WEEKS demanding the corrupt Yanukovych - who reversed every promise, every platform that got him elected (pro-West) for payoffs from Putin just weeks before the ratification of the EU Association Agreement.
The revolt against Russia’s dead, corrupt hand was organic, troll. This line is like saying France overthrew the Brits in America. Actually - France did far more to help the colonies than we ever did to help Ukraine’s rejection of their traitorous puppet..
There was absolutely no such agreement about NATO’s growth anywhere ever in any treaty or written and negotiated document.. That is attributed to a STATEMENT not an agreement by James Baker, and it is often misconstrued. He was not speaking of the whole of NATO only about military infrastructure in West Germany. And later in the same meeting he clarified that he was making NO SUCH PROMISE.
This big lie never ends.
As the Cold War ended, the U.S., U.K., France, and West Germany negotiated with Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev over reunifying Germany inside NATO.
The USSR’s main concern was that a unified Germany in NATO would move the alliance closer to Soviet borders.
⸻
Key statement often cited as a “promise”
James Baker – U.S. Secretary of State (February 9, 1990) In a meeting with Gorbachev, Baker said:
“NATO’s jurisdiction would not move one inch eastward from its present position.”
This referred to NATO troops and infrastructure in East Germany—not to Central and Eastern Europe generally.
Later that same day, Baker qualified this, saying NATO’s expansion policy outside Germany would depend on broader security arrangements agreed upon with Moscow. No such agreement was ever reached
Mic drop
"Invading a neighboring country violates contemporary norms." It sure does.
Yes, no need for the profanity. Also no need for the back and forth in the comments about poverty, crime, and drugs ... The issue is the war. The author said:
"For anyone still indignant, and angrily aware that far more than 1 million young men on all sides have been killed or maimed in a war Russia alone chose to launch ... the war could end tomorrow if Lockheed Martin and RTX (Raytheon) America stopped fueling it."
Umm, yes, the US has sent arms, but the driving force in the support of Ukraine has been a fearful--a very reasonably fearful--Europe. And Dr. Matt, GET A GRIP; countries have joined NATO because they also were fearful of Russia. Putin attacked when he did because Europe was weak, not because it was strong and threatening.
An aside to the woman in Española; Santa Fe is a few miles to your south. Taos is a few miles to your north. You are responsible for your own choices in life.
Well said, John. This myth that the war is a product of the MIC is nauseating. What, is Ukraine supposed to fight back with sticks and sharpened stones?? Note to Russian trolls: RUSSIA has a MIC as well, owned outright by Putin’s oligarchs. Fully 50% or more of the entire budget of Russia is going to fund the war. Honestly, (profanity is sometimes necessary, John) shove this moronic narrative up your asses. EVERY DAY Russia is sending missiles and drones into apartment buildings and private homes JUST TO TERRORIZE the people. If it takes a $500,000 interceptor to save 50 or 100 lives, well, I hope we can take it out of Russia’s frozen funds.
Europe knows what Russia is about. We can read Putin’s speeches. No he isn’t lamenting the good old days, he wants to MRSA - Make Russia Soviet Again. What an apt acronym. Russia is just like a nasty and persistent bacteria infection.
Do you think Ukraine should be in NATO? I don.t, and I,d like to get rid of Turkey.
The flip side of nationalist chauvinism often sounds like this. Basically the same stuff, only self directed. Auto-chauvinism. (Although it’s still really Other-directed, because it’s meant to distinguish oneself from the rest of one’s “own” people.) We are the worst people, a bunch of genocidal ignorant racist a**holes, throw in lots of f-bombs to signal righteous fury. As tiresome as the usual kind of chauvinism.
A disease of modern America is psycho-babble. Passion is not always neurosis.
Snap out of it.
Truth. Ukraine was offered an implicit “deal”-become a complete puppet state like Belarus with Putin’s tool Lukashenko or get invaded. It’s funny how Putin lovers in the West profess to have zero knowledge of the situation in Belarus or said regime’s complete vassal state relationship to Russia, and completely hem and haw if asked if that is their preferred outcome.
⸻
That’s intense. We can tell you’re angry. But it’s almost never as simple as one side being purely evil and the other being a helpless underdog. As an American myself, it’s hard not to notice the surge of anti-Russian sentiment that built up around 2014–2018. “Russiagate” turned out to be overstated or misleading, and it’s also difficult to ignore that U.S. defense contractors are, in different ways, supplying or profiting from both sides of this conflict.
But the way you’re expressing your point comes across more fucky and greasy than any thoughtful critique of “Russian apologism” I’ve seen.
“Almost never” maybe, but in. This case, it is absolute. Do a little reading about Russia’s “cognitive warfare.” Far more that the US or even China, Russian propaganda and manipulation are literally everywhere. That is why people like you believe that it is possible to have “thoughtful” discussion around this issue. Remember what the goal of the invasion was, Barret. Not war, but total domination. It was suppose to be thre days to take Kyiv, install a puppet regime, and enslave the entire nation. What is there to be “thoughtful” about? Do you not understand that the justifications are PRECISELY THE SAME as those given for EVERY Russian aggression?
US Defense contractors have always been the armorers of freedom. Without them we would be subject to the same depredations as any weak nation. Be thankful they make the world’s best, as well as the most overpriced, weapons. At least we see some value for money.
My anger and disgust with Russia has NOTHING to do with Russiagate. That was a Hillary/DNC psyop on the gullible left. Maybe it helped turn some normally pacifist lefties into rabid warmongers because they hate Trumo so much. It certainly made them willing to try to turn us into Russia to stop his election.
So what is your plan, Richie Rich? It looks like this war will be won on the battlefield with Russia deciding who gets what. The whole thread is a lot of sound and fury signifying nothing.
Comments rarely (ever?) signify anything of great moment and yet I enjoy them immensely. They are often thoughtful, insightful, interesting, funny. Occasionally they are piercingly honest and moving. They provide an anonymous space for human nature to exhibit. They are useful as a way for old people to engage.
You are a despicable Ukro-Nazi troll.
US caused this horrible war - Russian selfdefense invasion was perhaps regrettable but unavoidable and necessary.
….While we watch for three years US genocide in Gaza….
Time to decapitate Ukrainian Nazi-dominated government is long overdue. Poor peace loving Putin is behaving cowardly
I,m not sure what you are saying about US involvement in the middle east.
To be clear, "US genocide in Gaza" is a preemptive strike against Iran, whose dearest wish is to visit genocide upon the US.
You have been TV watching US genocide in Gaza for 3 years — you Zionist (Nazi) troll
Lol - Zionist Nazi troll? 😂
Zionist == Nazi 🤡🤡
😱
I am going to assume this is satire.
Because it’s almost too funny.
“Boris Petrov—. LOL. Where is Natasha Gudunov?
WHat I particularly love is how Russians ignore the genocide being conducted against them… by their own leaders!!
Over a million dead and mutilated. For nothing.
Pro tip: The invaders who are indiscriminately bombing a civilian population are generally the Nazis.
Once again - a despicable Ukro-Nazi troll.
BTW - I am not a Russian (but would love to be able to speak Russian)
Oh,Bobo, you speak Russian, my boy.
“Ukro-Nazi” is the very SOUL of Russian word vomit.
As for English and other languages, you need a lot of work. No English speaker writes like that. Perhaps Iranian?
The notion of “Nazis” in Ukraine is the essence of Russian propaganda bullshit. Just like I said in my original post…you fascist Orc scum with your preposterous “Jew Nazi” sewage about Zelensky - it would be funny if it weren’t followed up with your wholesale murder of innocent women and children in Ukraine.
Next usually come the tropes about biolabs, Zelensky being a coke addict and buying beach houses in Mallorca or such. Funny, yesterday my wife’s cousin wrote an email about three friends who were hit by a Russian drone in a kindergarten in Kharkiv. They ALL are Russian-speakers. The shrapnel in the spleen of the four year old child certainly is Russia’s idea of “protecting ethnic Russians and Russian speakers” - by doing what Russians do- KILLING them.
ONLY Russia started this war. “Self defense?” From a country that had two dozen ancient MIGs and zero modern armor?? That was DECADES away from even a glimmer of joining NATO, which made clear there were no such plans. What was the defense from, Boris Stupidinov? Tell me what Ukraine POSSIBLY could have done to Russia anywhere NEAR as bad as killing a million of your stupid cow “soldiers”? They had no means, no support, no intention and no notion of attack - nor did anyone else.
Only your deep stupidity and incompetence in the invasion gave Ukraine the time and space to be armed by the West to push you back. And if Biden were not such a coward, it would have been OUT in 2023.
No, the only Nazis are the Wagner boys and their acolytes - they are still Russia’s most capable force, even with Proghozin murdered - what an idiot. He spoke the truth about Putin and Russia. He should have finished the job.
You are a sad and ignorant Ukro-Nazi 🤡
Oh you sure told me off, there, Boris. I suspect you smell a lot like rancid herring. Orc troll trash got schooled as usual. Byeeeeeee.
Bunch of garbage lies and hatred from you, lies from end to end, about the war, about yourself.
You know this how?
I keep hearing how immoral Russia is over the Ukraine invasion. People have short term memories. It seems like yesterday that the US invaded Iraq.
Well, sure if Iranian or Russian secret police set up a coup in Canada or Mexico of a similar nature, how long do you think it would take us to invade? And your point is right--the US has built a track record of invading countries whose government it doesn't approve of. I am no fan of Putin, but just in terms of geopolitics, what else could Russia do? Sign over its sovereignty to Apple or Google?
Exactly what threat did Ukraine pose to Russian “sovereignity”?
If you need help answering that question you've got no business commenting.
That's not how open forums work, Heidi. Make your case. Be sure to throw in how the USSR, UK and USA guaranteed Ukraine's geographic boundaries in the Budapest Accords.
Thanks Dad for the rules!! Oh did you forget about Minsk???
God the UK and globalist aholes are out inforce!
If you think this even is a question, you have no business saying anything, really. Not that Americans were known for being either intelligent or informed of anything happening further than the nearest Disneyland, but the "oooh, evil Americans had provoked the Russian bear" crowd make even those look almost intelligent.
👍👍🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯🎯
It wasn't Ukraine, as much as it was NATO, which was continually admitting new countries on Russia's borders to NATO.
I suspect the CIA activities within Ukraine may have been a factor as well.
Funny how all of those countries, having an actual experience with Russia, begged to be admitted... What could they possibly know.
But they have been doing business with the burly bear..
Sure. Because if you don't do business with the bear, bear does business with you.
It takes quite an effort to make the "America, f*ck yeah" crowd look reasonable, but the "It was all a CIA operation folks ace it.
So, NATO is a defensive alliance to protect “liberal democracies” in Europe from Russian aggression. It’s charter does not include offensive activities.
“The Alliance is purely defensive in purpose: none of its weapons will ever be used except in self-defence, and it does not consider itself … the instrument of aggression. “
Sweden and Finland did not join NATO before the invasion of Ukraine. They chose to believe Russia would not unilaterally attack its neighbors and preferred to be free of alliances that would oblige them to defend a neighbor, along with other liabilities and obligations. They both judged those would
“CIA activities?” WHat does that mean? WHat was the FSB doing???
If you seriously believe that NATO does not engage in offensive activities, then how do you explain its bombing of Serbia?
CIA activities like setting up listening posts on Russia’s borders, and fomenting the Maidan coup.
Have you really never heard of these things until now?
The definition of “listening” is non-aggressive. LOL
NATO’s 1999 Kosovo air campaign halted Milošević’s ethnic cleansing of Albanians, averting a Rwanda-scale genocide under the emerging “Responsibility to Protect” norm—defensive action against a non-NATO aggressor, not unprovoked offense. Amazingly enough sometimes defense involves violence.
CIA listening posts along Russia’s borders? Standard great-power intel gathering—Russia runs its own spy networks near NATO states, from Arctic cables to Baltic outposts. It’s deterrence, not invasion prep, idiot.
Maidan? A mass Ukrainian uprising against Yanukovych’s corruption and EU reversal at the tip of Putin’s dick, , not a “CIA coup”—no evidence of orchestration, just U.S. support for democracy amid Russian meddling.
Realpolitik: NATO checks Russian revanchism to safeguard Europe; every hegemon plays hardball. Ignoring that invites weakness. As we learned with Biden’s jelly belly appeasement.
Or the overthrow of Libya, and lots of activity in former African colonies like Burkina Fasso. NATO is a set of brigands trying to impose central bank dominance on the world. This is what the Russian sanctions are about. How offensive is it also for EU to starve their own people and deindustrialize while afflicting their own people with millions of unassimilable jihad-adjacent military aged men, and we criticize Putin? How intensely evil is the climate hoax deployed as the excuse to strip mine the wealth of the people and leave them with digital totalitarianism so they cannot respond to being reduced to serfdom? EU / NATO is embarked on plans directly hostile to US, Russian, and indeed human interests. But they sure want to get us into a nuclear exchange to prop up their failing monarchist elites and rescue them from the wrath of their victims.
Is this a joke? Just look at the European Eurasian map over the last 75 years . NATO is not only an offensive actor so aggressively so!
Christ all the globalist neo con war mongers are infiltrating this site- the stench!!!!!
Defending against the aggression of the Soviets and now the Russians is globalist neo con war mongering. America should let silly little countries be taken over and save money. And my trailer home needs a new roof instead of sending money to those Albanians or whatever they are!
Libya was a NATO operation. The allegations were the same as when NATO went on offense against Serbia; that unless they acted right away a "genocide" would occur. So they overthrew Gadaffi and a genocide occurred. But NATO did not care because they got what they wanted, destabilization of Libya, and the US used the gathered weapons to arm ISIS. Hillary and Obama were surely participants, but so was NATO.
Check your history. Libya was a UNITED NATIONS action, to of protect civilians undertaken by a multi-national coalition including NATO The narrative that the intervention was a covert mission to destabilize Libya and arm ISIS by NATO/US is not borne out by the public record. The UN mandate (Resolution 1973) authorized action to protect civilians, and the coalition/NATO campaign did not have the mandate to impose regime change. What is true is that the follow-through—post-conflict state-building, arms control, governance—was woefully inadequate, which contributed to chaos, weapons proliferation and extremist footholds. THAT was all Hilary. Thus the operation’s failure is less an example of a deliberate destabilization plan and more of a strategic planning failure and inability to manage the aftermath. It was NOT an imperialist genocidal putsch to steal territory and children
NATO posed the threat and Ukraine was attempting to join NATO.
Once Ukraine is destroyed, a choice being made every day by Ukrainian leadership and the United States, there will be no NATO presence and no threat.
Simple stuff.
Your Russian arrogance is amusing. FINALLY Trump is putting the screws to your economy - as revenues dwindle from China and India your rictus smile will turn to dust. No one in Ukraine wants to capitulate to Russia - while they support negotiations they do not support surrender.
If you believe ruining Russia’s economy and laying waste to its future is worth 20% of Ukraine, good luck to you. There will be no “destruction” of Ukraine. They STILL have not conscripted a single male 24 or under.
I’m not Russian you lunatic.
Azov is accepting conscripts, do you have any family you can send?
You can take your kopeks, Andy, but I don’t see how you’ll spend them in the tomb.
You might as well be Russian. My wife’s distant family certainly has many fighters out killing Russians. She is a blonde, blue-eyed, tall fit warrior who graduated Summa and PBK from an Ivy, then went on to become the most accomplished professional in her field of commerce and scholarship. Tough as nails. If they are like her, your vatniks are in DEEEEEEEP trouble.
Would anyone miss Parasha once it is finally destroyed?...
NATO membership = offensive missile sites disguised as defensive that could pre-emptively take out Russian nuclear missile sites. What that does is eliminate the balance of nuclear deterrance.
There are 300 degrees of unprotected flight paths to the US from Russia over non-NATO members. MAD is thoroughly intact.
The missile-defense sites in Europe (Aegis Ashore, ships, radars) are designed and deployed to defeat limited short- and medium-range threats (regional ballistic missiles), not to eliminate Russia’s strategic nuclear forces. Russia’s strategic trajectories to North America generally use polar/Arctic routes, and Russia retains multiple, dispersed, survivable nuclear forces (silos, road-mobile ICBMs, SSBNs and MIRVed warheads) that cannot be “pre-empted” or neutralized by the modest missile-defense footprint NATO has in Europe. Not to mention the distance to far-eastern silos using polar routes. The technical and political realities mean mutual-assured destruction (MAD) remains inviolate.
Reality bites.
We all can debate, discuss, call each other names, etc but ultimately it doesn’t matter. All the large powers, US, Russia, China and especially nuclear powers don’t give a damn what their populations want or think. None of them are democracies really. They all play at elections to give the veneer of democracy except for China, they are autocratic, but at least they’re honest and don’t pretend. The billionaires, the MIC of each country, they are the ones that determine what happens in this world not voters. All politicians are either bought or making piles of money. That is the same in Ukraine, Russia, America and China. The rest of the world knows this, except for Americans, who continue to delude themselves.
I don't think that any war is moral in the modern era, if at any time? I view war as about power, money, land mass, safety, preservation of civilizations, and on and on. I get your point, though.
War is always fought by the hoi polloi on behalf of entities seeking money and power....this has always been the case, IMO.
The current conflict in Ukraine features scores of dead Ukrainian Slavs who are sacrificed on the alter of Western political interests.....same for the Russian Slavs being sacrificed.
One context to consider is from a historical perspective....Russia was always considered the red headed stepchild of Europe....the extreme anti Russian attitude has always served as a mechanism of desire by European powers that wanted to destroy Russia and rob its natural resources.....this is still the case, but unfortunately for the Europeans, their "leaders" have gutted their productive industrial bases and stolen their wealth...Europe has no means to destroy Russia, barring nuclear conflagration. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia suffered through the last decade of the 20th century and have now rebuilt....during that period the "West" destroyed their productive bases and implemented a culture destroying bureaucracy (the EU) and drowned the member countries in debt. I don't see the West getting out of this scenario unscathed....it would make a lot more sense to just trade freely with Russia and the global South.....lets face it, war is a horrible waste of precious, limited resources both natural and human.
Oh hre we go, again with the “history” lessons from a Putin troll. No one wants to rob Russia or destroy it. The US had the chance to do that in 1945 and instead (sadly) allowed Stalin to pretend he was entitled to a place at the big table. Truman’s big mistake - we are still paying for it in blood. I love the way you guys incorporate any modern development into your revisionist narrative. Just go back to your bolt hole “Guiseppe” Ivanovich.
Not really worth a lot of effort, but resorting to ad hominem does little to advance your side of the argument. I'd suggest you might want to read Scott Horton's Provoked if you want a detailed background on this issue.
Afghanistan is another interesting history lesson. Russia invades. We champion the Taliban. Rambo III sings their praises to the public. Russian leaves. We invade, changing our mind 180 degrees about the Taliban.
As if 9/11 never happened. Amazing illiteracy.
9/11 is why we invaded. We were saying they were the "good guys" right up until they launched 9/11 against us. Do you follow now?
Only a sick in the head Russian tool would try to relitigat Iraq to justify the genocide in Ukraine. You all are truly demented.
It's okay when we do it, because we're always the good guys.
(Allegedly.)
LOL
Amen
So that makes it OK? Whatabboutism.
The US invasion of Iraq was dumb and strategically inept, and was done under false justifications. Nonetheless, it was not done for straightforward territorial expansion.
Um, no. It was done to defuse a dangerous enemy in a bad neighborhood.
... and for less reason. (Been there, done that.)
I'm not even going to bother contesting the view that America, and the expansion of a purely defensive alliance that only came into existence in response to Russian threats of aggression and has never taken any territory from anybody, somehow make Putin's invasion of Ukraine rational and defensible, or bear any responsibility for it. My real reaction to the article is relief that I live in a country where I can talk about anything I like at the dinner table.
Of course, I didn't need the article to remind me or confirm just how lucky we all are in comparison with the literally billions of people who, because of their oppressive leaders, don't feel comfortable doing this.
Hmm... Why would a "purely defensive alliance" bomb Serbia?
In the 1980s, ethnic cleansing in Europe was no more acceptable to the west than apartheid had been in South Africa. NATO sent no troops but used its air power in a limited way to protect the victims of Serbia's ethnic cleansing program, not to acquire Serbian territory or threaten the existence of the Serbian state or its government. The aggressors were the Serbs, not their victims and defenders, and this was NATO's first-ever military action, the only other one in its seventy-plus year history being the role it played in Afghanistan following the September 11 attacks on the USA (according to Wikipedia, NATO's other roles have included “relief efforts, counter-piracy, enforcing no-fly zones and naval blockades”). It's a defensive alliance all right.
So, if we strip away the propaganda from your post, what's left is the following: despite being a "purely defensive alliance", NATO chose to attack a country that wasn't threatening any of its members in any way.
Using the guise of protecting the victims of the Serbia's ethnic cleansing program doesn't change the fact that NATO acted as an aggressor. Especially since this particular ethnic cleansing program was neither the first, nor the only in the former Yugoslavia. Recall Franjo Tudjman's ethnic cleansing program, which was perfectly acceptable to NATO and even encouraged by some NATO members.
Likewise, NATO choosing a bombing campaign over boots-on-the ground operation has nothing to do with the fact that it was acting as an aggressor against Serbia.
As for this being "the first-ever military action", doesn't it sound like a hooker describing her first day on the job?
Ah! I see now. This has nothing to do with NATO: you're a Serb apologist who's never accepted that Yugoslavia's refusal to grant ethnic minorities the autonomy they wanted, and deserved, guaranteed the country's fragmentation. And you still bear a grudge against NATO for having sided with Belgrade's victims. In Colin McEvedy's words, “The two northernmost of its [Yugoslavia's] constituent republics, Slovenia and Croatia, were fed up with a union they saw as Serb-dominated, eastward-looking and repressive: they wanted autonomy, and an opening to the west. It would have taken a very tactful Yugoslav leadership to have held the South Slavs together at this juncture: Belgrade's decision to maintain the union by force ensured its collapse.”
I have no interest in rehashing ethnic antagonisms with you, or in indulging attempts at revisionist history about Serb terror campaigns against Muslims and Croats in Bosnia, and against Albanians in Kosovo. NATO was neither aggressor nor villain in this chapter of a story of ethnic squabbling all too endemic in this part of the world.
P.S. I'm a retired reference librarian whose career consisted of connecting people with the most reliable reference sources possible. Librarians don't do propaganda. You're clearly engaging in a bit of projection here.
Librarians don't do propaganda - right... In reality librarians are the original "disinformation experts". Why? Because they have little - if any - knowledge about the subject matter, yet they believe themselves capable of "connecting people to the most reliable reference sources possible". Just like "disinformation experts" of Covid era. And their "most reliable reference sources"? Why, whatever the government says must be reliable. Even when it's clear to the subject matter experts that the government spreads disinformation. And propaganda.
As for me being a Serb apologist... Well, you're wrong about that as well. I have no more love for Serbs than for Croats or Albanians. All - and I mean ALL - of them committed atrocities after the breakdown of Yugoslavia. And there were attempts at ethnic cleansing by all sides, and there were victims of all ethnicities.
Outsiders shouldn't meddle in ethnic conflicts other than to separate the sides as much as possible and keep them from each others throats. And yes, that requires boots on the ground, not indiscriminate bombing. And the real peacekeepers - maintaining neutrality - won't be popular with either side.
NATO may have been formed as a "purely defensive alliance" against the USSR and the Warsaw pact. It stopped being one when both were broken down. But, as any bureaucratic structure would do, NATO went searching for a new enemy to justify its existence. Plus the usual mission creep and bloat.
So it is very much about NATO. It has outlived its usefulness, as bombing of Serbia, "relief missions" and "no fly zone enforcement" show.
You're still serving up Serbian apologia here, and your equally irrelevant side-excursion into “mission creep” does nothing to obscure NATO's purely defensive purpose: it just isn't an alliance bent on aggression and conquest, except in the paranoid fantasies of an authoritarian for whom aggression is first nature.
You clearly haven't the slightest notion of what librarianship is all about, much less what librarians themselves know and believe. They certainly aren't spokespeople for governments, or any other kind of institutional authority, including legacy media. Last November, America's ideologically captured legacy media assured readers and viewers that the country's presidential election was going to be very close, but that Harris (for whom they were plainly rooting) would probably win it. My sources, in contrast, predicted Trump would win 312 electoral votes, exactly what he ended up with. But what could I, a librarian, possibly know about information source reliability, despite having spent years interacting with information providers and giving them feedback on the limitations of their products?
As for librarians' knowledge of the vast subject matter libraries embrace, that obviously varies from individual to individual and could never be complete. In my own case I have, in addition to the usual graduate degree in information science, a philosophy M.A. and a reading background in literature and intellectual history that would leave yours in the dust, I assure you (how up to speed are you on Husserl's phenomenology of internal time consciousness; have you read much Marcel, Heidegger or Jaspers lately?).
In terms of wide familiarity with subject matter I was by no means exceptional among my former colleagues; there are eight thousand books in my home library alone, and the reference library where I worked had millions. Strictly speaking, none of this is relevant to one's ability to navigate the information commons, of course, which is a skill librarians have in spades and that improves with experience. I mention the subject expertise for your benefit, since you're plainly winging it here and have zero understanding of what professional librarians actually do (reading of reviews, book selection, preparation of special indexes, experimenting with new information products, etc.) when they don't happen to be sitting at an information desk serving library users.
Incidentally, there's no such thing as 'disinformation' or 'misinformation.' We tend to say we're misinformed as a shorthand for saying we've been given information that's inaccurate or unreliable in some other way, but everything that comes to our attention is information: ontologically, 'disinformation' and 'misinformation' are null sets. What we're normally concerned to know about information is its truth status and relevance, and these are matters that can only be settled by empirical investigation. 'Disinformation' and 'misinformation' are labels in the censor's arsenal: they pretend we already have answers to questions we haven't even been allowed to ask yet, and that authoritarians at both ends of the ideological spectrum seek to prevent us from asking.
Librarians have the opposite impulse: since the public's judgment can be no more reliable than the sources that inform it, ensuring public access to the widest range of sources possible ('official' and otherwise) is their apolitical, non-ideological, non-propagandistic aim.
Nicely done, and with none of the hallmarks of AI like so many here! Clearly no relation to the Hyannisport clan of pedos and drug dealers.
Mark, intervening in a foreign conflict is not "defensive" in nature and only a brainwashed lunatic could possibly suggest that. NATO was not attacked, and yet, it used military force against a nation that did nothing to attack NATO. This is, by definition, in violation of your claim of NATO being a defensive alliance.
Britain wasn't attacked in 1914 or 1939, so I guess the Brits weren't really intervening in a foreign conflict to defend Belgium, France and Poland after all. The shelf ranges of history books that agree these were Britain's reasons for entering those conflicts were written by brainwashed lunatics—or at any rate big fibbers.
Canada wasn't attacked in either world war, yet fought in both; so I guess Canadians too are just pathologically aggressive. How lucky for Ukraine it doesn't share a border with Canada! Oh, wait... it shares one with Poland, another aggressive NATO member. Ukrainians are doomed—unless maybe they can persuade Mother Russia to save them from their misguided anti-Russian resistance and associated follies. Save us from ourselves, Vlad! We don't know who our friends are.
You and Tashaj should get married.
So whenever the west comes up with logic to attack a nation that never attacked it, that’s defensive. Iraq was a defensive war, as was Afghanistan, as was Libya, as was Vietnam. After all, we were defending the French and the south Vietnamese democratic nationalists, right?
In your world, these are all defensive acts.
Your use of the word 'logic' for this kind of fallacious, slippery slope argument isn't just fraudulent, it suggests you've never opened a book of logic in your life and wouldn't know Modus Ponens from Modus Tollens, or any other rule of inference. If you're going to post here, please at least don't commit fraud... and don't insult people's intelligence either. Nothing in what was previously said about the specific circumstances of Britain's and Canada's entries into two world wars commits anybody to any view about the behaviour of other nations in other circumstances in other wars.
Do you even know what a counter-example is? The existence of one black swan suffices to show that the categorical claim, “All swans are white,” is false. We don't need to produce any more non-white swans: one is enough. The WWII example already cited sufficed to show that your claims about what categorically (“by definition”) qualifies as aggression and defense among nations and alliances are false; no additional historical counter-examples are needed, from Iraq, Vietnam, or anyplace else. One pinprick let the air out of a balloon that you made a very easy target.
For the record, preemptive action has always been an option open to defense—frequently a necessary one, if the defenders are to survive—something that's been known since antiquity. There's no rule that says defenders threatened by aggressors have to passively wait until they're attacked before taking measures to ensure their safety; that's not a requirement for accurately calling oneself a defender.
I thought that "dinner with the friend" was illuminating, certainly the most interesting part of the piece. The American left (Dr Matt) has it's point of view, quite unlike the Russian friend's, or in fact the friend's wife. I find it hard to regard any American perspective on this conflict as altogether accurate. What a tangled web we humans weave!
How did the US re
Tedious and repetitive. Trump has been significantly more willing to negotiate with Putin than Biden, but that's apparently gotten him exactly nowhere. Despite Bivens' claim that Trump won't give in to Putin's demand that NATO stop expanding towards Russia, what actually appears to be true is that Putin won't seriously negotiate because he expects to defeat Ukraine on the battlefield. And maybe Putin is right, but that's not Trump or the West's fault.
Consider the lies from the West to Russia and I suspect that after Minsk 1 and Minsk 2, the Russians are a bit skeptical of what the West is trying to sell them......also, Russia has been consistent in their conditions for suspending the SMO. The real victims here are the Ukrainian population whose interests are ill served by the corrupt state installed after Maiden. If you have any interest in the backstory I recommend Provoked by Scott Horton.
And again!! Russia abided by Minsk!! How can anyone tak you seriously???
Yes, I wondered about that claim, too. (about NATO)
Nothing is Trump's fault to cult members. None of the policies of his own government are Trump's fault. None of the directives Trump leads are his fault. The sanctions that he bragged about just this week are not his fault. Trump is an eternal victim. Cry me a river.
Don't be such a pompous infant. I am not a member of his 'cult'. In fact, you have no idea what my politics are.
Wow, another point of view on the Russian-Ukraine War.. I mean, different from the one we are fed more or less continually...
The late Stephen F Cohen's War with Russia? remains a valuable guide to the origins of this conflict. Highly recommended.
Re the war, no one has clean hands, except maybe Trump.
The average American probably has a lot more in common with the average Russian person, than we have with the average person from most other countries. The evil that exists within our government helped create and spur on that which exists in the Russian government. I think the US .Gov (and the West, in general) made a lot of mistakes after the Berlin wall came down - and most importantly, we showed that we couldn’t be trusted to keep our word.
Also, about 20,000,000 Russians / Soviets died in WW-2 - let that sink in.
The Soviets murdered between (depending on the historian - few records) between 20 and 50 million of its own citizens. Let that sink in.
20M killed in a war, and 20M killed by a communist dictator / regime . . . Pardon me , but I see a big difference.
Yeah, me too. And 20m is very much on the low side of estimates. I'm not sure whether it includes the 4m Ukrainians killed during the Holodomor (two periods, actually). Might have something to do with their current truculence.
As for WWII, I rarely hear it mentioned that the U.S. provided vital food and military aid to keep the Soviet Union afloat vs. Nazi Germany. Russians don't like to acknowledge that, and most Americans don't even know about it.
Russia has so much potential, great people. Unlike countries like Sweden, Britain, Portugal and Spain, they just can't seem to get past their imperial history.
Sea Sentry - you DO know that Russia was an ally during WWII along with Britain, et al.
It was a complicated alliance, one where the Russians always seemed to cut the better deal. The “alliance “ with Russia was not comparable to that with Britain.
Stalin's desperate alliance with the West began after Hitler broke the Molotov Ribbentrop alliance to divide Poland and began Operation Barbarossa to take all of the USSR. "Did you really want to talk about history, or were you just making chitchat?" - Not Phil Conners in Groundhog Day
Ah yes the mystical “ Holdomor” which has been challenged and debunked. Watch movies by Oliver Stone on Ukraine and read the Famine history that occurred both in Russia and in Ukraine( then part of Russia). Nazi and UK spread narratives- works when your goal is to vilify and break up Russia for its resources - heh just like today (right Cookies Nuland?)
No serious historian “debunks” the Holodomor, Carol. And “break up Russia for its resources “ is laughable. My conclusion is that your name is not “Carol”.
And Soviet apologists ignore the fact that the US provided aid to the USSR during the war.
I repeat, Russia was an ally. For the love of Pete, do they not teach history, or do people just not pay attention.
The average American had more in common with the average German in WWII than the average person from most other countries. Isolationism worked then and is working now among a few uninformed and entitled. Let the Russians have Ukraine and torture as much as they want as long as it ends all the fuss.
How are Trump's hands clean?
He kept this war going, after he promised to end it on "Day 1."
All he had to do was stop sending weapons and money to Zelenskyy, & he couldn't even do that.
Seriously thats all you have guess you are blaming Trump for this war too right? FFS 🤦♂️
I do not blame Trump for starting this war, but I do blame him for perpetuating it.
How has he perpetuated it?
By failing to stop shipments of arms and by not cutting off funding.
Heaven forbid you blame those involved like the UK the EU and of course Ukraine and Russia🙄🙄🙄
Of course I blame the EU and the UK.
Ukraine and Russia are just providing the chess board. This is all an exercise of the Military Industrial Complex.
Trump promised to end the war, teasing that he would get tough with Putin, not eliminate all aid to Ukraine but sell weapons to countries concerned about war crime and illegal invasion of a neighbor.
I agree with you about Professor Cohen's book, "War with Russia?".
Europe is clearly the most violent, domineering continent on the planet. The two world wars proved that, as did hundreds of years of colonial conquest around the world. Why the United States continues to involve itself in European affairs is a question all Americans should be asking. If the Europeans aren't civilized enough to keep themselves from one another's throats, why should we be constantly rushing to their "rescue"?
One word - money. It's always and only ever about that.
Ditto
We know why..All the bankers live there..When they are not at their vacation homes in the USA..$$$ Wars are started by governments & governments are run by donors..
I’m not informed enough on all the details & background of this conflict to judge. However, I do know our LEADERS have lied to us too many times to accept anything they’re telling us in general or this war in particular.
The idea that there is plenty of blame to go around for the Russia-Ukraine War seems to be a hard concept for many on this comment page to grasp.
Remember, Comrade: the war started because the mad imperialist Putin woke up bored one morning in February 2022 and thought, "You know what is problem with Mother Russia? Not big enough! Dmitri, send in the tanks!"
War propaganda has (yet again) rotted people's minds.
Love the gaslighting “ comrade”
Interesting point of view but NATO expansion is a poor excuse for an illegal annexation of the Crimea and a brutal attack on a neighbor. Putin has imperial ambitions but a reach that barely extends past his borders. You argue that US defense contractors are responsible for prolonging the war. Putin is solely responsible for that. I suppose you believe that Ukraine should simply surrender or that the West should repeat the Munich mistake and simply hand Czechoslo-Ukraine over to Putin.
You are the sort of Massachusetts neighbor that makes it such an odd state to live in. Belief is more important than reality. The military industrial complex is the root of all evil. As a doctor you would be better qualified to comment on why Beth Israel is driving patients to its wholly-owned subsidiaries and making it difficult for patients to keep their PCPs.
"Putin has imperial ambitions..." How do you know that, except what the NY Times prints?
He has repeatedly said in public that the breakup was ""The greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the century." for Russia. He thinks the invasion points into his country need to be held by his army. Is that "imperial" depends on your point of view.
If you look at the context of this and similar statements, it has nothing to do with the loss of territory. Putin is talking about how much suffering the breakup caused.
More than 2 million people were forcibly uprooted from the Central Asian republics and had to relocate, mostly to Russia. Oftentimes with nothing but the clothes on their backs. Older people lost their hard-earned pensions because they couldn't document employment in the former Soviet republics. Families ended up split between countries. And so on.
Actually it does. Putin has claimed those land invasion routes are vital to the future of Russia.
Citation, please.
Yes, Russia's sovereignty and safety.
I know that, but that doesn't mean "imperial" or at least any more imperial than many other big countries, say USA, Brazil, China, India, Indonesia... I hate to be defending the likes of Putin, but geopolitics, especially the ever present desire by the West to take everything that's not nailed down kind of leads Russia to act the way it does. I remember in Moscow they had this big snow machine that had two horizontal arms that gathered up snow, which went up into a conveyor, to an end dump truck to be carted off. You know what people called this thing? Capitalist, because it gathers everything up! So that might be an informal indication of what it looks like from a Russian point of view.
So what would the machine that imitates Russian “democracy” and “kleptocracy ” look like? I suspect one of those sex tools so popular in the 70s.
I believe that he followed that up with something to the effect of "but only a fool would seek to recreate it." This oft-repeated quote is very much taken out of context.
Right-when a tyrant with a large army says he is not going to invade, we are supposed to believe him? Ask the Ukrainians. Thanks for your contribution Neville.
So if America fell apart like the Soviet Union and then one day we had a president who remarked that this was the worst geopolitical catastrophe of the century, would these same idiots be claiming that is evidence of imperial ambitions?
Not comparable. Russia is has always been imperial and open about it expanding by invasion and conquering. The US had an imperial period in the late 19th century (manifest destiny) but has retreated to economic hegemony of late.
Don’t read the Times because it is so woke and pretentious. Restoring the USSR is equivalent to restoring the Russian empire and by definition Imperial. Putin is clearly trying to return to a greater Russia larger than ethnic Russia. You can quibble about words but the intent has been clearly stated. For example:
“Both Russians, and Ukrainians, and Belarusians are heirs of Ancient Rus, which was the largest state in Europe. Slavonic and other tribes across a vast territory — from Ladoga, Novgorod and Pskov to Kyiv and Chernihiv — were united by one language (which today we call Old Russian), by economic ties, by the rule of princes of the Rurik dynasty, and after the baptism of Rus — by one Orthodox faith.”
TeeJae's got it right. It used to be the Russian Empire, so in the sense of trying to restore it, maybe. But it's historical. Ukraine actually means "borderland" and was where the Rus originated (Kyiv) so the two are tied together. I'm not really in favor of big countries--sometimes I think the US itself would be better off breaking into smaller ones, especially with the current polarized situation, so I don't think Russia has some divine or historical right to be big, but it is, anyway.
So, is it our mission to make sure Russia is not restored to its previous empire? Is it worth fighting a war over? I think it's more about the West having unobstructed access to their mineral wealth, and nothing about freedom, democracy, etc. I also think the idea that Russia wants to take over Europe or something like that is far-fetched.
No one in the US really cared much about Ukraine, except maybe the Bidens before Putin invaded. If we cared about mineral wealth we would invade the Congo. The whole mineral deal came from Trump wanting to get something in return for all the support given. After WW2 Britain and France owed huge sums “borrowed” from the US. The loans magically turned into gifts because of the Soviet threat. Same with a lot of other countries. The “evil US” is a stereotype that has been wrong more times than not. Russia’s stereotype is Stalin, who Putin admires.
The West was after Russia’s resources all the way back to the Russian Empire and the Tsars. I don’t know what you’re talking about with “Russia’s stereotype”— do you mean from the West’s point of view, or from Russia’s point of view?
Don’t know what you are referring to. Prior to 1917 Russia was mainly an agricultural country. Napoleon did not seek resources. If you argue that Hitler was part of the “West” he sought oil but was more interested in ethnic cleansing. No one else cared. Plenty of other resources to fight over in the Middle East and Africa.
That sounds like a description of Russia's history; not plans for Russia's future.
He says that they are now heirs of a common heritage. His actions toward Belarus as a vassal and Ukraine as a target show what his words mean.
Russia would just as soon not take the territory if they could eliminate the threat vector without needing to do so.
Oh please. Ukraine invading Russia is absolutely ludicrous. What next, Finland’s territorial ambitions? Or perhaps Estonian paratroops landing on the Kremlin? Siberian tigers uplift by genetic terrorists?
Let Russia try & put a military in Cuba & see how the US behaves.
There were no foreign troops in the Ukraine. And for better or worse the Monroe doctrine and the difficulty of projecting power from Europe/Asia into the Americas has made Cuba a special case. Note that America hasn’t attacked Cuba since 1962 despite Russian advisors and Cuban troops in conflicts all over the world. I could see your point if Ukraine was arming and training separatists in the former USSR republics.
Putin having imperial ambitions is a propaganda meme that has absolutely no basis in reality, Russian geopolitical policy, or Putin's own personal ambitions. This is made up entirely out of hysteria and fear. There is no evidence whatsoever to back this up.
Except invading Ukraine twice now. And threatening nuclear war if thwarted. Doesn’t sound ambitious at all.
Invading a country is not in itself imperial.
Now you are splitting hairs. Would you like “territorial aggrandizement” better?
This article humanizes the Russian people. There is something very subversive about that.
You mean they are not just a bunch of "greasy" hicks? ... Not just Appalachia with a Russian accent? Get outta here! How are we supposed to hate if we persist in humanizing our "enemy"?
Best comment yet. lol
Huh? Humanizing people is somehow subversive??.
I think he means it in a good/sarcastic way.
Duh, went right over my head. Oops😉
Wow, Russians nice peace-loving people, and Putin a poor, terrified leader trying to stave off NATO invasion.
Funny, not my experience, they are overwhelmingly paranoid imperialists a couple of centuries too late.
And all this stuff blaming the US for everything is delusional.
But it is a pity that we’re going to have to kill so many of them to give Europe back peace.
Let Europe sort it out this time, enough of our people getting killed.
Ukraine is going to be destroyed and Europe is going to be fed in their place like fodder.
1. If I could "Like" this article thousands of times, I would! 2. I wish I could have visited Russia with you and your family; as I've always wished to visit. But other places, other wars, came and went on their own (and my) time. 3. As a now-senior American military and combat veteran, I've met and known some interesting Russians, and ironically a few Ukrainians - when it, too, was Russia. I liked them all - for their droll humor, their cynical worldview, their beautiful women, and their friendship. I look forward to reading your remaining notes. My biggest fear is, as Le Carré wrote, "... in the fight for peace not a stone will be left standing." (... в борьбе за мир не останется камня на камне.) Бог с тобой.
Excellent and most enlightening article. Also heartbreaking and enraging.
Such a damnable war that never, ever should have happened, much less gone on this long. Tragic doesn’t come close to describing it. 💔
Heartbreaking?
For the brain dead monsters killing Ukrainians in their homes and schools??
Oh please, Fooooookoff
Yes. For them, as well as the hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians who’ve been forced to die in this senseless war.
At this point it almost doesn’t matter whose fault it was for starting it, but it is now clearly both sides fault for allowing it to go on as it does.
No. Putin and Russia could end it tomorrow. Stop and go home. What are they fighting for?? What is their goal??
IT ALWAYS MATTERS who started it Suzie. No one is FORCING Ukraine to fight on, my dear. They want to save their country. Ukrainians dont get shot by their commander if they retreat from the front. Russians do.
A recent Gallup poll indicates only 24% of Ukrainians favor continuing this war.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/693203/ukrainian-support-war-effort-collapses.aspx
I hear you and am inclined to agree with you.
That being said, the behavior and actions of Zelensky, the EU and the Biden administration from the run up to this war, (including the Maiden revolution), and after Russia invaded, cannot go unmentioned. It has been odd, to say the VERY least and they have far from the purest motives in both their prosecution of it and their total lack of interest the last three years, in any meaningful way, of finding a way for it to end .
Im confused. The Maidan was a protest uprising against the continued infiltration of Ukrainian politics and society by Russian operatives and propagandists. The people had ENOUGH of the corruption and oppression of Russian revanchists, like Putin. This has NOTHING to do with the US or anyone else. The only input the US had was to support the Western-leaning pols to give them some resources to combat Russian influence. Trying to paint its as the US “engineered” ANYTHING is ludicrous. It’s not up to the West to end the war — that’s up to the combatants. If Ukraine does not want to surrender 20% - or ANY - of their country to Russian invaders, well, we are OBLIGED to help them - we signed an agreement to do precisely that when they gave up 1,300 nuclear warheads. I bet they regret not keeping a few to remind Russia that MAD is more than a phrase.
The travesty the Biden group crated was not giving Ukraine what it needed to finish the 2023 counteroffensive. They had Russia in chaotic retreat, but ran out of munitions and had no air support to cut Russian logistics behind the lines. 20 F-16s, 100 ATACMS and a bunch more HIMARS likely saw Russia pushed back to the border. THAT was our mistake — too little, not too much.
Ukraine is starting to completely lay waste to Russia’s energy complex. Oil refining, oil storage, gas transmission, and thermal electric generation. All are getting SLAMMED. A couple more months. Be strong,
The CIA fomented the Maidan coup.
You are Russian. Do you think there is any scenario you could possibly conceive of where Putin would actually hold up a white flag and surrender? I don’t.
And as this war now only continues to escalate things can go all sorts of wrong in all sorts of unimaginable ways.
Bringing the two together - now - with no clear victor - is, to my mind, the only way to avoid far graver and unthinkable consequences for the wider world for not having done all in our power toward that end.
It may seem distasteful, even repugnant for you to think of doing that, but the alternative is simply far too great a risk to take IF a way out can be forged now.
Just a tiny pointer, the Maidan happened under Obama...though genocide Joe was vice president....John Kerry was secretary of state. Read Provoked by Scott Horton for more details.
I’ve been reading a Substack author named Andrew Korybko who is Russian and has been excellent with his reporting on the “Special operation” as he calls it. Lately though he has slipped and called it a war. If anyone wishes to become more informed on the region I’d say give him a read. The CIA was the reason this whole thing started. They had like 20 “secret bases” in Ukraine and one was even dug underground into Russia. These assholes made it so Putin had enough. Instead of him coming out and blaming the US he went in to force them out leading to this shit show. You also cannot leave out the Brits in this. Boris Johnson and his buddy who have large stakes in defense contractor who is selling them arms to defend themselves. Ukraine isn’t above board here either with the corruption as oligarchs there are snapping up mansions in Switzerland. There’s fuckery going on all around and now it’s just a money making endeavor even for Zelensky. Look up his Wife’s spending habits as shopping sprees. This needs to end.
Andrew is a paid Russian propagandist, often reprinted on Zero hedge.
There wer no “secret bases” or “biolanbs”.
NOT ONE has ever been found, even though Russia held almost half the country at one point.
STOP THE RUSSIAN PROPAGANDA, COMRADE
Victoria Nuland did not deny the presence of Ukrainian biolabs:
"Nuland did not deny this: at all. She instead — with palpable pen-twirling discomfort and in halting speech, a glaring contrast to her normally cocky style of speaking in obfuscatory State Department officialese — acknowledged: 'uh, Ukraine has, uh, biological research facilities.'”
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/victoria-nuland-ukraine-has-biological
I believe Toria Nuland (who helped engineer the CIA coup in 2014 overthrowing Yanukovych, the democratically elected leader of Ukraine in UN-proctored elections) was quite excited when Russians took some of those "non-existent" biolabs:
youtube.com/watch?v=qRxi4QLQITY&t=2s
You seem to advocate Biden's eradication of Russian language, culture and ethnic Russian Ukrainians from Ukraine. Is Stepan Bandera (or Hitler) your Hero, as he was named "Hero of Ukraine" by Yushchenko (after he lost the election with less than 7% of the vote)? I believe Zelensky was elected with >70% of the vote running on a "Peace with Russia" platform? But elections are for democracies...
Oh, yeah, RIGHT. Nuland got 1.5 MILLION Ukrainians out in the street to protest Yanukovych who took Putin’s cash and flipped from pro-EU to Russian Nazi. PLEASE STOP. You make my head hurt. Eradication of Russian..BLAHBLAHBLAH. Bandera is a minor figure, please stop the Russian garbage. Yanukovich fled Ukraine. Where did he go? Brussels? London? New York?? NO HE WENT TO RUSSIA.
This endless repetition of Putin’s talking points is so boring, friend. No one was radicating “ethnic Russians.” Everyone there has the same DNA freak.
He might be but he doesn’t only write about Russia and I’ve had discussions and debates with him where he had his mind changed. I’ve called him out on his bias sometimes and he’s always been nice to me and trust me I’m no pro Russia guy. I’m as Right as they come but I’m not blind either.
I have never seen him write anything outside the FSB-approved narrative. But I did stop reading him a while ago, TBH
I get what you’re saying and I can see it and I’m guessing it’s possible he is a sanctioned writer for them because I’ve seen people really go at him for it but as far as that part of Europe he gives news you ain’t seeing anywhere. It was only $60. He has been nice to me and he was just real sick and didn’t elaborate what happened so maybe he got out of line and they poisoned him. The Ukraine is a fucked up situation with plenty of fault to go around.
I’m no Bivens fan either. I quit following a long time ago and I a little pissed Matt allowed him on Racket.
The Russian people have never experienced decent leadership in their entire history. From monarchy to communist dictatorship. A visit to St. Petersburg was eye-opening. Dour, withdrawn people in the streets. Ugly buildings-prison like. Our tour bus picked up two young military looking males likely KGB, so conversations were duly truncated. I marveled at the artwork, but could not wait to get the hell out.
Thanks for regaling us with your expertise, doc
If you have better, post it. I can only relate what I experienced and it was not good and I would never go back. Consider that regalia.
Putin is a far superior leader than Trump or Biden.
Countries familiar with Russian dominance joined NATO because they never want Russia to visit them again. In Putin's February 21, 2022 address, he echoed imperial ambitions, lamenting the collapse of the Soviet Union and framing Russia as the rightful heir to a broader Eurasian civilization. If Russia fears the NATO alliance, these countries made the right choice.
Countries joining NATO after 1991:
1999
Warsaw Pact countries: Poland, Czech Republic, Hungary
2004
Soviet Republics: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania.
Warsaw Pact: Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria
2009
Warsaw Pact: Albania (until 1968)
Non-aligned, Soviet-leaning: Croatia
2017
Non-aligned *Yugoslav republic: Montenegro
2020
Non-aligned *Yugoslav republic: North Macedonia
2023
Neutral but under Soviet/Russian pressure: Finland[ization]
2024
Response to Russian invasion of Ukraine: Sweden
*Yugoslavia was the first and only communist country to successfully defy
Stalin and survive. The Soviet Union continued to pressure Yugoslavia but never regained control.
Yeah, they had a choice. They certainly didn't choose to stick with Russia, and there shouldn't be any argument about that.