Comments by "" (@timogul) on "TLDR News EU"
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If Russia is worried that NATO might attack them on humanitarian grounds, then maybe they could just. . . stop being so inhumane to their own people? I mean, wouldn't removing the pretext remove even the hint of a threat?
On point 2, if you view NATO as being "anti-evil," maybe just. . . don't be evil?
On point three, when everyone to your west is "a hammer," maybe you're just a nail? The same groups that messed with Russia over the past 300 years tended to be attacking everyone else too. Napoleon invaded Russia, but also he invaded every other part of Europe. Hitler invaded Russia, but also he invaded every other part of Europe. Russia isn't special, bub, you're just the same as everyone else.
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Any country in which a country might choose to incorporate while not being the place where that company's executives live and work, is a tax haven. There is no reason why any business would be incorporated in a Swiss PO Box other than tax avoidance, so as long as that practice remains active, they are a tax haven. If they want to stop being a tax haven, then stop allowing that practice.
I personally think that the larger industrialized countries of the world should join together and sign up to a "tax fairness zone," in which a tax "minimum wage" is set up, with the rule being that if this minimum amount is set at, say, 30%, then ANY business that operates in ANY of these countries will be expected to pay a total of 30% tax to someone. If they just pay that 30% to their home country, then fine, burden covered. If, however, they set up in some tax haven with an 8% rate, and only pay 8%, then they will still owe 22% to someone, and will have to pay it off. That money needs to be passed into the hands of some government, a sort of "you don't have to go home, but you can't stay here" policy. If they're going to be offloading that money anyway, then it may as well go to the country they are physically established in anyway, rather than off to some tax haven.
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@TheMajorpickle01 I can get why Turkey would want people to use the toll road, and I get why they would want to force a renegotiation on the treaty. My point though is that if the treaty says "you aren't allowed to mess with the natural waterways," then building a canal would not suddenly allow them to "mess with the waterways if you like." They should still be required to leave those natural waterways unobstructed and allow nature to takes its course.
Realistically, if the current average wait time is, say, ten hours, and they do build the canal, and some portion of the traffic decides to pay to use it, then that would actually reduce the traffic on the natural routes, reducing wait times even further, so they might go away completely, causing people to not use the toll lane, causing wait times to go up, etc. ;) But either way, they should never end up higher than they would be without the canal.
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@bicualexandru246 Everything has perceived value, even gold. Gold has no inherent value to it, I mean if you were on a desert island, which would be of more value to you, a pound of gold or a pound of canned soup? Gold only has value in what things you can buy with it, and likewise a dollar only has value in what things you can buy with it, and just as the amount you can get with a dollar will go up and down based on all sorts of complex values, the amount you can get with a pound of gold will go up and down over time.
The only difference is that the value of gold is not terribly agile, it will only rise and fall relative to production, and the relative value of other things, whereas a fiat currency they have ways to adjust the value on the fly by tweaking things like interest rates, so that they can adjust the value of the currency to the right balance between low inflation and economic productivity.
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On the one hand, I think that the bar to be able to punish people for speech should be very high, allowing a wide margin of speech, because any system of deciding "good" or "bad" speech can be open to abuse. On the other hand, speech can often lead to criminal acts, so I would also believe in a system of increased scrutiny based on ones speech. Basically, if you tend ot do a lot of hate speech, that might not land you in jail, but it should land you on watch lists and maybe send active surveillance after you, because the speech is indication that you're more likely to actually do bad things. Then of course if there is evidence of an actual criminal plot, they can take appropriate measures to shut it down.
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@cryptarisprotocol1872 We've sanctioned bigger countries in the past. You make the sanctions proportionate to the harm, you wouldn't employ the same massive sanctions on India that are currently being put on Russia since their harm is lower, but it wouldn't be unheard of for various countries to just put out a tariff, or to cut direct government assistance, or just pull one of the many levels connecting the two nations.
Like I said, I doubt anyone will sanction India over this, but they obviously could if they wanted to.
And yes, the west does need India to counterbalance China, but India also needs the west to counterbalance China. they would prefer to not strain that relationship if they can help it. Sanctions are not the end of the conversation, they are just a part of the process. If someone does something horrible, like invade a neighbor, then you bring down the hammer. If they just annoy you in a meaningful way, then you just give them a little pinch (and this goes both ways, of course, plenty of countries take economic jabs at the US when we annoy them, it's just how the game is played).
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@cryptarisprotocol1872 No, RUSSIA killed 20,000 civilians. Ukraine did not. The war in donbass prior to Russia's direct invasion was a proxy war between the Ukraine forces and separatists backed by Russia. Even adding up all civilian casualties in the region that only amounted to 3400 killed, most of those by the Russia side. I have no idea where you are getting your "20,000" figure, if you are not referencing the numbers of Ukrainian civilians killed by Russia in Mariupol.
As for "what is genocide," the definition is pretty clear. "The deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group"
Russia announced that Ukraine did not exist as a nation, that they did not deserve to exist as a nation, and went about obliterating civilian populations without any regard for their humanity. That is genocide. This could not be compared to "collateral damage," because the civilians dying was not an unavoidable consequence of pursuing valid military targets, they were deliberately targeting purely civilian areas. They clearly intend to wipe out Ukrainians as a nation and group.
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@wothin >They are not socialist.
Of course they are. And you haven't even made a case why modern Europe would be going after socialist countries in the first place.
>People will always judge. Russia also claimed that in annexed Crimea based on humanitarian concerns. The point of pretext is so that one has plausible deniability.
Pretext does not add or remove plausible deniability. If the pretext is a valid one, like an actual humanitarian crisis, and the result is that you leave the country better than you found it, then that's fine. If the prexted is some imaginary humanitarian crisis that nobody actually believes existed in the first place, and the result is that you've annexed the country for your own purposes and its conveniently placed sea port, nobody cares that you attempted a pretext. The pretext is irrelevant if it is not valid. It's like throwing a sheet over an elephant and asking people to guess "what could be under there?!"
>And yet you protect the USA in their irrational paranoia in case the Cuban missile crisis. Hypocrite is being hypocritical.
Different situation, different outcome. There was no paranoia to the US response to the Cuban missile crisis. It was just a different scenario.
>Yes Russia is destabilizing things. So what now? The goal should be that in the long term Europe is stable and peaceful.
And that's a fair goal, but it can't come at the cost of Russia gaining ground via aggression. Every act of aggression they take must be met with a higher cost, otherwise they will just keep taking two steps forward, one step back "just to stabilize things," and they're still one step ahead of where they were. They still haven't given Crimea back. They still have not pulled out of Eastern Ukraine, and now they are threatening more violence. They need to give back what they have taken if they expect the west to give them any concessions. They haven't even offered to do so.
>To give you an extreme analogy, that's like escalating up to a nuclear war and then being happy that it was the "other's" fault, while millions of people died from nuclear war and many are dying because of nuclear fallout. It's like you don't care about the damage from the escalation, you only care about your pride and the false sense of being right.
So to continue your analogy, how far is too far, to prevent Putin from unilaterally starting a nuclear apocalypse? Say he takes Ukraine. "No big deal, better to be stable?" And then maybe Lithuania? Not that big a deal, right? Latvia, Estonia? Finland maybe? Sweden, better pick up Norway just to complete the set. Poland, Romania, Hungary, let's leave the Balkans alone for now, but Turkey might be nice. Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, at what point is "stability" not worth saying "maybe don't do that?"
We all want to avoid a war, but Putin is the one starting wars. We all want to avoid a nuclear apocalypse, but you can be damned sure that the west won't fire that first nuke. Just because Russia has nuclear weapons and might be crazy enough to use them, that's no reason to give in to their demands. If anything it's a good reason NOT to, because anyone that you fear might use nukes to get their way, is someone you can't trust with any more authority than you have to.
>Yes, but can you realistically throw Vladimir in jail without suffering massive damage yourself? No, you can't. It's all cute that you act on principles, but the real world does not work like that.
Ok, you've established where you stand. I can barely see you down there.
>We talked about the Baltics. You apparently find it totally justified for them to be afraid of Russia invading them back then when they joined NATO.
I never claimed that they were justified in being afraid of Russia invading them when they joined NATO. What would that have to do with anything? NATO used to be about the USSR, but since the fall of the Soviet Union it has nothing to do with Russia, aside from Russia wanting it to be about them for some reason. The Baltics joined NATO because it's generally a good club to be in, not because they had any fear of Russia specifically.
>Yet you conveniently don't care that the West invaded Russia around the same time ago, with much bigger casualties.
Yes, because, again, that was before most of our lifetimes and completely irrelevant to modern geopolitics.
>Again, whether you personally think something is justified has no relevance.
But my position more closely aligns with that of the rest of the world on the matter, and what the world personally thinks about things matters very much. Again, a bully can get away with a lot by throwing his violence around, but he will always be viewed as a bully, and treated as a bully, and that is not how you make friends. If Russia was less of a bully, maybe all their neighbors wouldn't prefer being friends with Europe.
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Would it be possible to just trade Donbas for Ukraine in total? What I mean is, institute a formal treaty that says, on the one side, Russia gets Donbas, in full, no squirley language, Donbas is just a part of Russia now. But in return for that, the rest of Ukraine becomes fully part of Europe, if not a full EU member, then at least a part of NATO, and/or other guarantees of support and protection that should keep any pro-Russian future off the table entirely. Could Russia agree to that? Could the Ukrainian people accept it?
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@Gwyrddu Under normal conditions, it would be complicated, and they will not let them join while actively at war, but given the extreme risk they are now under, if them joining it part of a peace deal, NATO might agree. And Turkey will allow Finland and Sweden to join, they just need to get their beak wet first.
While I think Ukraine could hurt Putin badly, and drive them off for a bit, lead to a "peace deal," if the only thing holding it together is Putin's promise to not invade again, then it will never last. The minute they get the Russian forces back across the border they will start plans for "Invade Ukraine 2," and start building up their forces in preparation for that. Another invasion could come within a year, or at most maybe five. They need some stronger international framework that would keep Putin away for good.
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I don't believe in purely demand-side decriminalization. That was what Prohibition was in the US, and it didn't work, because drug dealers will always meet demand, and that leads to crime, and it is the drug-related crime that is the real problem, not the use. I believe the best course is total decriminalization, along with government provided drugs for those that need them. Government sanctioned facilities would sell drugs at cost, but only to those with a prescription from a highly regulated specialist doctor (not just anyone with an MD), and the sales of those drugs would go to fund drug treatment and awareness programs to try and reduce the drug use.
Remove almost all motivation for anyone to sell drugs illegally by making them legally available at affordable prices. Of course selling drugs outside of these controlled circumstances would be VERY illegal, much more harshly punished than even current laws, so it's a very carrot and stick approach. The point would be that anyone who has a drug problem could do whatever they need to do about that in a relatively safe and legal way, with low chances of overdoses or other adverse reactions, while also making it easier to quit, and harder to get into drugs in the first place.
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@themightycat7238 Well, the idea would be balance. If you have a drug problem, if you are dependent on them, then you should be able to get a prescription, and then get drugs legally. So if that applies to you, why not do that?
But if you don't have a drug problem, then it should be fairly hard to find drugs, and VERY illegal for both you and the dealers, so the risks involved should make that not as worth doing.
The idea is to sort of break the "middle" of the supply/demand cycle, to make it so that the "repeat customer" is zero value to drug dealers, which would effectively price them out of the game. I mean if they wanted to play, they could, but their costs would be astronomical, and their returns would be relatively low, so why would they even bother?
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@rutessian Ok, yes, gold does have practical purposes, but we were discussing it as a currency, and that's sort of the problem. When you use gold for currency, then you aren't doing practical things with it, it's just sitting around doing nothing. The point is, most people are not going to be printing circuits with it or anything, they just want something they can spend to buy groceries with, and in that regard, fiat currencies are better than gold backed ones.
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@danielwebb8402 Oh, this is just a massive misunderstanding about what "authoritarianism" means. It does not mean "someone tells me what to do." It means "someone tells me what to do and I have no say in the process." You can have democratic communism, which is very different than authoritarian communism. The problem with the communist governments in history were that they were built around authoritarian power structures that funneled power and authority to elites at the top. That is a problem with authoritarian power systems, not with communism, and really isn't even technically "communism" by the definition of the term, it was just a misuse of the term. Cuba is also an example of an authoritarian version, largely as an offshoot of the Soviet model that dominated the middle 20th Century.
If, on the other hand, the people can freely vote, freely elect people to represent those interests, then it is not an issue. Everyone would be required to contribute, but the systems to manage those people and determine how they contribute would be in the hands of the people.
Personally, I don't favor a fully communist system but it is still highly misunderstood, largely due to the influence that Russia and China have had on the conversation.
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@SirAlric82 Plenty of non-communist countries have also devolved into totalitarian dictatorships, like Mussolini's Italy, or Hitler's Germany. Even the US had a brush with that a couple years back. Also, the meme that "communism killed more people" is a bit nonsense, don't make a fool of yourself by spreading it. Authoritarian killed those people, not communism, and authoritarianism is the big killer.
The point is, communism is an economic model, not a political model. Most of the states you discussed were some degree of communist politically and some amount of authoritarianism politically. It was the authoritarianism that got them into trouble. Full on communism has never been fully implemented on a national scale, and is probably impractical at that level, but there are plenty of socialist nations out there that are doing as well or better than their less socialist neighbors. Successful countries tend to be a balance of factors, not fully one thing or another.
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@SirAlric82 So your argument is that even though "their ideology" has never been attempted before, "their ideology" must suck because other ideologies with the same name failed? That makes total sense.
I don't think it was at all a coincidence that so many communist countries went bad. I think that it was geopolitics. I think that the first communist country was Soviet Russia, and that most other countries in the early 20th Century were rabidly anti-communist, to the point that they elected people like Hitler and Mussolini to keep the communists out. any country that did attempt to go communist was ruthlessly crushed by outside powers as best they could be. This meant that what communist countries did emerge tended to be politically aligned with Soviet Russia, at least in their formative years, and as they say, "lie down with dogs, wake up with fleas." No communist nation has yet formed that was not ideologically founded on Soviet Russia as a base, and that is no communism at all.
It's also worth pointing out that many of the capitalist nations that the west supported in the Cold War were no less authoritarian and harmful to their own public than the Soviets. It was the right call to make at the time from a geopolitical standpoint, but no basis on which to judge the efficacy or fairness of a political ideology.
As to your second point, there is no political system on Earth that can allow people to say "no, I don't want to do that." No nation in the world functions like that. Everyone must follow the rules of the nation they are in or face punishment for it. The difference between a good nation and a bad one are that in a good nation the rules and punishments are both faith and supported by the people in general, but there will always be some who would prefer not to follow them.
Here's a simple example of how it works. Say you have an apartment of nine people, and it's gotten a bit messy. The majority of the roomates agree that they would prefer it cleaner. Now, you could go with anarchy, anyone who wants o clean can, and anyone who doesn't has no obligation. That would only lead to the lazy people doing no work and the more responsible ones taking on an undue burden. You could go with authoritarianism, one person dictates who cleans what, forcing everyone else into compliance (and realistically giving himself a lighter load, although that is not strictly necessary). And then there would be the democratic communist approach, which is that everyone discusses among themselves what the chore schedule should be and votes on the outcomes, such that some of the lazier ones might not want to do their assigned task, but they are required to do so by the consensus of the group, everyone does their fair share, everyone shares the benefit of a cleaner apartment. What is "authoritarian" about that?
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@Juho221 And yet Crimea was still a Sovereign part of Ukraine after the fall of the Soviet Union. If Russia wanted it back, they could make a fair offer to buy it, or go through proper Ukrainian legal channels to have a referendum, as happened with Scotland a few years back, but NOTHING justifies their military occupation of the area, and no state is allowed to unilaterally secede from another without the consent of the full state as a whole.
Also, the value to Ukraine is that it is part of their contiguous landmass. It has no land border with Russia. Crimea being a part of Ukraine gives them more contiguous sea access. More importantly, even IF Crimea is "useless" to Ukraine, it is still a part of Ukraine, and no country is allowed to seize part of another country, no matter how "useless" it might be.
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@Juho221 Ukraine is gaining ground consistently. The current conditions are not there for a serious push in either direction, but the weather will change, and then Ukraine will start advancing again while Russians keep dying and dying until they run out. If Putin decides to use nukes, then he's done. Russia's done. He might, but that's out of anyone's hands. Again, "Putin might be stupid enough to use nukes" would not justify allowing him to keep Ukrainian territory at the end of this, because then the ONLY lesson to be learned from this conflict is, "if I invade a place, and threaten to use nukes, I'll be allowed to KEEP IT," which will just mean he'll invade someplace else within a few years, and keep going until he's put down. Total defeat for Russia is the ONLY peaceful solution to this conflict. ALL alternatives only lead to more war in the future.
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@Juho221 Again, if "Putin might use nukes" is allowed to be a reason to not oppose him, then we may as well just hand him Europe and the rest of the world right now and skip the middleman, because he'll keep taking a bite off that apple so long as it doesn't kill him.
Ukraine is unlikely to gain ground over the winter, but they are unlikely to lose it either, and will continue pushing forward in the spring. They will have no trouble surviving the winter, even if Putin inhumanely cuts their power. The more he tries to harm civilians, the worse it will backfire on him.
Russia was clearly not in the state for THIS invasion, given how badly it's gone for them, and yet if they are allowed to walk away from it with territory gained, then that will have been a long term success for them. They cannot be allowed to have gained ANYTHING from this little adventure. If "peace" were declared today and the borders settled at their current locations, then Russia might not invade again tomorrow, or even next year, but within the next few years they would go "you know, I think more of Ukraine is actually Russia" and just swoop right into it again, maybe better prepared that time. They did it when they were allowed to keep Crimea.
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@revertrevertz5438 They have wind and solar in Antarctica. They don't freeze unless you don't bother winterizing them for some stupid reason. I'm not sure where you live, but a few years back, the US state of Texas had a big blackout. Why? Because their NATURAL GAS pipelines froze up! And because they had removed themselves from the national power grid, otherwise their neighboring states could have offset their power load. It just goes to show, avoid putting Republicans in charge of anything, right? :D
Anyway, no, wind and solar can work regardless of weather, IF the system is designed reliably. You need to ensure that you have strong battery facilities (not necessarily a generic chemical battery, but some form of energy storage), that can hold onto energy accumulated during peak periods so that you can spend it during lower periods. There are all sorts of projects being developed to store energy like that, and which is best for a given area depends on the local conditions.
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@wothin
>You mean troops? By that definition NATO still has troops in Serbia.
No, I don't mean "by troops," I mean "do they have the local politics under their thumb?" That seems from the outside to be the case. NATO has peacekeeping troops in the Balkans, but they do not act to control the politics of the region, only to prevent violence.
>Wow. You really don't get what pretext means. Pretext just means "good sounding excuse",
I wasn't saying that they could not find any pretext, I was saying that if Russia did not create humanitarian crisises, then NATO could not use "humanitarian crisis" as their pretext. They would at minimum need to find another, perhaps less plausible one. Of course, the whole point is moot since NATO is not invading Russia unless Russia continues to invade its neighbors, and even then it's extremely unlikely.
Basically, if Russia does not start problems, NATO won't finish them. So don't start problems.
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@wothin >It had much to do with it. The whole thing was about Ukraine going closer and closer to the west, and thus also eventually NATO.
But there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. They are entirely allowed to do that. Nothing about that would justify invading Crimea. EVER.
> One could also argue that NATO had no right to invade Serbia, but they did and they used their own pretexts.
Not remotely equivalent. They do not currently occupy Serbia or unilaterally consider it a part of NATO. They went in to solve a humanitarian crisis and then left them to their own devices once that had been resolved. You literally cannot compare the two things responsibly, and it's a bad faith argument to try it.
>All that could have been avoided if NATO listened more to Russia. Sure it certainly would have hurt their pride, but in would have been the better long term strategy.
No, all could have been avoided if Russia just accepted that no part of Ukraine belonged to them. "If you give the bully what he wants, maybe he'll stop punching you" is no compelling argument. The bully is still always the bad guy, not the victim for not doing enough to appease him.
> The only way Russia has Georgia under control is in the sense that unless Georgia gives up their claims on Abkhazia and South Ossetia, they are most likely never joining NATO or the EU (except if Russia collapses, though then this could be maybe even worse for Georgia). Plus they more or less force Georgia to spend their already rather small budget on their military than on their economy, thus making it even harder to meet EU requirements.
Oh is that all? Well that's barely political hegemony at all!
>NATO forces enforced the unilateral independence by Kosovo on Serbia. How on earth is this not "an act to control the politics of the region"?
Helping a region that wants independence to attain that independence is not "control," and certainly not comparable to the actions Russia has taken to unilaterally carve out "independent states" as Russian satellites. It's hard to tell whether you genuinely believe what you are saying or are just presenting convenient talking points to defend the indefensible, but if the former, you have some serious judgement issues.
>Russia does not care whether it is officially invaded by a NATO task mission or whether those NATO members use the existing NATO infrastructure and coordination to invade Russia.
But, again, nobody is invading Russia, so that point is moot. Russia is quite literally not WORTH invading. The costs of doing so under any scenario would never be justified. Russia is ONLY at any military risk if THEY are the aggressor and violence is the only way to stop them.
>Russia would gladly prefer if it could reduce the likely threat of NATO invasion diplomatically, but that was not listened to back then.
Again, for those in the back, Russia does not get a say in who joins NATO. If a country wants to join NATO, that in NO way justifies Russia doing "whatever it takes" to prevent that. If a country wants to join NATO, then Russia can ask them nicely not to, or offer them positive benefits for not joining, but is in NO way EVER justified in violence against them.
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@wothin >I mean, we can also play your naive "pretext game" or "on paper" game. Crimea after all declared unilateral independence before Russia asked them.
Lol.
You don't actually believe that. Making bad faith arguments adds nothing to the discussion.
>Again, you can repeat your pretext all you want. In the end of the day, NATO was used offensively, and "strangely" directly after the USSR dissolved. The message whether intentional or not is clear.
Again, not all pretext is equal. A justifiable pretext is not an excuse for an unjustifiable pretext. By that argument, ANY action could be justified under ANY circumstances, which is simply unworkable.
>Well, I don't care. I care about Europe being stable and not about winning on some hypothetical "morality war" on who was more morally just.
Stability as a result of capitulation is not always the ideal outcome. Neville Chamberlain agreed with you, and it helped lead to WWII. If you allow bullies to just keep taking without consequence, then they will just keep taking until there is nothing left. A just peace requires resistance to evil. Again, nothing Ukraine EVER did or threatened to do or implied that they might do was EVER justification for Russia's military actions within their borders.
>The USSR for example appeased the USA in regards to the whole Cuba missile thing. It helped out, and a potential nuclear escalation was avoided.
The USSR did not "help out" anyone. They were putting nuclear weapons in Cuba, which is what CAUSED the crisis in the first place. That they removed the problem they caused is no cause for praise.
>All polls show that most Crimeas want to be part of Russia. So yeah.
Lol, seriously, I know you're kidding here, but it really cast doubt on your credibility on the whole. The thirteenth striking of a clock is not only alarming in itself, but also that it casts doubt on the previous twelve.
>Nobody was invading the Baltics either, yet they were afraid of Russia invading them.
Russia is not the Baltics. There is no fair basis for comparison. You would have to be quite the lunatic to believe that the west is likely to invade Russia within the forseeable future.
>Sure thing, Russia will base their national security on some "trust me bro" logic.
This is how the entire rest of the world functions. It's not hard.
>The USA was also under no danger to be nuked by Cuba during the Cuban missile crisis, as long as the US did nothing aggressive, so then why was the USA so afraid, that it wanted to even invade Cuba?
The Soviet Union was much less trustworthy than the US. They were not equivalent forces in this. Pretending that they were equivalent benefits nothing.
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@wothin >I also do not believe that NATO mainly went to Kosovo out of humanitarian reasons.
Why not? What other reason could they have had? They stood to gain nothing, and gained nothing.
> So I gave you something similar naively.
It is not similar at all though. You are comparing apples to golf balls.
>Ah, and so who decides what is "justifiable" now?
the same thing that always decides what is "justifiable." Morality. Anyone can justify to themselves that their own behavior is fine, that does not mean that everyone else must agree with them on it. The point is that if one person does something, and has a valid pretext for it, and everyone agrees that he was justified in doing so, then if a second person does something very different, and declares "but pretext!" and everyone responds negatively to that, that is not hypocritical, it is just a value judgement. Some things are justified, others are not, and this has always been the case.
>I waited until you come with this default uninformed "WW2 appeasement" thing. But Kudos to you, it took somewhat longer than expected.
It's entirely accurate to your argument though. In some cases, what a bully hopes to achieve is not worth the cost of standing up to him, but there must be some sort of response or the bully will just keep bullying until nothing is left. The bully is NEVER justified in his actions under these circumstances.
>if you looked at a world map at that time, it were France and the UK who took and controlled everything, as they had colonies in almost every part of the world.
We have become less and less supportive of empire and colonialism over time. The modern standard is to not permanently annex anyone, but rather to remove autocrats where necessary to allow the people of a country to thrive on their own.
>"oooh but the USSR does not has to be afraid if it is not aggressive thing",
Exactly.
>Look and when I say something which you do not like, you simply deflect.
I have addressed many positions you have taken that I do not like. I only laugh when the positions you take are laughable.
>And now you are arbitrarily deciding what one can compare. Moving the goal post.
That is not what "moving the goal posts" means. You tried to make an unreasonable comparison point. I pointed out that this comparison was unreasonable. You use a football analogy, you were making the case that what works in high school is just as valid in the NFL. The NFL is not high school.
>One could have also argued back then that one would have to be a lunatic to believe that Russia would invade the Baltics.
One could, but one would be an idiot to do so, as Russia has invaded several of their neighbors over the past decade. It's entirely possible that Russia would invade the Baltics if they thought they could get away with it, although I don't think anyone seriously believes that would be their immediate next step. Maybe after Ukraine.
>Yes, they were not. The USA had back then much more nukes than the USSR AFAIK, around 12 times. So the USA was much more threatening.
They may have had more nukes, but were less likely to actually use any of them, because they were a more responsible world power. The USSR was an oppressive government that had no friends beyond those that they controlled via force. The US was economic allies with most of the world at that time. There was no risk to Russia beyond what risk they created themselves. It was only their aggression toward the west and their oppression of their own people that posed any risk to Russia. If Russia had released the soviet states to their own independence and stopped involving themselves in military conflicts, then the entire cold war would have evaporated.
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@wothin >They basically dismantled the last vastige of Yugoslavia.
And? What did NATO gain from that? All they did was set the country up on its best possible footing moving forward and sent it on its way. They didn't turn it into a little puppet-state or anything.
>They are quite similar.
Nope. Saying that does not make it so.
>You are still a teenager, aren't you? Who decides what is moral?
Everyone. Pretext only matters if everyone agrees that this pretext is a valid one. You can't just do what you want, declare "pretext!" and expect everyone else to be fine with that, or declare them "unfair" if they think your pretext is nonsense while another guy's pretext was accepted.
>You have to know why somebody does what it does. And Russia always was very loud about it. You can either ignore and dismiss it or you can try to address it.
I'm not arguing that Russia doesn't express reasons for their decisions, I'm only pointing out that their reasons are almost always bad ones that boil down to "we would like to do bad things, and these guys were in the way of us doing those bad things, so we had to knock them over." You can accept that these are the reasons they claim, without accepting that these are valid reasons for their actions, and can respond negatively to their actions.
>Russia is whether you like it or not powerful enough to do stuff which will bother most of Europe. So what is more important? You feeling of moral superiority or the actual stability on the ground?
"Stability" that requires allowing Russia to seize more and more territory and concessions by force is not "stability," any more than allowing a forest first to continue unchecked is "stability." "Stability" is Russia stops starting problems. So long as Russia starts problems with their neighbors, it is responsible to push them back to where they were before they started problems, not to just accept that they get whatever they want. If they want to advance and grow as a country, then they need to do so using peaceful methods, not military methods. If they cannot do this, then they do not deserve to advance.
>You laugh, when you can't respond. It's a protection mechanism in humans.
I laugh when it is a kinder response than to believe that you were serious. It is the only way to avoid the sorts of ad hominem attacks that you make, to assume that you are more capable than some of your statements would indicate if read straight.
>You did by arbitrarily saying something is unreasonable because you don't like it.
I never arbitrarily said anything was unreasonable because I didn't like it. I said it was unreasonable because it lacked reason.
>If it were so unreasonable, you could easily simply point to the logical inconsistencies, but as always you simply use pointless talking points, by acting "upset".
This is a debating falsehood used by bad faith actors. "I have said nonsense, but I refuse to accept any response you make to it, and therefore declare that you cannot respond to it, therefore, I win." Junk in, junk out. Expect nothing otherwise.
>The West has also invaded Russia over the last decades.
Nonsense. The west has not touched anything within Russian territory since WWII, and that was Nazi Germany, the side that NATO was fighting AGAINST (including the post-war West Germans). No current NATO government has ever invaded Russia. Again, there is ZERO credible threat of the west setting a single foot into Russia militarily. The ONLY military risk to Russia from NATO forces is IF Russia unilaterally attacks a neighboring country and NATO deems it necessary to intervene (or, I suppose, any other country, but their neighbors seem to be most at risk, since Russia _constantly attacks them already_).
Even such a justified, defensive war is extremely unlikely, and is particularly unlikely to cross onto Russian territory. Total war just isn't done anymore, particularly with nukes on the table.
>So when the USA, a country which increased their nuclear arsenal from a few hundreds to 25.000 within 10 years, puts nukes next to the USSR, it's no biggie. Because they are "responsible", even though they were already unhinged enough to use them. But when the USSR puts nukes next to the USA, it's apparently the aggressor.
Exactly.
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@wothin > You seriously ask what the west has from finally destroying the last vestige of a socialist state in Europe?
Yes? You don't have a serious answer? NATO hasn't gone after Norway or the Netherlands yet.
>Pretext just means that this is the "official reason" for the actual geopolitical goal. Whether somebody agrees is a different thing.
And that goes back to my original point, that if the west does something on the pretext of "humanitarian crisis," then they are still going to be judged based on whether people agree that their intervention was justified. If there is not an existing humanitarian crisis for them to intervene in, then they cannot use that pretext, so it's always best practices to not do humanitarian crisis'. Also, just because NATO uses a pretext and it is viewed as a justified action, does not mean that other people can claim that same pretext in a very different situation and be justified in being offended when nobody accepts their rationale, ie, there has never been a valid justification for anything Russia has done in Ukraine.
>Their reasons boil down to that they are super paranoid about the national security. They will, whether you like it or not, do everything to reduce that threat.
And again, "irrational paranoia" is never a valid argument. If they are that paranoid, they need to seek professional help, not invade their neighbors. Nobody on the world stage should go "oh well, Russia is insane and using that as an excuse to murder people in their neighboring countries, but they're just paranoid. . . what time is football on?"
If Russia is trying to do bad things, then their reasons for doing so become largely irrelevant to whether outside forces should act to prevent it.
>What NATO did was a very dumb thing. Instead of using Russia's fear of NATO expansion to force Russia to always play ball, because that way they could have avoided their biggest fear, NATO did the dumbest thing. In the current timeline Russia's main way to stop NATO expansion was to create frozen conflicts in Georgia and Ukraine, because looking in the past, if that did not happen, NATO would have expanded into Ukraine and Georgia. Considering how much Russia's government is willing to suffer for their national security, it would be rather easy to make Russia play ball most of the time, with NATO expansion being only a threat. But no, emotional people like you prevailed. I thank god, that during the cold war, people like you were not in power.
That would be an extremely convenient narrative for Russia, if it were true. "Just never get in their way and let them bully their neighbors all they want, because if we get involved it will just "destabilize" things. Well when Russia is trying to prevent their neighbors form joining NATO, that is destablizing things. It's not like there was a way to make Russia less paranoid, if NATO had retreated from the region, they just would have insisted on even larger retreats. Maybe let Russian forces occupy Poland, just to make sure Germany doesn't get too close or something. There never would have been a point where Russia would have been satisfied that they were safe from invisible "western aggression," and in the process, those neighbors would have been irrevocably harmed. If Russia chooses to invade Georgia or Ukraine, that is NOT the fault of NATO for being nice to those countries, it is NOT the fault of those countries wanting to be nice to the west. It is ENTIRELY the fault of Russia.
Your argument is terrible. It's like saying if Vladimir got divorced from his wife, and they had been separated for years, and then he found out that she was dating some other guy, so he went over and beat her up. Your response would have been "well, she shouldn't have dated anyone, that would only piss off Vladimir," when the only appropriate response is "throw Vladimir in jail."
>If that threat was not present, except if they were aggressive, then Russia would do everything to not be aggressive.
Oh, it's cute that you think anyone believes that.
>Yes and this is 7 decades ago. Considering people like to bring up that the USSR invaded Czechoslovakia all the time, which was 5 decades ago, this is not far off.
I certainly didn't bring it up. I don't think I've ever heard anyone bring it up. I brought up how they invaded Georgia and Ukraine, both within the last ten years. How often has the west invaded Russia within the past 20? 30? The last time the west invaded Russia was before Putin was born.
>No current Russian government also invaded Baltics, it was the USSR government. Yet the Baltics are afraid. Why? What will your mental gymnastics be in that case?
You were the one that brought up the threat of a Baltic invasion, I pointed out that I don't think anyone is seriously concerned about it. People are much more concerned about Russia invading the countries that it is actively invading.
>Before the USSR collapsed there was also "NO WAY" NATO would be ever used offensively, yet after the USSR collapsed NATO was started to be used offensively.
This is just such a bad argument and we've already been over "why" multiple times. Stop trying with this nonsense. NATO's humanitarian interventions are NOTHING when compared to the Russian annexation of their neighbors. You can't justify the latter by pointing to the former. Ever. Move on.
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@wothin Social democratic countries are a form of socialism. I get the impression that maybe you meant "communist" countries, which is a very different thing than "socialist" ones.
And Kosovo was after the Cold War was over. Nothing NATO did there was a strategic advantage to them, beyond that a stable and peaceful country is better for everyone.
>The USA was super paranoid that it threatened to blockade and even invade Cuba.
Yes it did do that, but it was not super paranoid, it was pragmatic. The Us could not allow Soviet missiles in Cuba. Again, the US and Soviet Union were not "equivalent." You cannot insist on "well if the US did something, then the Soviets could do it too and it should be ok." The Soviets were a despotic autocracy with a history of conquering and occupying their neighbors. Until they allowed the satellite states to go free, they could not claim political legitimacy with the west.
>You say that NATO's offensive use was valid because of a "valid pretext", others say it was not valid, as there is nothing objective about whether something is "valid" or not, except your own conveniently chosen criteria.
Nobody says that the NATO pretext was not valid, unless they are acting in bad faith to pursue an anti-NATO agenda.
>Not sure what you are trying to accomplish by using a strawman argument. I notice you are highly emotional on that topic and you try to appeal to emotions the whole time, but what is the point to misrepresent my point? Do you just need to vent?
You were advocating that the west should just capitulate to Putin's demands and allow him control over his neighbors, whether they like that or not. It is a fair question, how far do YOU believe is too far? There is no reason whatsoever to believe that Putin would just be satisfied with Georgia and Ukraine, how many countries do you believe he should be entitled to absorb, before the west should intervene?
>That's as silly as saying that just because the USA invaded country X, they want now to invade every country in the world. I mean it's a good tactic for fear mongering however and works on the uneducated ones.
We can talk about that once Russia pulls out of Georgia and Crimea. Until then, Russia is still permanently occupying territory of their neighbors, against the will of the legitimate governments of those countries, which puts them significantly behind the US in moral standing.
> You have this naive "the West == good guys" syndrome. You live in a bubble.
You have this irrational "the West != good guys" syndrome. You live in a bubble.
>Let me guess, you will now find to excuse those official policies? Let's see your mental gymnastics.
The "official policies" are intended as deterrents, to not officially rule anything off the table, so that nobody pushes their luck. In terms of actual practice, however, it is far less likely that the US would ever push that button without a reasonable belief that someone else had pushed theirs first. You can believe otherwise, you would just be wrong to do so.
> You probably do not even realize how laws and states work and on what principle they operates. PS: It's mainly based on "monopoly on violence". I know, I know, not very romantic.
That's just an anarchist nonsense viewpoint that is only actually true in autocracies. I am sorry that wherever you live has made you feel that way about government. While it is true that the government had a "monopoly on violence," in a democratic government, they use that monopoly power to exert the will of the people. Only the government is allowed to use force, but the government can only use that force where the people have indicated it should be used. Obviously it would be impractical to do a national poll in each specific instance of necessitated violence, so policies are formed and representatives are chosen to make those decisions in the moment, but this all flows from the decisions of the voters that these are the people who should be setting and carrying out those policies. Ultimately the people are responsible for the choices of the government.
>Eastern Europe, especially the Baltics, Poland etc, definitely joined NATO because they wanted to have a guarantee against Russia.
Well fair enough, that's their business, but either way, NATO is a good club to join, and its purpose is no longer specific to Russia. It's basically like the UN, but with teeth, its goal is to ensure stability in Europe by ensuring that any minor violence against the weak will be met with massive violence by the strong. If Ukraine had already been a part of NATO, none of this would have happened. If Russia had been a part of NATO, this would not have happened either.
Russia is currently the only real threat to peace in the European theater, and that is entirely of their own making.
>Also, it's irrelevant whether it's behind your life time. Most of Russia's population are on the elderly side, for them that is rather close to their lifetimes, as well as the effects of WW2 were rather relevant for most people alive today in Russia.
The security of Ukraine should not be hostage to Russia's senility.
I understand the situation, I just don't accept your attempts to justify Russia's activities. They have their reasons. Their reasons are terrible and they need to stop trying this.
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@wothin >Simply no. They are still strongly capitalist and none of them say they are socialist.
Most countries are a mix of capitalist and socialist elements. Going to either extreme tends to work out poorly. the point being, there would be no reason for NATO to directly target a country because of socialism.
>I was not. That you interpret that from my comments simply says that you are emotional about that topic and you simply want to vent.
No, it was literally the argument that you were making.
>Russia is as much occupying Georgia as much as the USA aka NATO is occupying Serbia.
>And in case of Crimea, the majority supports Russia. At least that was the case before Corona.
So you agree that Russia won't pull out of those countries and allow them to continue how they were before the Russian invasions then. This is why the world has no trust in Russia.
>I do think the West is as everybody else, entities with their own self-interest and geopolitical goals.
Of course the West has its own self interest and goals, and is not purely benevolent and self-sacrificing, but the goals that the west pursues tend to much more often be in the best interests of the people of an area than Russia is. They are much less likely to cause unnecessary harm. Russia has invaded two of its neighbors in the past decade and occupied their territory, however you want to apologize for that. The west has not done this. They are not perfect, but they are very certainly better, and that does make them "the good guys," in relative terms.
>And who decides who should be part of the government?
The consent of the governed, in a democracy. The people vote for representatives, and then those representatives, and the people they choose, end up in government positions. If the representatives make choices that the people disagree with, then they are replaced.
>Why should anybody have power to decide what jurisdiction I'm under?
They don't, you have the freedom to leave at any time. But if you live within a society of more than one person, then the other members of that society have a say in what goes on there, and can agree among themselves on rules that might curtail your actions. If you dislike these rules, you can either convince them to change their minds, or find a different community that follows rules you prefer. There is no other way to manage populations of people larger than one.
> Maybe me and my town want to secede. Hm, would your democratic governments allow that? I think not. Why is that? Because of monopoly on violence. You can try to declare independence, but after a certain time after you paid no taxes, they will invade your new country.
You and your town do not own the land under your feet, that is shared by the entire nation. You are free to leave, you cannot take your land with you. If you want to secede and take the land of your region with you, you do not need the consent of the government to do that, you would need the consent of the people of the rest of the country to do that, and the government would just be carrying out their will.
>Yes, and you'd like to escalate it further.
If becoming allies with their neighbors causes Russia to "escalate," then that is entirely Russia causing problems, NOT those nations getting friendly with their neighbors. Do not blame the ex-wife for being beaten.
>But they won't. You can either try to compromise and actually achieve something positive in the long term OR you can play this childish morality game, feel morally righteous but achieve nothing in the end or in the worst case only higher probability to conflict.
There is no rational compromise here. Either Putin gets exactly what he wants, or he will keep coming after it until he does. Anything else is temporary posturing. There is no point in playing the game of "oh, if only we appease him now, that will solve the problem," there is no evidence of that, and quite a lot of evidence to the contrary. No, the west must not take the first military action against Russia, but neither should they condone Russia taking unjustifiable military action against their neighbors. It is dangerously naive to believe otherwise.
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@wothin Since you can no longer defend Russia's stance in this, you have shifted to gaslighting and deflection.
>You are moving the goalpost. It all started with me simply saying Russia has reasons to distrust NATO and now it became, whatever this weird train of excuses and moral posturing is.
But the point is that Russia never had any reason to distrust NATO. They can definitely trust in NATO to oppose them if they attempt to conquer their neighbors. Beyond that, they have absolutely no reason to fear NATO, unless they become such an utterly failed state that NATO might need to intervene to protect their population, in which case, NATO is not Russia's problem, Russia is.
>You act like the west supporting various civil wars around the world did not harm many people massively.
Postures shift over time. The Cold War was a much more dangerous period, and one that we'd like to avoid shifting back to. The west did sometimes make moves that we don't look back on with pride, but by and large the actions of the west were at least better than those of the Soviets of the same time period, and in service of preventing the Soviet Union's continued expansion. So long as the West in general was a free democracy, and the Soviets were an autocratic and oppressive state, it was in the world's interest to keep as much of it out of their hands as possible.
Again, within the last decade, Russia has invaded two of its neighbors and retains claims in both. The West has not. When Russia pulls out of those regions and compensates them for their trouble, THEN we can talk about moral equivalency, not a moment before.
>And why? If my little village does not want to be part of that government, why should we be forced? Just a little thought experiment for you.
"A village" is not a person. A person is a person. If YOU do not want to be a part of that government, then YOU are free to leave it and go somewhere else. If every person in your village wants to leave that government, then every one of them is free to leave and go somewhere else. But the people of that village do not own that land, the sum total of the people of the nation own that land, and if you want to remove that land from the people's control, then you need to gain the consent of ALL the people, not just of the people currently living on that land. If you don't want to play anymore, you can go home, but you don't own the court.
>You do not have the freedom to leave at any time. Unless you actually refer to physically leaving the country, which then amounts to "Kosovars could simply move to Albania if they wanted to".
True. Although it's worth pointing out that many autocratic regimes make it difficult, if not impossible for their citizens to leave, as was the case with the Soviet Union.
Now if the external society determined that unacceptable human rights violations are taking place within a country, they might choose to intervene, or if you want to push to legally change the laws of your land then you have the right to do so, but at no point can some smaller unit of a society unilaterally declare himself exempt from the rules of that society, while remaining within it. So long as you are within a society, you must follow the rules that this society has made for people living there. This is only a problem in cases where the rules are not made by the governed.
>What if that was not one town, but 2 towns who wanted to secede and form the same countries? What about 3, etc? Hm.
There would need to be enough to gain a majority vote of the entire population, OR that the majority of the entire population agree to let them go, OR that some outside organization felt that it was necessary and justified to recognize the separation. Recognizing separatists is extremely rare, and typically boils down to the ruling regime making things absolutely intolerable for the separatist group, and seeing no way to resolve that within the existing leadership. It is not typically "we just don't like the laws here because we're special."
>In the end it is Europe's problem. And I prefer a save and stable Europe. You probably would prefer Europe to be burning down, if you could get the the chance to feel morally superior.
No, I would just prefer a safe, stable, and FREE Europe, over one where every decade or so another country is "safely and stably" absorbed into the Russian state.
>Not sure what "rational compromise" even means. Compromises are compromises, they are neither rational nor irrational, it's a give and take kind of thing.
If Putin creates a crisis, gains ground, and then "compromises" by giving some, but not all of it back, that is not a rational compromise. It is not always rational to just give a person half of whatever it is they want, otherwise you will just keep losing half of what you have until nothing is left. Rational compromises are when you give some reasonable concession in return for reasonable concessions from the other side. So far Putin has offered nothing at all, beyond "I probably won't do more bad things right now."
>The initial topic was simply that Russia has reasons to be afraid of NATO and they will try to not let them expand any further around Russia.
And the fact remains that they have no reason to be afraid of NATO, unless they intend to start more wars. Maybe they are afraid, but it would not be a rational fear, like the fears their neighbors have of Russia. If WW3 breaks out, that is Russia's choice, there is nothing that anyone else can do about that.
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@wothin >That's basically you simply dismissing Russia's fear of NATO.
Yes. I dismiss it because it is irrational. They should be treated as adults, if they do terrible things on the basis of an irrational fear, then they deserve no respect for doing so. They deserve no concessions.
>I mean feel free in doing so, but that brought us the current Russia situation in the first place.
No, the current Russia situation has nothing to do with a fear of NATO, it has to do with a lust for power, for regaining control over Eastern Europe. That would remain even if NATO disbanded. None of this would be happening if Russia were not determined to be considered a major world power, a status which they have not earned by merit.
ONLY Russia is responsible for the current situations, not Russia's victims.
>Now you are looking for excuses. As expected.
Now who's living in a naive fantasy. You insist on absolute perfection from the West if they claim any sort of moral legitimacy, while defending any sort of barbarism out of Russia. Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. The west is not perfect, but it IS better.
> I think that the West's "achievement" of bringing back slavery to Libya and basically damning 7 million people to live in a failed state is much worse than whatever Russia did to Georgia and Ukraine.
But that's only because you have a very biased take on both situations that is strongly out of step with reality. If you lived in the real world, you would not believe either of those things.
>Why should I leave or my village leave or the collection of villages?
That is entirely your choice to make. If you live within a society, then you should always have the choice to leave it, or to follow its rules. But a society is unlivable if people are allowed to partake in all of its benefits without having any rule of law. That is an impossible state of being. Every society needs the right to determine the laws that govern it, and if you are unwilling to follow that laws, then it is better for you to leave it than for everyone else to just have to put up with you not following those rules.
Land is not a person, the land is owned by the overall population. A person owns his land, but only within the rules of his village. A village owns its land, but only within the rules of its state. A state owns its land, but only within the rules of its nation. A nation owns its land, but only within the rules of the world. If a village wants to leave the country they are a part of, they are free to do so as individuals, but if they want to take the land of that country with them, then they require the consent of the country in total.
>So according to your argument, all separatists or people who want to have a changed government, should simply leave the country?
That's one option, Option A. Option B would be to work within the system to enact change, such as convincing the majority of their country that they should be allowed to separate, or by changing the laws of their country such that they feel no need to separate. In either case, they need to achieve consent from the people as a whole. Option C would be to appeal to an external agent to help them achieve independence, but this should be avoided in almost all cases. It should only be used when the government is intolerably oppressing them in their current state, and recognizing their independence would be preferable to accepting the population as refugees.
>, all the Ukrainians who did not want to be part of the USSR, should have simply left the USSR? After all they should have asked every person in the country first and if others did not agree, they were out of luck?
Two problems with your analogy. One, people were not allowed to leave the USSR. Those who attempted to do so were often killed. If the USSR has an open emigration policy, then sure, leaving would have been a valid option. Second, the USSR was not a true democracy, it was an autocracy, so the rule of the government did not represent the will of the people within that government. If a nation of three million people must follow a rule because a dozen guys said they had to, then sure, they have a right to revolt. If three million people must follow rules made by the people that the majority of that population chose to make and enforce rules, then those that choose to break the rules are not going against some faceless bureaucrats, they are going against the will of their fellow citizens. Government is only valid as an expression of the will of the people.
>"The external society"? You have weird ways to refer to "the West".
I was speaking broadly. It's a situation that has come up thousands of times over human history, and "the west" was only one potential example.
>What gives some outside organization the authority to decide that? You are simply looking for ways to basically say "if the West decided that".
Outcomes are basically determined by the agreement of the world at large, "the west" and all other parties. There are dissenting viewpoints, of course.
>But according to your logic, all those Kosovars could has simply leave the country. You are not very consistent.
Geopolitics is very complicated. There is no "one size fits all" solution, only reasonable guidelines. What is appropriate to one scenario, with all its complexities, might be completely inappropriate to another.
>Again, Russia does its aggression to stop Ukraine and Georgia joining NATO.
Again, Russia would do the same Aggression regardless of NATO, their issue has nothing to do with NATO, it has to do with Ukraine and Georgia preferring to be allied with countries other than Russia. Now if your argument is rather "Russia would not be doing this if Ukraine and Georgia agreed to do their bidding," then that may be true, but in no world would it be just to enslave those countries to Russia.
>You dismissing them won't change anything. That behavior led to the present day situation. So again you can be proud of yourself of what your thinking achieved in Ukraine and Georgia.
Again, NOTHING led to the present situation OTHER than Russia's insistence that their neighbors bend the knee. No actions by Ukraine, Gerogia, or anyone in the west contributed to what is happening today in any way. The ONLY actor here is Russia, it is ENTIRELY their responsibility, always. The ONLY way to stop this is for Russia to just. . . stop. That's it. That's all there is.
>So beforehand you you did not think the Baltics were justified to afraid of Russia, but now you do claim that they are justified.
If the Baltics had used their fear to justify ATTACKING Russia, then I do not believe their fear would justify their actions. If they used their fear to seek admission into NATO, an organization they would have every reason to join with or without that fear? Fine, that's their business. Personally, I don't think their fear would have been justified decades ago, and I don't feel that they are immediately at risk from Russia, but if Russia continues to absorb its neighbors without resistance from the west, then Russia would be knocking on their door eventually.
I state my position as I believe it to be. If you question that position from a different angle, then I will consider the question from that angle, and might expand what I believe on the matter. This is how a rational discussion should function.
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@jonbbbb Does anyone actually believe that Trump would betray Putin by helping Ukraine if they decided to "move first?" What a wasted investment would that be?
And what would "move first" even mean? Ukraine is already willing to cut a deal with Russia, that deal being that Russia leave Ukraine and the war is over. For Ukraine to do anything else, they would need to propose a compromise, and what would that mean? "You can keep what you hold, war over?" That would obviously be terrible for Ukraine. "You can keep that bridge you built, but get out of the rest?" That would be fine for Ukraine, but Russia would never agree. There is no such thing as "moving first" in the negotiation, it is a process to reach some sort of peace deal, and the two sides are too far apart in what they want for that to happen as quickly as Trump wishes it could be.
Both sides might be willing to make AN offer right away, but neither side would make a REASONABLE offer, or accept an unreasonable one. Realistically, Trump would just accept whatever offer Putin put on the table as being "the fair deal, take it or leave it, Ukraine," and would view any offer Ukraine put on the table as "not good enough, offer the boss more than that."
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@cryptarisprotocol1872 I can find absolutely no reference from the UN that Ukraine killed 20,000 civilians, anywhere, at any time. I have no idea who told you that figure, I assume Soviet propaganda, but it does not seem to be true. I blame the killings that actually DID happen on Russia because Russia is the one that did those killings. THAT the UN DOES back up.
And when Putin makes jingoistic comments about how Ukraine does not actually exist in the speech announcing the invasion of Ukraine, after which they deliberately target schools, hospitals, civilian apartments, and civilian bomb shelters, it's hard to make the case that this is not genocide. Other things can also be genocide, but this is one of them too.
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@cryptarisprotocol1872 The Soviet Union is gone? Tell that to Putin, because he clearly doesn't think so. He insists that every part of the Soviet Union belongs to Russia, and that it is a genocide-worthy offense for them to be friendly with other countries. the problem with the Soviet Union had nothing to do with their economic model, the problem with the Soviet Union was their authoritarianism, and that is alive and well in Russia today. Putin is no better than Stalin.
And if you believe "Russia was not present in Donbas between 2014-2021" then clearly the Soviet propaganda has worked on you.
Also, Ukraine does not fight in their cities out of choice, they fight to DEFEND those cities from an invading force. If they were not in those cities, then Russian forces would swoop into them and rape, loot, and murder the population as they have in every other city they have occupied so far. The military forces generally stay separate from the civilian structures, but that does not help the civilians any. Most of the civilian targets hit by Russia had ZERO military presence, and those that did only had a few token soldiers around, never enough to justify missile strikes. A maternity hospital with hundreds of civilian patients and a few soldiers is not suddenly a valid military target.
This is 100% a "Russia is bad here" problem. I don't know why you want to pretend otherwise, unless you are acting in deliberate bad faith on this.
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I think that in most wealthy countries, there should be a massive tax on home ownership, but this tax is waived on your primary residence, so most people who only own one home would see no difference. For those with multiple homes, it would become very expensive to hold onto them. For rental properties, there would be a significant tax for those too, one that scales up based on the value of the property, but one designed to be offset based on the number of affordable housing units provided, so the more people they have actually living in apartments at an affordable price, the less impact that tax would have, whereas the more people they try to get to pay high rates, the higher the taxes would climb.
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@Anashadk I mean, Ukraine can't afford to pay for anything right now, they will be a debter nation for the next decade or more as they try to recover from the harm Russia has caused them, but they definitely could allow US and UK bases in their territory, at those countries' expense, and those bases would certainly give Russia additional pause. I think it would be funny if we "pulled an Afghanistan" on that, and decided that we would not actively fight if Russia invaded again (although ideally we would), but instead the US forces "abandoned" these bases, along with all sorts of weapons that we would hesitate to give to the Ukrainians, "whoops, I guess they get a full wing of fighter jets and long range missiles, hope they don't use those against Russia or anything. . ."
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@CatWithAHat2HD To be clear, I wasn't making any argument specific to German politics, and wouldn't know enough to get into specifics if I wanted to. I was just talking of parliamentary democracies in general, where, from what I've seen of recent history, if there are say 4-5 significant parties, then the frequent result is "largest party forms coalition with the 5% nutters on their fringe to reach 51%," rather than "largest party forms coalition with second largest party," or even "largest party forms coalition with smaller reasonable party that is closer to the other side of the aisle." I just feel like in a situation of less than a complete majority, the impulse should be to balance the political forces, rather than to grasp further outside of balance.
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@davepx1 I sort of agree, although not completely. You do need a central executive to handle the big picture decisions and the snap decisions and to basically make sure things run smoothly, when a giant deliberative body is way too slow for that. Even for cabinet roles, it does help to have one person in charge, just in case. But it could still be that each role is picked by the body to fill that role, rather than just being a secondary choice by the executive they picked. Instead of voting for "Geoff and all his friends," you would be voting for Geoff, and then picking the other roles based on who you think would be best at them, even if they conflict in a lot of ways.
And I do think that civil servants should have a lot of power, but still, the whole point of democracy is that people vote for their representation, so if ultimately most of the real decisions got made by civil servants then the people wouldn't have much role in it. The voices at the top need to be directly responsible to the people, even if the civil servants are more capable. :D
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