Comments by "Alan Friesen" (@alanfriesen9837) on "Russia-US talks on Ukraine: How real is threat of invasion? | DW News" video.

  1. There is a difference between Russia stationing Russian troops in Russia and non-Ukrainian countries stationing non-Ukrainian troops in Ukraine.
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  2.    If Ukraine comes anywhere close to NATO membership, Russia will take it over before it gets the chance. That's why Russia destabilized Ukraine in the first place—they were getting too close to NATO/EU.
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  3. War made Russia a great power in 1812 and a superpower in 1945. What would it bring now? Destruction maybe, or prestige.
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  4.  @poorchristopher15  As a former soldier I assure you that weather matters a great deal in battle.
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  5.    Ideally, sovereign countries can do what they will. Realistically, weak countries are at the mercy of strong ones. If Ukraine moves to join NATO, Russia will move to stop them, sovereign or not. It is against Russia's interest for Ukraine to be in NATO. As long as Russia has the ability to stop it, they will, regardless of what Ukraine wants.
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  6. Yeah, I choked on that too, and I'm a Biden supporter.
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  7. You think he isn't?
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  8. Ukraine is a pawn, like all small countries growing in the shadows of great powers. Ukraine is stuck in the middle and must find a way to accommodate both Europe and Russia in order to prosper.
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  9.  @khrystynahrynkevych7440  I'm not exactly sure what your point is. If you're saying that life was better for West Germans in the fifties and sixties had a higher standard of living then Russians did in that time, I would agree. Germans currently have and have always had better living standards than Russians throughout modern history. Germany has very different issues than Russia, and it always has. But that doesn't mean Russia hasn't sometimes benefitted from war. They've also suffered from war, even the wars that they won. The one thing Russia hasn't done much of, is shrink from war. Win or lose, they tend to be all in.
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  10.    I think that if NATO moved to make Ukraine a member, Russia would take Ukraine rather than let that happen. Russia feels very betrayed over the admission of the Baltic countries into NATO. Putin will not let that happen again on his watch.
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  11.  @DianeKovacs  Putin certainly has his detractors within Russia. But even his detractors recognize that Putin is the locus of power within Russia. Putin also has his supporters. The west raped Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union. Most Russians realize that, if nothing else, Putin stands up to their abusers. That gives him a lot of leeway for abuse of power in the eyes of most of his countrymen, at least those that remember the nineties.
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  12.  @Duke19073  Breaking apart into little tiny countries doesn't ever make life better.
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