Comments by "Baddonkey" (@dannysullivan3951) on "AOC: Why Helping Ukraine Is 'The Key In Defending Democracy Geopolitically'" video.

GOP finally woke up and voted like grownups against appeasing Putin. Reagan was spinning in his grave at Moscow Marjorie
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@dwl3006 What about S Korea?
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@dwl3006 While we both agree Vietnam was a failure, if America backed down everytime Russia (or China) stepped forward the Iron Curtain would still be up and Taiwan, Japan and S Korea might be under China's thumb. When do you think American intervention is warranted?
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@dwl3006 We agree on quite a lot. I’m no cheerleader for American military adventurism, but let’s get real about the reality of democracy, even our flawed version, vs Putin’s reign of quiet terror or China’s. They are not equivalent. Democracies with a few exceptions rarely war on each other. The threats to world peace are autocratic. Our longstanding policy of containing and degrading Russian and Chinese power since WW2 has been mostly a resounding success-collapse of USSR and freedom for Easter Europe, guaranteed protection for Asian democracies. you seem a little complacent about China’s intentions, see Hong Kong. I believe we failed Russia during Glasnost but that ship has sailed. Afghanistan, Chechnya, Georgia and Ukraine are all on Putin’s watch. And I will claim that Dems do less ‘adventuring’ than the GOP, until they become isolationist which is even worse.
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@dwl3006 It's clear, and Mearsheimer and others are correct, that we helped ignite the Ukrainian war. But it's also hard to argue that Putin was ever going to stand by and let Ukraine become a functioning democracy leaning West on his doorstep. Mearsheimer's contention that we should buddy up with Putin to challenge China is strategically, not to mention morally questionable. And I disagree with his assessment that we've 'allowed' or abetted China's growth into a superpower. That was inevitable. I would say that a democratic Russia would be a far better strategic partner for us than Putin would ever be. I don't see how you can argue comparing us to Russia is 'irrelevant' when you agree that democracies are less likely to wage war. As for birthing democracies, the blood being shed right now is Ukrainian just like US blood was shed for our independence. France helped us (to screw over the English) and we're helping Ukraine to undermine a dictator. I do think it's time for negotiations; Ukraine can't win or produce enough soldiers (although they've demolished Russia's military rep) and Russia is never going to occupy Ukraine successfully. Strategically, however, I'd say American objectives and Europes have been served.
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@dwl3006 We’ll have to agree to disagree.
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@dwl3006 It’s absolute naivete to think that dictatorships are not afraid of democracy. Tell that to Hong Kong, or Navalny, or the doctors, reporters, politicians and ‘friends’ that Putin has tossed out of third story windows. And if you want to argue in favor of Machiavelli, which has become a grey area in the contemporary world, it’s easy to make the case that the US by proxy has devastated both the Russian military (imagine the US held to a standstill by Canada or Mexico for 2 yrs) and Putin’s world standing while enlarging and bolstering support for NATO. And believe me China is not glad at this outcome. That is a win for the US, in Machiavellian terms. And if Korea was a legitimate war, then so was Vietnam. It just happened at a time when media coverage became a factor. Complexity. What would an ‘alliance’ with Putin look like? Are we going to sell him arms? Is he going to help us protect Taiwan? Russia cannot afford to antagonize 1.5 billion Chinese. Our use of ‘bad actors’ has usually been limited in scope (WW2) or ended in failure (the Shah of Iran , the Saudis). I get that you dislike American imperialism, there is plenty to dislike, but there is no one side-fits-all approach to world politics.
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