Comments by "the other Andrew" (@theotherandrew5540) on "Who and what are we defending in the UK It’s a question in need of an answer?" video.

  1. I have great respect for the professor’s knowledge and wisdom WRT economics and issues related to money, but WRT the invasion of Ukraine there is a common misunderstanding deliberately fostered by NATO and the US. I address this question as someone who lived in Russia for any years and came to understand their views. Russia has a huge land border, … while the USA has oceans on two side and friendly/weaker countries on two other sides. Historically Russia has endured devastating invasions, two from Western Europe. Russia lost around 27 million of its citizens during the last invasion (more than all the other allied countries put together) so understandably there is a visceral fear of invasion. After the collapse of the USSR, Gorbachev had an agreement with the US that if Russia agreed to German unification, NATO would not advance any further eastward towards Russia. Bush ignored this, planting missiles in Poland when Russia was still recovering and Putin was finding he feet. Don’t forget that when the US learned of a potential missile base in Cuba there was near blind panic in Florida, and the world came to the brink of nuclear war. Putin explained the Russian strategic need for buffer stated, but NATO threatened to push right up to the most sensitive border. Now, I speak from information given by people who know much more than I do; Russia does not want or need more territory (it is already the largest country in the world), it doesn’t want to take over Belorussia of Kazakhstan or any other of those countries. If the little Baltic states and Finland don’t engage in military provocation, their former good relations with Russia can be restored. The invasion of Ukraine was deliberately provoked by NATO in order to pretend that they were the good guys without needing a single boot on the ground, and with the intention of weakening Russia, perhaps even breaking it up so the US could grab its resources. The solution … after the end of WW2, the most terrible European (and global), it was recognised that cross border trade agreements would make war much more unlikely. Since the reign of Elizabeth 1, Russia has been trying to establish good trading relations with Europe but has been repeatedly thwarted by “the great powers” fear of having to accommodate the rising power of Russia. The sale of cheap Russian gas to Europe presented a major threat to American dominance of Europe … thus the destruction of the Nordsea pipeline and anti-Russian sanctions (which have greatly stimulated industrial and agricultural development within Russia). If we want peace and stability, we need more cross border trade, not more dead Ukrainians.
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