(Thread IKs:
fatherboxx)
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Kikas posted:Gotta convince Latvia to finally help us annex and divide Kaliningrad then. Because as of now, Russia is at the border of NATO and has been since Poland joined the coalition. But since nothing is happening there, and even Putin is too smart to try something stupid like move troops through the Baltic, Kaliningrad (sorry, Królewiec as we went back to calling it) and Belarus, noone talks about that. Again, my wording was maybe opaque. I wasn't suggesting destroying Russia as a state and salting their earth, but rather that their imperialistic tendencies be curbed. I live in a country with a 1300 kilometer-long land border with Russia, I doubt annexing Karelia and the Kuola peninsula would really help matters either.
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Aug 16, 2023 13:11
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Rappaport posted:Forever is a long time. Capitalizing random nouns is a thing in some languages, but I assume you are not calling all eastern Europeans super mutants in want of a Master. So what is the point of this post? I cannot legitimately tell what you are arguing or positing here. Could you enlighten me? Sorry about that. I'll edit the post to remove the capital. I was just agreeing with the guy I replied to and emphasizing that Europe will need more of what they are doing. Nothing groundbreaking really.
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Aug 16, 2023 13:13
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Kikas posted:Unfortunately, all Polish governments have ever destabilized is themselves. Including the current one. We're quite good at that russia has shared a border with nato since -49
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Aug 16, 2023 13:17
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I also think Luka is very unlikely to ever turn coat. He can stutter and delay when it is convenient, but he is not only a puppet of Putin, he is a firm believer in his ideology, extending beyond how to run a country.
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fatherboxx posted:That will teach them, Putin is shaking
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Aug 16, 2023 13:17
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How do indirect embargos even work. If you as a nation export some goods to some country do you need to verify that they don't resell it somewhere else? That doesn't really seem feasible. Also i doubt that ALL the additional exports to central Asia end up in Russia. A lot of it is probably just selling your stuff elsewhere for cheaper than they would have made in Russia, because just keeping it or lowering production would cost more.
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Aug 16, 2023 13:18
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cant cook creole bream posted:How do indirect embargos even work. If you as a nation export some goods to some country do you need to verify that they don't resell it somewhere else? That doesn't really seem feasible. It has been attempted before, causing a lot of head-ache for diplomats and potentially some rich bastards too.
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Aug 16, 2023 13:25
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cant cook creole bream posted:How do indirect embargos even work. If you as a nation export some goods to some country do you need to verify that they don't resell it somewhere else? That doesn't really seem feasible. This already exists for a lot of military exports - yeah, those tend to be higher ticket price and smaller scale in general, and more politically sensitive and so forth, but it's not like it's an impossible concept
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Aug 16, 2023 13:26
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cant cook creole bream posted:How do indirect embargos even work. If you as a nation export some goods to some country do you need to verify that they don't resell it somewhere else? That doesn't really seem feasible. quote:It is important to note that the prohibited sales to Iran through (This is for Iran, but the basic scenario is the same) OddObserver fucked around with this message at 13:34 on Aug 16, 2023 |
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Aug 16, 2023 13:31
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MikeC posted:You cheerleaders are wierd. Stating simple facts seems to break your brain. Yes, the Ukrainian desire to break from the Russian sphere of influence is a cause for this war. Deal with it. i asked for clarification because what you previously said was loving insane: MikeC posted:Peace cannot be had until both sides are willing to give up things that caused them to go to war in the first place. your implication is that ukraine had a direct part in initiating hostilities. i wanted to make sure you actually meant that, so i asked for clarification. you then said: MikeC posted:Yes, the Ukrainian desire to break from the Russian sphere of influence is a cause for this war. which is a true statement on its face, but still implies that ukraine is somehow responsible for the initiation of hostilities, which... it isn't. on top of that, there is no "a" cause, there is only "the" cause: instead of using one of the many other avenues russia had at its disposal - diplomacy, reparations, support, pressure, etc - russia chose invasion. this war was not inevitable. it did not have to happen. ukraine did not choose to antagonize russia until putin simply had no choice but to initiate hostile military action. ukraine was attempting to find its own way in the world to protect itself and its interests, is not in any way at fault for the war, and any insinuation that it could be is extremely hosed up. you should, in your words: "deal with it".
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Aug 16, 2023 14:11
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Kith posted:i asked for clarification because what you previously said was loving insane: I believe he was trying to describe things in a realpolitik sense. Which, while factual, is not useful for any sort of discussion and tries to pretend that it's not "real" to look at moral considerations. Like obviously yes, if Ukraine was cool with being subjugated and having no self-determination there would be no war but what is the point of even bringing that up? It is not a thing any nation would do so it's just ridiculous. It is only "a cause for this war" in a world that is completely divorced from reality.
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Aug 16, 2023 14:50
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Fidelitious posted:I believe he was trying to describe things in a realpolitik sense. Which, while factual, is not useful for any sort of discussion and tries to pretend that it's not "real" to look at moral considerations. I haven't seen anyone arguing otherwise. I don't think the cheerleader squad appreciates any realpolitik posts because of the implication that Ukraine will have to give up more territory and the possibility of joining NATO in a negotiated settlement. They probably don't need to worry, NATO (the USA) seems perfectly content to let the war continue. Edit: added a comma for clarity daslog fucked around with this message at 15:22 on Aug 16, 2023 |
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Aug 16, 2023 15:00
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People don't appreciate "realpolitik" posts because they are morally abhorrent, "Ukraine's skirt was too short" posts.
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Aug 16, 2023 15:14
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daslog posted:I haven't seen anyone arguing otherwise. I don't think the cheerleader squad appreciates any realpolitik posts because of the implication that Ukraine will have to give up more territory and the possibility of joining NATO in a negotiated settlement. They probably don't need to worry that NATO (The USA) seems perfectly content to let the war continue. your obsession with a "cheerleader squad" is weird as gently caress, thanks especially since i'm primarily a lurker and barely post here OddObserver posted:People don't appreciate "realpolitik" posts because they are morally abhorrent, "Ukraine's skirt was too short" posts. also it's this
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Aug 16, 2023 15:17
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Crosby B. Alfred posted:May you expand upon this? And what I mean by that, from what I am interpreting from this description of current Russian society and along reading other media is that it's honestly pretty terrible? But how can this be real? It sounds like a borderline dystopian fiction novel that is not at all real... but is? How did it get this way? How does it... even persist? I think a big part of it is that the Russian government doesn't really see these problems as being worth confronting. It's not a coincidence that the principal victims of these issues are women, addicts, the mentally ill, the elderly, the impoverished, sexual and racial minorities, etc. - precisely the sort of folks that regressive and patriarchal societies devalue in the first place. And to the extent that they do combat them, they do so ineffectually via mass criminalization tempered by rampant police corruption. Mostly they just ban studies on these issues and pretend they don't exist. But the reality that Russia is facing is that these sorts of problems don't stay contained to these stigmatized groups, but spiral into the larger population. While there were brief signals that the perennial Russian struggle with alcoholism was succeeding, the pandemic (there was a belief that alcohol could prevent covid) and the war on Ukraine has seen a resurgence of heavy drinking throughout the population - and the government has reportedly only responded by increasing the alcohol limits at Kremlin banquets to two bottles of vodka. There are millions of intravenous drug users in Russia (consuming locally produced synthetic cathinones and imported heroin), and majority of local doctors recommend abstinence and prayer. HIV, Hepatitis C, and Tuberculosis are running rampant despite the lack of official figures, with perhaps five to ten percent of the population suffering from at least one of these conditions, and it's treated as a death sentence despite being very medicable. Studies indicate that 70% of Russian women experience sexual or physical abuse in their lifetime, yet the state de-criminalized domestic violence. Depression and bullying affects a wide population, particularly in the northeastern regions and amongst the LGBQT+ youth, and suicide is a leading cause of death for boys and men, but Putin's primary response has been to fund fascist youth propaganda that celebrates joining the military and "dying a hero's death". The combination of these and other factors has led to a significant decline in life expectancy to the point that the average Russian man dies at 65 and woman dies at 75, and yet the Russian government has begun raising the retirement age to 65 - meaning you essentially work until you drop dead. There's also significant regionalism so many of these problems are concentrated in border regions to the point of crisis yet are tolerated so long as they don't affect the core constituency of Muscovite racial and economic elites. The overriding trend here is that the Russian state is abandoning its people - and in fact often acts contrary to their interests. In a society where the public has long been expected to give up political influence in exchange for economic stability, the relationship between people and the state has become entirely transactional. And that has contributed to a pervasive laissez faire attitude where nothing really matters and everyone is out for themselves. While many of these victims might be natural political allies in other societies, there is very little sense of commonality between these groups in Russia - adding to the intractability of these problems. The comparisons between the Russian government and the American GOP-controlled states basically write themselves. They both share the same contempt for social programs or technocratic reforms that help vulnerable populations. And they both are resulting in the same sort of societal stagnation and decay. Until there is a significant political change (which almost certainly won't happen until Putin's death), these social, economic, and moral problems will persist.
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Aug 16, 2023 15:24
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Chill Monster posted:Where can we see this sphere of influence at work? My favorites are Belarus, Transnistria, and Kazakhstan. North Africa is another one to consider.
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Aug 16, 2023 15:34
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boofhead posted:This already exists for a lot of military exports - yeah, those tend to be higher ticket price and smaller scale in general, and more politically sensitive and so forth, but it's not like it's an impossible concept Yes, you can keep tabs on a sold tank amd make sure it doesn't end up North Korea, but I don't think it extends to more basic stuff like oil. Russia sells oil to Saudi Arabia, Saudi Arabia sells the same amount of oil to Europe at a markup. You could even argue that it's not even the same oil. Maybe the stuff send to Europe is actually procured in Saudi Arabia while they use the Russian stuff for internal use. In order to have a blanket ban in that kind of stuff, you'd need to enforce literally every other country to sanction Russia. Or you'd need to put every country which bought a drop of Russian oil on a seperate sanction list. Of course then they could corcumvent this further by going to a fourth country. Sanctions of basic goods like oil, wood, or metals can only make it significantly more of a hassle and not worth bothering, but if you are truly willing, you'd find ways around it.
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Aug 16, 2023 16:07
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I never thought I'd come into this thread and see a "Ukraine is just as guilty for causing this war as Russia" and "Light genocide is ok actually" post but here we are.
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Aug 16, 2023 16:24
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boofhead posted:This already exists for a lot of military exports - yeah, those tend to be higher ticket price and smaller scale in general, and more politically sensitive and so forth, but it's not like it's an impossible concept I mean scale is the big issue here. On the small scale you can track a chain of custody to the end user. If you want to do the same with commercial goods you would have to do that with every link on the supply chain, which effectively means taking the good off certain markets because lol at the idea of selling everything to the customer directly without regional distributors. But also good luck suing regional distributors if they fail to do their due diligence and ship to somebody on the naughty list. I think you would have this problem with stuff well before you even get to raw materials like oil and lumber. I think the economic charts are interesting but I would love to see what/how Finland is doing it. I'm not even sure what the main exports of Finland would be.
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Aug 16, 2023 16:24
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cant cook creole bream posted:Yes, you can keep tabs on a sold tank amd make sure it doesn't end up North Korea, but I don't think it extends to more basic stuff like oil. Azerbaijan does this with natural gas too. https://eurasianet.org/azerbaijans-russian-gas-deal-raises-uncomfortable-questions-for-europe
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Aug 16, 2023 16:28
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fatherboxx posted:Speaking of sphere of influence, here is a great thread of trade diversion. Something not mentioned here. Shifting from direct to indirect routes has a major effect too. International logistics is a pain in the rear end. There are all sorts of ways to gently caress up and to just get hosed randomly. So a big way to deal with that is to find logistics providers that work with minimal fuckups and stick to them. All those new indirect routes. All that’s going to be… a mess. From third tier sub contractors loving up, to outright extortion because they know it’s going to Russia.
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Aug 16, 2023 17:36
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Bar Ran Dun posted:Something not mentioned here. I'm assuming the prices go way up finding alternate trade routes. Also loads of access money being splashed around. the ends result is the russian domestic market being crippled by skyrocketing prices.
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Aug 16, 2023 17:46
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This is very similar to what happened with the Trump import tariffs on China. China simply rerouted a bunch of their exports through countries that were not getting taxed like Vietnam.
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Aug 16, 2023 17:47
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Chill Monster posted:The idea of Russia 'collapsing' has come up a few times in this thread. Rather than consider a collapse of the government, let's consider its 'sphere of influence' collapsing. Russia, just like the US, and many other countries, influences politics beyond its borders in an outsized way compared to other weak states. North Africa? Morocco has always firmly been Camp America, Tunisia has typically leaned that way (especially after they expelled the PLO), and Egypt has also gradually been increasingly been pro-US / W Europe since Nasser died. Libya is, like Lebanon or Iraq, more fractured and complicated although was traditionally more USSR leaning in the Gaddadi years. Even Algeria has had a major detente with the US in the past 20 years and is more neutral with respect to US v Russia relations. But not even Algeria is voting in favor of Russia at the UN, and Tunisia Libya and Egypt all voted against Russia. Morocco was absent but certainly would have voted with the US/West if they’d been in attendance.
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Aug 16, 2023 18:10
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LifeSunDeath posted:I'm assuming the prices go way up finding alternate trade routes. Also loads of access money being splashed around. the ends result is the russian domestic market being crippled by skyrocketing prices. Yeah - mere sanctions are never going to completely cut a country off from global trade. To do that you would need a total war military campaign that interdicted literally every ship, plane and land vehicle - making even Allied WW1 Naval Blockade or US submarine campaign against Japan look amateur. But it can massively increase the friction and costs of trade. You may be able to still source some Western tech indirectly via Kazakstan or whatever. But the flow is a trickle compared to before, and the costs are much much higher. You also earn less from your exports too (see impact of Oil price cap).
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Aug 16, 2023 18:23
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Saladman posted:North Africa? Morocco has always firmly been Camp America, Tunisia has typically leaned that way (especially after they expelled the PLO), and Egypt has also gradually been increasingly been pro-US / W Europe since Nasser died. Libya is, like Lebanon or Iraq, more fractured and complicated although was traditionally more USSR leaning in the Gaddadi years. Even Algeria has had a major detente with the US in the past 20 years and is more neutral with respect to US v Russia relations. Pretty sure they are referring to Sahel countries - like the recent coup in Niger, and earlier ones in Mali and Burkina Faso - where there is strong anti-French sentiment (its not hard to see why) and new governments are vocally pro-Russia.
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Aug 16, 2023 18:25
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Cpt_Obvious posted:This is very similar to what happened with the Trump import tariffs on China. China simply rerouted a bunch of their exports through countries that were not getting taxed like Vietnam. That's not how this works. The bane of my existence is providing USMCA certificates to my various customers who demand things like HS Codes and certificates of origin to prove something didn't come from China. As a Canadian distributor if I bought an isotank of Chinese solvent and then tried to launder it as a blend or sell it into the US and claim it comes from Canada I won't be able to fake it without risking prosecution. You could potentially sneak a few by US customs but eventually theyd audit your books to see where everything came from and if they find out you have been using Canada as a transshipment point for Chinese imports they'll smack you with all kinds of retroactive tariffs and penalties. Long story short, unless you can find a way to fake where something came from you can't avoid the tariffs.
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Aug 16, 2023 18:26
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OddObserver posted:People don't appreciate "realpolitik" posts because they are morally abhorrent, "Ukraine's skirt was too short" posts. Why is explanation of why a conflict has occurred considered as justification or endorsement for the aggressor? Do you think Russia would have invaded regardless of what Ukraine did in regards to NATO or EU membership?
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Aug 16, 2023 18:46
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Not So Fast posted:Why is explanation of why a conflict has occurred considered as justification or endorsement for the aggressor? Do you think Russia would have invaded regardless of what Ukraine did in regards to NATO or EU membership? It's true, they could have just been a wildly corrupt puppet nation. Ah, if only they'd known!
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Aug 16, 2023 18:51
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Not So Fast posted:Why is explanation of why a conflict has occurred considered as justification or endorsement for the aggressor? Do you think Russia would have invaded regardless of what Ukraine did in regards to NATO or EU membership? Discussing why the war started is fine, making extremely obvious points like "Ukraine could end this war if they fully capitulated to Russia" is useless and paints a picture of Ukraine somehow being culpable for being invaded by Russia.
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Aug 16, 2023 18:58
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Not So Fast posted:Why is explanation of why a conflict has occurred considered as justification or endorsement for the aggressor? Do you think Russia would have invaded regardless of what Ukraine did in regards to NATO or EU membership? Considering Putin has talked about how Ukraine is not a real country, yes, this invasion was inevitable
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Aug 16, 2023 18:59
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Not So Fast posted:Why is explanation of why a conflict has occurred considered as justification or endorsement for the aggressor? Do you think Russia would have invaded regardless of what Ukraine did in regards to NATO or EU membership? I mean, their bargaining position from the get-go seemed to require multi-lateral European agreements and treaties, so it isn't like Ukraine was in any position to stave off an invasion all by their lonesome, if we look at this from the benefit of hind-sight. An article from Reuters in December 2021 posted:Russia said on Friday it wanted a legally binding guarantee that NATO would give up any military activity in Eastern Europe and Ukraine, part of a wish list of security guarantees it wants to negotiate with the West. Of course we could give Russia the benefit of the doubt and figure they weren't really serious about having NATO withdraw from their borders  , but maybe that is a bit silly.
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Aug 16, 2023 19:00
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Not So Fast posted:Why is explanation of why a conflict has occurred considered as justification or endorsement for the aggressor? Do you think Russia would have invaded regardless of what Ukraine did in regards to NATO or EU membership? I think Russia wouldn't have invaded if Ukraine were actually accepted into NATO, so I guess the answer to that is no. Ukraine wanting to join NATO wasn't what caused this war; it was Ukraine attempting to prevent it.
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Aug 16, 2023 19:11
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fatherboxx posted:Speaking of sphere of influence, here is a great thread of trade diversion. These are all super interesting. thanks for posting them. Isn't Russia having to reroute obtaining the material it needs through Central Asia be essentially handing off some of it's power to Central Asia, and thus its sphere of influence shrinking, and it becoming victim to the whims of other governments/actors further down the road? It looks like Russia is dodging the sanctions, but they are paying a large amount of political capital to make that happen. Budzilla posted:Transnistria is a country? Not Moldova's pressure point and ammo base for Russia to exploit? I never said it was a country, but it does have an autonomous government that is largely separate from Moldolva. It also behaves exactly like you describe, yes. Russia is applying pressure there to maintain power. To me, this looks like their sphere of influence is beginning to slip there. Saladman posted:North Africa? I meant just Africa, I just miswrote. Look up an article on Wagner's influence in Africa to see what I mean. Maybe they are staging further exploits from Belarus, I dunno. Chill Monster fucked around with this message at 19:15 on Aug 16, 2023 |
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Aug 16, 2023 19:13
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:Oh, so it's only partly genocide. Good, thanks for keeping us up to date with the Accugenocide Forecast. The imprisonment and/or execution of opposition figures has happened in the large majority of wars and does not constitute genocide. The extreme lengths the West has to reach for in it's rhetoric, like claiming this is a "genocidal" invasion, is not only inane but delegitimizes actual claims of genocide. The idea that Russia intends some sort of mass execution or deportation of the population of Ukraine is entirely without basis. No one takes this claim seriously outside the most ideologically incestous liberal echo chambers. You could make plenty of cases why this war is immoral and should be stopped. The frequent claims of genocide here and in popular Western rhetoric only make them seem laughable. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Aug 16, 2023 19:20
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Not So Fast posted:Why is explanation of why a conflict has occurred considered as justification or endorsement for the aggressor? Do you think Russia would have invaded regardless of what Ukraine did in regards to NATO or EU membership? Yes, I do and haven't seen evidence to the otherwise. The question is why do you take Authoritarian propaganda at face value? (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Aug 16, 2023 19:25
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Not So Fast posted:Why is explanation of why a conflict has occurred considered as justification or endorsement for the aggressor? Do you think Russia would have invaded regardless of what Ukraine did in regards to NATO or EU membership? If Ukraine totally submits every time Russia demands something, it would just give Russia more reasons to make more demands and more threats. There is no real way for Ukraine to remain independent in that case. Maybe there was some hypothetical position that Ukraine could have adopted to guarantee independence and peace, but I haven't seen any good explanation of what that would have been. Certainly not one coming from Russia prior to the war.
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Aug 16, 2023 19:27
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i'm sorry people these mass graves full of obviously executed civilians and mobile crematoriums used to obfuscate bodycounts and highly documented organized kidnapping of children do not fully constitute a genocide, they are merely on the level of sparkling slaughter
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Aug 16, 2023 19:27
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Nissin Cup Nudist posted:Considering Putin has talked about how Ukraine is not a real country, yes, this invasion was inevitable This is pure after-the-decision-to-invade-has-been-made rusplaining, though. Ukrainians were mysteriously a distinct culture in the USSR that Putin nostalgizes about and there was no word to the contrary until it was suddenly convenient to him. Currently Belarusians are being treated as their own category, but if Putin needed to change rules so that Minsk becomes an oblast in the federation, that distinction is the first thing to be defenestrated.
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Aug 16, 2023 19:30
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TheNakedFantastic posted:The imprisonment and/or execution of opposition figures has happened in the large majority of wars and does not constitute genocide. The extreme lengths the West has to reach for in it's rhetoric, like claiming this is a "genocidal" invasion, is not only inane but delegitimizes actual claims of genocide. The idea that Russia intends some sort of mass execution or deportation of the population of Ukraine is entirely without basis. No one takes this claim seriously outside the most ideologically incestous liberal echo chambers. Just gonna fly right on by the relocation camps and large scale child abduction and mass graves, huh? 's cool, you do you homey. It just makes you a poo poo head. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Aug 16, 2023 19:32
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Kith posted:i'm sorry people these mass graves full of obviously executed civilians and mobile crematoriums used to obfuscate bodycounts and highly documented organized kidnapping of children do not fully constitute a genocide, they are merely on the level of sparkling slaughter But have you considered that it is not genocide because I really do not want it to be?
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Aug 16, 2023 19:33
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