quote:

I. The Nature of the Russo-Ukrainian War
“The Russia-Ukraine conflict is a clash of civilisations [文明的冲突] that has to be viewed from a higher viewpoint and within a longer-term framework.”

“Viewed from the perspective of the evolving global landscape, I believe that the Russo-Ukrainian conflict is the opening battle for a multipolar world [多极世界的揭幕之战]. Before this war, the world was still a unipolar one dominated by the United States. Although there were some pockets of resistance in different parts of the world, it was still not enough to challenge the unipolar world in an overall manner.”

“This special military operation was to a large extent forced to take place [被迫发生的]. It is a response to America's continued efforts both to weaken Russia and eliminate challenges to [its] unipolar world order. It is also a response to Washington’s strategic scheming and proactive moves to maintain its global hegemony. In a certain sense, this special military operation is of an anti-hegemonic nature. Its fundamental goal is to oppose the hegemonic nature of the [current] unipolar world system and to promote the establishment of a multipolar one. That is why I call the Russo-Ukrainian conflict the opening battle on the road towards a multipolar world.”

II. The Winners and Losers of the War in Ukraine

...

“On the face of it, the biggest winner so far appears to be the United States. It has succeeded in getting Europe's financial assets and capital to flow to the United States. This helped provide it with continued inflows of capital during the epidemic and made the US the best performing economy among the developed countries. And then there has been its scuppering of Europe's strategic autonomy, [thereby] bringing Europe back under its protective umbrella. By imposing sanctions on Russia's energy exports and then taking the opportunity to peddle its own energy at a high price and make a fortune from the war, the US has caused the European economy, which is heavily dependent on foreign sources of energy, to suffer badly.”

“But from a longer-term perspective, the Russia-Ukraine conflict is seriously weakening the US-led unipolar world order. [Moreover,] the credibility of the United States has been greatly undermined and many countries have seen that America cannot be relied upon. The US-led unipolar world is now in a precarious state.”

“Russia has paid a huge price in this conflict, but it has also gained a great deal. Moscow’s initial objectives, as outlined at the beginning of its special military operation, have been achieved. Crucially, through this war, Russia is reshaping its image and status as a great power. Russia will become a formidable and important pole [令人敬畏的重要一极] in the future multipolar world. As a result, I believe that Russia could in the long run emerge as the real, long-term winner of this conflict.”

III. Europe’s Strategic Misjudgment

“In provoking this conflict, one of the US’s key strategic objectives was to drive a wedge between Europe and Russia. If Russia and Europe were to join hands, Europe would be strengthened economically, politically and militarily. It would also transform Europe into a major military and strategic force [安全力量和战略力量] in the world.”

“In my view, European leaders have grossly misjudged the question of who is an adversary and who is a friend. They regard Russia, which could bolster Europe's economic power and provide it with security guarantees, as an opponent and a threat, and the United States, which suppresses the eurozone’s financial and economic development and provokes military conflicts in the heart of Europe, as a friend.”

“There are very few relatively lucid politicians like Angela Merkel left in Europe. The European political scene is now dominated by a group of ‘baizuo’ [Note: ‘白左’ is a pejorative term referring to left-leaning Western liberals] who place ideology above all else, mostly follow the baton of the United States and lack strategic awareness.”

“I feel that if Europe does not wake up, they will continue to lose heavily. Their actions during the Russia-Ukraine conflict are not only akin to rescuing [Ukraine] while clutching a ‘pack of dynamite’, but also to carrying a ‘bag of dynamite’ into an open fire. They will not only fail to solve the problems between Russia and Ukraine, they will also get their fingers burnt or even blow themselves up [还会引火烧身甚至炸死自己].”

“Europe's tragedy is that it has failed to recognise its strategic predicament. Europe must understand the basic nature of this war, which is the opening battle towards multipolarity. Neither the United States nor Europe can stop this [trend]. What Europe has to do now is to follow the trend and endeavour to become a pole in this multipolar world, rather than helping the United States preserve the old unipolar world.”

quote:

Crucially, through this war, Russia is reshaping its image and status as a great power.

poor waif posted:

It's fascinating how Chinese analysts always see everything as competition between various imperial centres. It has zero ability to consider countries outside of Russia, China and the US as anything but subjects to be conquered or controlled. It's not a great method for analyzing European policy, being made up of dozens of smaller states.

Xarn posted:

Lot of these comments assume that it is a serious analysis, and not basically propaganda for internal consumption.

Volmarias posted:

Most recent was when the child of some policy wonk who helped write legislation was clearing out their estate, they happened to come across some correspondence. Which, again, explicitly stated that voter ID laws that they were helping with writing were entirely about suppressing certain votes.

Nothingtoseehere posted:

And people say the US is the only country that fatally misjudges how the rest of the world perceive them and arrogantly assumes everyone else thinks like they do.

Nosre posted:

Could I get a link or name to read more about that case?

ronya posted:

it would be correct to observe that Germany and Poland would be better off prostrating themselves for Russian gas, in a sense,

Vincent Van Goatse posted:

In all seriousness, what sense is this?

Kaal posted:

While the infamous “hanging chads” of 2000 are fortunately behind us now that mechanical voting is obsolete, marked bubbles have given us a lot of problems over the years. User error is common, and there’s many different ways to fill them in too much or too little. The bubbles are also easy to confuse, leading many people to fill the wrong one by mistake (particularly if they are positioned away from the names). Over-voting is a common issue with them, and the judges often don’t have much to go on when deciding voter intent.

Poorly-designed ballots can lead to big statistical errors, because people make the same sorts of mistakes en masse (for example one of the reasons that candidate order needs to be randomized is because voters prefer the first options on the page). A voter might get confused about which position “Circle B” represents, or for which candidate. Drawing a line from a name to a position (sometimes still with a bubble to help older OCR machines) provides feedback to users that want John Smith ——— Mayor.

While some forms of marked bubbles can be fine (they are familiar, use less space on the page, which reduces costs, and can be appropriate for voter initiatives and things of a similar format), there’s several reasons to use the drawn line. They’re easy to use and understand, which ultimately goes to the heart of what voting is all about. That being said, no system is perfect and a carefully-designed marked bubble ballot can also work well.

Peter Falk posted:

Yeah sorry this is complete bullshit. Scantron ballots are extremely easy to use and have a very low rate of marking error. My evidence for that is that live in the state of the famous “lizard people” recount and the rate of error was tiny.

PainterofCrap posted:

I don't know what it's called, but my polling place (Gloucester County, New Jersey) uses a system with both a touch screen & a paper ballot.

ronya posted:

Russian pipeline gas is cheaper than American LNG. That's more or less the observation made by Wang above.

Of course, if such economics were the only consideration then China itself would hardly be on a national security bender too.

Nenonen posted:

Supposing you are sending the ballot along with necessary documentation that the ballot was cast by a legit person in mail in separate envelopes in a bigger envelope, you have to trust that the people opening those letters handle them properly and just notice that "Peter Falk" is a legit voter and then put his ballot envelope in the right stack which is counted later. Instead of opening the ballot envelope and finding out if "Peter Falk" voted for Putin or not.

And this still ignores the problem that "Peter Falk" might have been someone other than "Peter Falk". Like Mrs. Falk (who we mysteriously never see???).

I don't understand what the importance of OCR is here specifically. It sounds like a total red herring. OCR is just a technology, it can just as well be done manually. Frankly I prefer people counting the votes.

ronya posted:

A partial translation, interesting throughout:

https://www.sinification.com/p/why-china-russia-ties-must-be-strengthened

Nitrox posted:

Who are "they"

Dirt5o8 posted:

Laying the ground work for Russia to have an excuse to step in an "Help" Transnistria?

Look how the evil West/Nazis/Ukrainians/etc are beating up on plucky, peaceful Transnistria! We have it on good authority that Moldova is planning to invade and we (Russia) need to up our garrison and station additional BTGs.

Yeah, yeah Clancy chat.

quote:

II. The Winners and Losers of the War in Ukraine

...

“On the face of it, the biggest winner so far appears to be the United States. It has succeeded in getting Europe's financial assets and capital to flow to the United States. This helped provide it with continued inflows of capital during the epidemic and made the US the best performing economy among the developed countries. And then there has been its scuppering of Europe's strategic autonomy, [thereby] bringing Europe back under its protective umbrella. By imposing sanctions on Russia's energy exports and then taking the opportunity to peddle its own energy at a high price and make a fortune from the war, the US has caused the European economy, which is heavily dependent on foreign sources of energy, to suffer badly.”

“But from a longer-term perspective, the Russia-Ukraine conflict is seriously weakening the US-led unipolar world order. [Moreover,] the credibility of the United States has been greatly undermined and many countries have seen that America cannot be relied upon. The US-led unipolar world is now in a precarious state.”

“Russia has paid a huge price in this conflict, but it has also gained a great deal. Moscow’s initial objectives, as outlined at the beginning of its special military operation, have been achieved. Crucially, through this war, Russia is reshaping its image and status as a great power.

ronya posted:

A partial translation, interesting throughout:

https://www.sinification.com/p/why-china-russia-ties-must-be-strengthened

Cherrypicking some bits:

most interesting element is the consciousness that Europe has shifted in some way from the Kosovo war/Belgrade bombing Europe that exists in the Chinese FP understanding: a Franco-German resentment of Atlanticism that can be channeled to Chinese benefit, in particular over reluctance to entangle themselves in the post-Soviet chaos: Wang complains about it but is unable to articulate why the shift has occurred, beyond waving hands about 白左 . The fact that he acknowledges the drift instead of denying it is remarkable, though.

GhostofJohnMuir posted:

the eu has four times the population and ten times the gdp of russia, in a multipolar world why would it be willing to have russian spheres play into its foreign policy perogatives?

jaete posted:

secondly, there is no such thing as EU or "western world", there are only individual countries, and since even Germany, the biggest of EU countries, is smaller than Russia, all EU countries should simply be subservient to Russia

Staluigi posted:

Raenir Salazar posted:

but what a "multipolar world" would entail/describe?

Volmarias posted:

What if imperialism, but we were the British this time?

The Artificial Kid posted:

So this time around is Japan going to unexpectedly defeat Russia in a … space battle?

Staluigi posted:

Staluigi posted:

mawarannahr posted:

What is this and how does it relate to the war in Ukraine?