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Deteriorata posted:The point seems to be to heckle him, like trying to call out all the moves a magician is making during a performance. You may not be right, but it infuriates the magician and he may blow his tricks spectacularly. It's also to the benefit of the many many civilians in Russia and elsewhere in Eastern Europe who have access to Western internet news sources. It's not clear exactly how many people in Russia or elsewhere are buying the Kremlin line that this is somehow a defense of Russia and Russian territorial integrity. But if you're the west and you make clear that you aren't doing anything and it's Russia that's invading for no reason that does theoretically help selling whatever happens next as entirely Russia's fault.
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Feb 13, 2022 05:11
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Gripweed posted:I think you are making a perhaps unfounded assumption that the claim is actually based on good intelligence. Not for nothing, but countries like South Korea and Saudi Arabia have started advising nationals to leave, and they don't really give a poo poo about Eastern Europe great power politics.
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Feb 13, 2022 16:01
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Generation Internet posted:I'm an idiot, but it seems to me more like preparations are being completed than anything is escalating. It takes a really long time to properly prepare a military operation of this magnitude and it seems like Putin has been committed to it for a while. He knew his "demands" would never be accepted and they were always going to be a pretext to do what he really wanted. He expected the US to act the way it has, it's unlikely he expected Germany and France to act as aggressively as they have. He probably had smaller military and political goals before Ukraine made clear they would fight and now who knows what the goal actually is.
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Feb 13, 2022 18:02
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Saladman posted:Russia can also just take over Donetsk and Luhansk and use their military for intimidation, basically just another one of their carved out statelets they’re so fond of like Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Transnistria. The Economist had an article on the buildup today and they ended with that, so presumably that’s what their analyst thinks is the most likely outcome. https://www.economist.com/europe/to-russian-denials-america-warns-of-an-imminent-invasion-of-ukraine/21807701 That is the "smallest" outcome of an invasion and the one that is least likely to result in long-term international condemnation (or caring). The odd thing to me has always been that by annexing Crimea and eastern Ukraine, Putin is removing the two regions most likely to elect a Russian friendly government in Ukraine and guarantees that every election is going to elect a government that favors EU ties.
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Feb 14, 2022 15:18
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alex314 posted:It's baffling how poo poo Russia is at soft power. Kremlin has some decent propaganda tools, and seems to successfully push narrative of strong manly men facing against degenerate weak Westerners. But just recently Kremlin started to push such basic messages like "be friendly with us if you want cheap energy". That's it, you don't need to add "or else we'll topple your regime and invade". This isn't directed at you, but what "soft power" does Russia even possess? They have a fungible commodity that Europe can get from other places if they need to. That's it. Their currency is poo poo, they don't export culture, they don't support their neighbors (only their autocratic rulers), they don't have a system of government people want to emulate, and they have a GDP roughly equivalent to Florida. Their soft power is basically a protection racket and nothing else.
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Feb 14, 2022 15:44
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Alchenar posted:I'm with you on the lingustics but the underlying argument isn't really true. Russia had the opportunity to complain at every phase of NATO enlargement and didn't. The 2004 and 2009 enlargements happened under Putin's watch and he didn't make any fuss about it then. It also lets you save face when selling it. "We suck at diplomacy and our neighbors are no longer dependent on us" doesn't sell as well as "We are a great power and the West is killing us with a thousand cuts and we must do these things to protect our honor"
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Feb 14, 2022 16:51
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Alchenar posted:Essentially (in terms on where responsibility lies) but I don't think I'd go as far as to say the problem was that Russia didn't do Shock Therapy 'properly'. The USSR was always a petrostate that worked by using the proceeds of oil and gas to subsidise the rest of the economy - the Soviet model needed to go but oil and gas revenue meant they probably had the option to roll on for quite some time slowly subsidising a transition to something else. Russia was also still strong enough and proud enough that it didn't "need" outside help when the USSR collapsed. While other countries in Eastern Europe suddenly found their subsidies gone and needed help to get back on their feet, the member country that had been doing the subsidizing did not "need" or seek western assistance.
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Feb 14, 2022 16:54
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pissinthewind posted:It just doesn't really make sense to me to be rooting for either side in Ukraine/Russia right now, unless you're mostly worried about which country has the most imperialism I suppose. The rise of fascism is a major problem in the US that no one is doing anything about, but look over here! Nazi grandma is learning to shoot an AK to protect against Putin, everyone cheer? It just seems like Biden is trying to do the unity he promised by promoting nationalist imperialism, stoking the flames of war by sending Ukraine arms and riling up Russia, since domestic patriotism unity kind of poo poo the bed when he failed to accomplish pretty much anything. And honestly, having lived through that poo poo in the early 2000s, I genuinely can't believe grown rear end human beings are falling for it, again. Well when Ukraine annexes southern Moldova or uses its military to attempt to extort absurd concessions it's not entitled to, I'll be sure to criticize Ukraine. This whataboutism is absurd. Russia has effectively annexed two portions of Ukraine in the past decade, and fomented a low-intensity civil war to boot. Ukraine has not done the same to Russia. They are not the same. They just aren't, by any measure you want to use.
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Feb 14, 2022 17:11
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Truga posted:no, the westerners came along and made their situation explicitly worse in every way Jesus Christ. People are aware that a lot of countries didn't actually want to be in the USSR anymore right? Like, there's a reason it fell apart, and while western efforts had something to do with it, it was internal divisions, not external forces that brought down the Eastern Bloc.
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Feb 14, 2022 17:25
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