Russia-Ukraine war and related tensions Megathread

[H.E. VOLODYMYR ZELENKSYY]

Wow. Shocked that CNN aired this.

Russia is settling Ukrainians in the Far East. Those who left for/sent to Russia don't have the opportunity to go back to Ukraine, due to fear of reprisals or prosecution as traitors/collaborators by the Ukrainian authorities. Admits that lot of those who spoke freely have sympathies with Russia.

Russia isn’t a saint at all and the invasion does show their imperial mindset, but the insistence of painting a very grey conflict that spans from tensions from even before 2014 as a non-discussion allowed black and white thing like they were in a Marvel movie is still coming back to bite Western media in the back eventually.

They all joined this based much more on their mutual historical hate for Russia than for real solidarity with Ukraine and everything that is done under these negative feelings is bound to somewhat backfire regardless of results. Many Ukrainians are being used as cannon fodder for the West so that they can stick it up to Russia without really doing the hard work.

I’m constantly amazed at someone whose country was subjected to horrible imperialism in the relatively recent past is calling a literal invasion of one country by another “a very grey conflict”. Based on what, the fact that people in Eastern Ukraine speak Russian?

[Hindsight was 2020]

I find the above post quite insulting to Ukrainians to suggest they are but pawns serving as cannon fodder for the West. The vast majority don't want to be ruled by Russia, in particular Putin's Russia, and are willing to sacrifice everything for that, including their lives. It really is a catastrophic tragedy. Viewing it through a canned and inappropriate prepacked ideological lens is something to which I take great exception.

Red Velvet is part of an obnoxious movement along with Lula and other supposed “anti imperialist leftists” who throughout this conflict have made statements that show they don’t view Ukraine has a true sovereign nation made up of people with their own agency. From calling the Euromaidan a “CIA coup” to imply like here that the West are somehow forcing them to fight against their will, they show they simply refuse to believe Ukraine would legitimately be doing these things but instead it’s some insidious Western conspiracy. Maybe it’s apart of some old Cold War mindset that leads them to refuse to believe in a legitimate grassroots mass populace movement whose goals align with the West

[Red Velvet]

Wow. Shocked that CNN aired this.

Russia is settling Ukrainians in the Far East. Those who left for/sent to Russia don't have the opportunity to go back to Ukraine, due to fear of reprisals or prosecution as traitors/collaborators by the Ukrainian authorities. Admits that lot of those who spoke freely have sympathies with Russia.

Russia isn’t a saint at all and the invasion does show their imperial mindset, but the insistence of painting a very grey conflict that spans from tensions from even before 2014 as a non-discussion allowed black and white thing like they were in a Marvel movie is still coming back to bite Western media in the back eventually.

They all joined this based much more on their mutual historical hate for Russia than for real solidarity with Ukraine and everything that is done under these negative feelings is bound to somewhat backfire regardless of results. Many Ukrainians are being used as cannon fodder for the West so that they can stick it up to Russia without really doing the hard work.

I’m constantly amazed at someone whose country was subjected to horrible imperialism in the relatively recent past is calling a literal invasion of one country by another “a very grey conflict”. Based on what, the fact that people in Eastern Ukraine speak Russian?

Amazed why? It’s clear that the Brazilian Left (and Global South Left as a whole if you care to look at it) agrees with the USA Right perspective on this particular matter simply because there’s no real strong left in USA. Only full middle ground liberalism.

In Western Europe is way more mixed but you see elements of both the right and left express views like that, while it’s the liberal centrists (center; center-right; center-left) that are the biggest Western believers of pushing for a longer war.

France is my favorite European country because that’s a country where even the neolibs have a degree of western skepticism as they care about being independent there. France has very strong cultural ID of their own in their blood and that accentuates nationalism as a whole, regardless if it’s for the left, right or center.

Meanwhile in places like Portugal you have the far-right Chega types like André Ventura being the loudest voice pushing a protest against Lula so that he won’t speak in Portuguese parliament using his positions on Ukraine as a false justification. It reflects Portugal own current position as a small country that priorizes their Western association (European Union) that allows them to be represent something bigger, so they feel they need to “respond” to this association lol

Feels like everything is dumped into the same place and people lose the nuances in each different position tbh. If anything the Economic Right tends to be way more pro-western than the Social/Cultural Right. Meanwhile the Economic Left is definitely way more skeptical of the west than the Social/Cultural Left

You would think that eventually this would mean a political rearrangement so that Economic Left would align with Social/Cultural Right in one camp while the Economic Right aligns with Social/Cultural Left in other but this will never happen because most people who believe in Economic leftism tend to be socially progressive and the opposite is also truth for the right.

So this creates the current scenario where you have massive fragmentation and multiple different “right” camps and “left” ones too. It’s almost like you couldn’t define peoples position on every different issue based on a single label? It leads to stuff like having the “far-right” that is extremely pro-ukrainian in some places and the “far-right” that is skeptical of support for Ukraine in others.

If an extraordinary leader like Trump was still president, someone who was more dovish instead of hawkish, I doubt the war would’ve even started btw. It did because there was enough will to let it happen, to try to stimulate a democracy vs autocracy divide that positions important economic players like Russia and China as enemies and helps repress economic competition from outside the West through a moral justification. Same way it was “moral” to intervene to destabilize places that weren’t “democratic” enough like Libya, Iraq, etc.

On that sense, there’s undoubtedly bipartisan alignment regarding China inside the US. However one’s strategy is way more honest and realistic than the other. Whenever I hear democrats acting like they or their country are so much superior than everyone else, I can’t help but find funny. It makes me kinda understand the Republican annoyance to people who are constantly so concerned on constantly signaling morality like it was some protection clothing that shields them much more than they care to live by what they say. Republicans know they have no morals and they even admit it sometimes, which becomes more refreshing.

[Hindsight was 2020]

I’m starting to notice that Red Velvet rarely if ever actually addresses the war in his posts here. Like a lot of their “global south” posts here are more about China vs the West economic tensions (with Russia as the implied junior partner of China) than anything with the actual war. Then in the post above we have 9 paragraphs and not once did Red Velvet actually address H.E.’s point about trying to paint a clear cut good vs bad conflict as grey

[Red Velvet]

I’m starting to notice that Red Velvet rarely if ever actually addresses the war in his posts here. Like a lot of their “global south” posts here are more about China vs the West economic tensions (with Russia as the implied junior partner of China) than anything with the actual war. Then in the post above we have 9 paragraphs and not once did Red Velvet actually address H.E.’s point about trying to paint a clear cut good vs bad conflict as grey

Those economic tensions are directly related to the start of the war, as it started during shaky 2010s, when the West noticed the economic competitiveness coming from different parts of the globe and wanted to shift their interventionist attention OUT of the Middle East and more into places like China and Russia.

Or do you think getting out if the middle east right when this starts happened by accident/coincidence? When they could’ve done much sooner? There’s always a war that the US has to be on non-stop.

[KaiserDave]

Anyone who refers to the Ukrainian people as "cannon fodder" with the west, is morally bankrupt, entirely vacuous, and should immediately reevaluate what lack of historical knowledge and/or soul led them to such a conclusion.

The Ukrainian people, since February 24th 2022, have not been a reluctant party to a war they rather would solve through surrender. They have enthusiastically mobilized the entire nation for war for the defense of the dearly-valued independence. With enthusiasm and with the entirety of the nation rallied together, the Ukrainian people are fighting for themselves. They are not fighting because they have been told to and they are afraid of the consequences, they are not fighting because of "NATO puppet masters" they are fighting because the alternative to fighting relentlessly and without a break is violent imperial domination. Saying they are "cannon fodder" plainly implies they are unwilling participants in a larger conflict, which is nonsense.

It's very easy to understand why they feel this way.  Under the Tsars, there was forced Russification and overbearing imperial secret police. Under Stalin, the Ukrainian intelligentsia was lined up and shot, the Ukrainian nation was subject to a devastating political famine. In the post-independence era, Russia has either played the role of the imperial aggressor (such as in 2014), or the sponsor of unpatriotic transnational oligarchs who have looted Ukraine for all she is worth.

With regards to Red Velvet it's clear he knows nothing about the history of Russia and Ukraine and is merely using this conflict as a vessel to vent his frustrations about NATO, the United States, and the neoliberal world order. Which is fine on its own I suppose, but as long as he uses this conflict merely as a vessel for his complaints, his position is morally appalling and incredibly stupid (as well as annoying).

[Hindsight was 2020]

I’m starting to notice that Red Velvet rarely if ever actually addresses the war in his posts here. Like a lot of their “global south” posts here are more about China vs the West economic tensions (with Russia as the implied junior partner of China) than anything with the actual war. Then in the post above we have 9 paragraphs and not once did Red Velvet actually address H.E.’s point about trying to paint a clear cut good vs bad conflict as grey

Those economic tensions are directly related to the start of the war, as it started during shaky 2010s, when the West noticed the economic competitiveness coming from different parts of the globe and wanted to shift their interventionist attention OUT of the Middle East and more into places like China and Russia.

Or do you think getting out if the middle east right when this starts happened by accident/coincidence? When they could’ve done much sooner? There’s always a war that the US has to be on non-stop.

The West becoming concerned about Ukraine in the late 2010’s because Russia freakin invaded it and set in motion the first major European crisis on such a scale since Bosnia in the 90’s and has now turned into the deadliest conflict on the continent since WW2

[KaiserDave]

This once great thread has become unreadable due to an endless waterfall of morons, useful idiots, and trolls proclaiming the imminent victory of Russia over a city that pre-war had more or less the population of greater Burlington. For the past 3 months coming here is just seeing some wannabe rebel post about how Bakhmut is about to fall or how sanctions aren’t working or western unity is about to shatter. Those sane people who post here should eventually stop arguing with people who are better suited for hysterical Russian language Telegram group chats.

I posted this in early February and Bakhmut has still not fallen.

[Woody]

Dangles potential NATO membership in front of it's face for decades, withholds significant aid during it's separatist war, and even now in partial waves.

*Also gives NATO membership for Sweden and Finland without any pre-conditions in under a year.

Yeah right, get the f**k out here, clown. They're milking this for everything it's worth.

[KaiserDave]

Dangles potential NATO membership in front of it's face for decades, withholds significant aid during it's separatist war, and even now in partial waves.

*Also gives NATO membership for Sweden and Finland without any pre-conditions in under a year.

Yeah right, get the f**k out here, clown. They're milking this for everything it's worth.

I don't think the guy who has spent months spamming Russian propaganda and claiming the imminent fall of Bakhmut for month after month has any right to say anyone else is a clown nor claim to be an honest broker on anything. Nobody takes you seriously and you have rendered this thread unreadable with nonsense.

You're not gonna get me to defend NATO's cowardly Ukraine policy and failure to admit Ukraine in 2008 when it actually had a chance. Although Ukrainian NATO membership was never possible after 2014 given NATO's contested territorial claims policy and Ukrainian leadership knew that.

The question is whether referring to the Ukrainian people as NATO's "cannon fodder" is appropriate. That the significance of this conflict can be boiled down to NATO using Ukraine as a meat shield between them and Russia, which is nonsense. It boils the Ukrainian nation down to a pawn on a chess board, the ever-present disease of the realist mind. This is wrong, the Ukrainian struggle for independence has significance beyond international chess-playing, and the Ukrainian people care about this.

[Red Velvet]

It’s OBVIOUS that the Ukrainian people care about this, but that doesn’t justify using their drama and hopes just for the sake of sticking up to Russia.

If the West really wanted to do something for Ukraine, it would’ve been done much longer ago or even right now by adopting a more incisive and direct action on Russia. The West didn’t start the Ukraine-Russia conflict, yes, but it also did nothing to promote peace in there either, only adding fuel to the fire for the past decade because it’s convenient for them to do so.

In other news, I think merely suggesting the truth that people want to keep hidden is threatening enough because the rhetoric being used is amping up…

https://twitter.com/AFP/status/1648079638118146053

[Mike88]

What kind of "promote peace" would that be? If the West did any mistake was of not tackling Putin and free itself from Russian dependency earlier, for example, when Russia annexed Crimea. And there's no possibility of peace in this case: Russia was always threatening Ukraine and negotiating "peace deals", or whatever, in which Russia would get this, and then that, and so on, would only end up in the demise of the Ukrainian State as we know it. Russia decided to invade Ukraine, they are the aggressor and if they started the war, Ukraine has every right to finish it. Because, in the end, if Russia is able to gain just a tiny thing out from all of this, they will come back for more.

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

The question is whether referring to the Ukrainian people as NATO's "cannon fodder" is appropriate. That the significance of this conflict can be boiled down to NATO using Ukraine as a meat shield between them and Russia, which is nonsense. It boils the Ukrainian nation down to a pawn on a chess board, the ever-present disease of the realist mind. This is wrong, the Ukrainian struggle for independence has significance beyond international chess-playing, and the Ukrainian people care about this.

This is broadly true, but the Western allies' attempts at chess-playing are happening - and they're frustrating to watch. Take, for instance, the French delaying the deal to supply ammunition to Ukraine. It's doing this on the grounds that all the ammunition must come from the EU, rather than including Turkish/British etc. suppliers. There is no way that the levels of pettiness, protectionism and bureaucracy seen amongst Ukraine's "supporters" would exist were Ukraine a NATO/EU member.

[Hindsight was 2020]

And if Ukraine doesn’t want peace because of what Russia has done what then? People who love to condemn the West for “imperialism” seem to keep implying that the West should be forcing Ukraine against its will to give up land to end the war

[Damocles]

The only permissible way for this war to end is for RuZZia to evacuate its army and abandon its territorial claims to the Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson regions of Ukraine; for Ukraine’s 1991 borders to be restored in their entirety; for RuZZian forces to permanently leave the Sevastopol Naval Base; for the Russo-Ukrainian land borders to be enforced as a demilitarized zone; for Ukraine to join NATO as a full member; and for NATO to maintain a permanent border policing and security mission in Kharkiv, Donetsk, Luhansk, Kyiv, Rivne, and other cities along the RuZZian-BelaruZZian border.

Also, while we’re at it, Finland and Estonia should hurry up and press their respective maritime territorial claims in the Gulf of Finland according to the principle of equidistance. Permanently claiming and enforcing those maritime claims opens the possibility of permanently connecting Tallinn with Helsinki through an undersea tunnel, enabling stronger economic connections between Finland, the Baltic states, and Central Europe.

It would also permanently block RuZZian military and civilian maritime traffic from transiting out of Saint Petersburg without crossing through the territorial waters of NATO member states, further isolate the Kaliningrad Oblast and make the geopolitics of its maintenance steadily more untenable, etc etc.

[Red Velvet]

And if Ukraine doesn’t want peace because of what Russia has done what then? People who love to condemn the West for “imperialism” seem to keep implying that the West should be forcing Ukraine against its will to give up land to end the war

They’re entitled to that but in that case you completely validate Lula’s argument of equivalence regarding both sides pushing for more conflict over less instead of the agressor and the other the victim one that you guys seem to defend. You cannot have your cake and eat it too.

What we see nowadays is every side wanting to push for more conflict instead of behaving like serious adults and going to the negotiation table to hear each other. You have an imperialist driven Russia who feels their security concerns are openly ignored; an Ukraine that seems to be driven by revenge and are naturally pushed to look west in order to survive the threat from East and the Western countries who seem a mix of concerned and excited about the war by the way they stimulate that these two should keep fighting each other for an indeterminate period of time like it was another of their forever wars.

That’s why it’s extremely necessary for the Brazil-China peace club to gain track, because they seem to be the only ones with the will to put all these actors in the same table to talk with each other and try to find a middle ground where everyone’s concerns can be heard. But a 1st step is CONVINCING all these actors that finding peace is preferable to pursuing more war, especially when the West seems focused in putting more fuel in the fire to justify these two fighting (which does evidence the support is more of an ~Anti-Russia~ thing than ~Pro-Ukraine~, enemy of my enemy logic).

Russia cannot get everything they want and so cannot Ukraine as geography inevitably ties these countries. The war has to end one day and these two countries will have to deal with each other forever, it’s not like they have a choice.

[Hindsight was 2020]

And if Ukraine doesn’t want peace because of what Russia has done what then? People who love to condemn the West for “imperialism” seem to keep implying that the West should be forcing Ukraine against its will to give up land to end the war

They’re entitled to that but in that case you completely validate Lula’s argument of equivalence regarding both sides pushing for more conflict instead of less instead of the agressor and the other the victim one that you guys seem to defend. You cannot have your cake and eat it too.

What we see nowadays is every side wanting to push for more conflict instead of behaving like serious adults and going to the negotiation table to hear each other. You have an imperialist driven Russia who feels their security concerns are openly ignored; an Ukraine that seems to be driven by revenge and are naturally pushed to look west in order to survive the threat from East and the Western countries who seem a mix of concerned and excited about the war by the way they stimulate that these two should keep fighting each other for an indeterminate period of time like it was another of their forever wars.

That’s why it’s extremely necessary for the Brazil-China peace club to gain track, because they seem to be the only ones with the will to put all these actors in the same table to talk with each other and try to find a middle ground where everyone’s concerns can be heard. But a 1st step is CONVINCING all these actors that finding peace is preferable to pursuing more war, especially when the West seems focused in putting more fuel in the fire to justify these two fighting (which does evidence the support is more of an ~Anti-Russia~ thing than ~Pro-Ukraine~, enemy of my enemy logic).

Russia cannot get everything they want and so cannot Ukraine as geography inevitably ties these countries. The war has to end one day and these two countries will have to deal with each other forever, it’s not like they have a choice.

No it doesn’t validate any bs argument that Ukraine has some type equal responsibility on this. Russia attacked them unprovoked, launched missiles at civilian targets, shot unarmed Ukrainians and dumped them in mass graves, and are beheading captured Ukrainian soldiers. Ukraine has ever right and responsibility in the wake of such horror but also in the fact that the past year of fighting has shown they can beat Russia in the field to keep fighting until Russia is gone from every inch of Ukrainian soil. Blaming the West for this war because they give Ukraine military aid is just gross victim blaming and I’d wish you stop dodging the fact that you’re position is the West should stop giving aid to defend itself in order to force them to give up. Also this idea that China-Brazil are the only ones to get everyone to the table are completely unfounded as China’s first attempt at a peace plan was mocked by Ukraine and the reactions to Lula’s comments haven’t been positive either

[pppolitics]

https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1648106855854485506

[TiltsAreUnderrated]

https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1648106855854485506

They've been getting billions annually in military aid for decades from the US - IIRC, in accordance with the Camp David agreements where they and Israel are paid to not resume warring with each other. Bad news for the US that it even came to this.

[NOVA Green]

https://twitter.com/washingtonpost/status/1648106855854485506

They've been getting billions annually in military aid for decades from the US - IIRC, in accordance with the Camp David agreements where they and Israel are paid to not resume warring with each other. Bad news for the US that it even came to this.

Still it looks like more 155mm artillery shells will end up heading to Ukraine because of this.

Side note: Russia's destabilization of neighboring Sudan might further increase tensions between Russia and Egypt.

[Storr]

https://twitter.com/IAPonomarenko/status/1648003877285797893?s=20

[Storr]

"Global South": There needs to be peace

Russia:

https://twitter.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1648188354310336512?s=20

[Woody]

Dangles potential NATO membership in front of it's face for decades, withholds significant aid during it's separatist war, and even now in partial waves.

*Also gives NATO membership for Sweden and Finland without any pre-conditions in under a year.

Yeah right, get the f**k out here, clown. They're milking this for everything it's worth.

You're not gonna get me to defend NATO's cowardly Ukraine policy and failure to admit Ukraine in 2008 when it actually had a chance...

Defends it anyway. Also, you keep changing the subject, nobody says Ukrainians don't give a sh*t, you're making this up. We're talking about the State Department & NATO and Co. right now, they're not acting in good faith. You think they care about morals? You think the same organization that bombed Libya and caused it to have one the biggest slave markets in the world are in this for morals?

[Woody]

Putin visited Genichesk (Kherson Region) and LPR. The only recently annexed subject he hasn't visited yet is Zaporozhye.
https://twitter.com/anadoluagency/status/1648223467060297728

[Red Velvet]

Dangles potential NATO membership in front of it's face for decades, withholds significant aid during it's separatist war, and even now in partial waves.

*Also gives NATO membership for Sweden and Finland without any pre-conditions in under a year.

Yeah right, get the f**k out here, clown. They're milking this for everything it's worth.

You're not gonna get me to defend NATO's cowardly Ukraine policy and failure to admit Ukraine in 2008 when it actually had a chance...

Defends it anyway. Also, you keep changing the subject, nobody says Ukrainians don't give a sh*t, you're making this up. We're talking about the State Department & NATO and Co. right now, they're not acting in good faith. You think they care about morals? You think the same organization that bombed Libya and caused it to have one the biggest slave markets in the world are in this for morals?

They know morals don’t guide geopolitical choices and never did, at least not as a protagonist motivation though it can be a secondary one. Realists understand that Idealists only use morals as a tool to justify positions they take based on their national self-interest. That’s why each and every place cones up with a narrative that positions them in the “good” side. Russia does it, The West does it and even Ukraine too.

And it’s not a matter of whether things should or shouldn’t be like this. It’s about how they ARE regardless and have always been. It’s laughable from Global South perspective because everything sounds hypocritical and fake as hell when a moral argument of “invading countries is evil and imperialistic” when the West has been doing that casually for the past decades all until now and whenever that happens the ~moral lecture speech~ is adapted to justify invasions and promotion of instability abroad instead, because the invaded countries are “anti-democratic”.

Morals can and ARE adapted to fill into the goals of each country. And it’s clear by the way morals are adaptable in the West, that they see as part of their interest the subjugation of the third world as a means of keeping their global dominance through the white fear of the “other”. Which is how Europe gets to be pushed as this unquestioned place of alliance while the non-white world is seen with suspicion, condescension and through an inhumane lens of “ moral higher ground”.

US Liberals are the main racists these days, while conservatives even if not saints and cutthroat/imperialist, respect much much more foreign countries sovereignty by simply admitting this realistic understanding of geopolitics instead of pushing for an idealistic vision that inevitably sounds like desperate propaganda for its lack if consistency. You see this in practice! Trump was mostly hated in Europe but literally elsewhere (with exceptions, like Iran or Venezuela), leaders got along better with Trump over Biden.

It’s pretty simple: It’s in the Ukrainian self-interest to fight Russia now for their own survival and more independence and the West uses this context as an opportunity for themselves to stick to Russia as they see it as an enemy/rival even if Ukraine don’t hold a strategic meaning to them like say, Taiwan does with their microchip technology industry.

Because it’s better to build a wall between Russia/Europe and then drive Europe into more dependence of a “reliable” partner like US, guaranteeing American hold over Europe. I get why it’s interesting from a realist American POV and I don’t judge it. I would only question to US government if it’s really that worth it to get more control and hold over Europe while completely alienating practically almost everyone outside that continent through the unapologetic politicization of their currency. I don’t think it’s smart to bet so hard in the maintainability of “Western US-EU order” just because it’s comfort known zone they are used to when demographic and economic trends shows that the future is in the South.

And from an European interests POV, I will just say that if a great leadership like Angela Merkel was still in power in Germany instead of the current weak submissive leadership, they would be much more moderate and able to separate economic goals from their political ones to achieve a position of European independence (from Russia or the USA) and sovereignty.