Nukes are NOT a deterrent in our current scenario.

I strongly believe Putin feels the end of the human race is a better fate than to allow homosexuality, pedophilia, and mutilation of children (gender reassignment therapy) to infect Russia. Putin will blow up the Earth and call it a win. Many may not believe that he is that radical, but I think all the signs are there. I mean hell, we go berserk here in the West to make sure Iran and North Korea does not have the bomb because we think they would blow up the Earth. For some reason, people will call Putin a crazy mad dictator but NOT think Putin would do the same if he doesn't get his way.

This post was edited by Kuggergug on Jul 23 2022 08:10pm

Putin is well known to be moderate.. There is a reason they call people from Petersburg etc to be far too western-centric for rule.. Just compare him to someone like medvedev or lavrov, or really anyone in the rest of duma... and you will understand how dovish he really is

Why is it that whenever I open any western-oriented forum, be it d2jsp, reddit or anything the discourse is completely fictional and absent mind?

This post was edited by ownyaah on Jul 23 2022 08:43pm

NATO would move to stop them, though, and so we would come full circle and the onus would be on Russia to initiate MAD. We cannot control what Russia might do, but we can draw red lines, communicate them clearly, and move to enforce them once crossed.

This is all fantasy speak, Russia will take odessa/kharkov unless a negotiated peace is settled after donbass is cleared. As for timelines they are irrelevant because the Russians can easily keep going a minimum of 10-20 years. The Russian economy is self-sufficient, the people resilient and the army can sustain losses of at least a few million.. Nukes are off the table, stop talking about them. Try looking at the situation from afar without regurgitating internal propaganda

2, Russia isn't going to invade the rest of Europe. The only place that could be at a high risk in the far distant future would be Baltics, and they are irrelevant from the broader perspective. It is pure Fantasy that article 5 would lead to a mass-scale war for the likes of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.. These are tiny, insignificant nations, all 3 together barely add to 5 million people.

As much as Latvia talks about a no-fly-zone their airforce has a total of 5 planes/helis. (1 training plane)

This post was edited by ownyaah on Jul 23 2022 08:58pm

I am replying to someone specifically talking about a Russian invasion of the Baltics, predicated on Russia's willingness to employ offensive nuclear warfare.

Both of your contentions are pure fantasy.

The Russians don't need any nuclear capability to invade the Baltics. Also your reply of nato responding to a Baltic invasion is silly. Nato will sit that one out, they will fulfill the bare minimum of article 5 by giving them a few planes and howitzers, nobody is gonna send the 5+ million soldiers needed to fight for insignificant countries that close to Russia.

If you were talking about Poland, or Scandinavia you would have more of an arguement. People need to read article 5 more clearly, there is a very important clause they tend to skip. Then again the Russians wouldn't invade Poland/Scandinavia unless there was massive geopolitical changes in which case you wouldn't even recognize current world-power structures, as such the point being moot.

This post was edited by ownyaah on Jul 23 2022 09:09pm

This is the sort of dangerous miscalculation that might lead to the extinction of the Russian race. NATO is predicated on mutual defense. An armed incursion into the Baltics would quickly lead to a hot European war. Can you imagine news headlines of American dead? Any politician that didn't support war would be in public danger.

Yes a war and a nuclear fall out that would cost anywhere from tens of millions of deaths to billions for the insignificant Estonia with barely 1 million people in total, and an airforce of 3 total planes. A country that poses no strategic depth for NATO or more correctly put, the US in any shape or form. You are chasing a golden truth here xD

I am not sure where people got the idea that power-politics somehow died a permanent death because there was a period of unipolarity, a period which has already passed. The written words of article 5, or any international treaty means nothing in the grand scheme of things when power politics are involved. You could argue a full-scale article 5 would be commenced for a hub like Germany, but for Estonia in this time and place? Like I said pure fantasy.

You are aware that Romania, Poland and Hungary were talking about establishing a second military pact? Long before the Ukraine war? Because even they have degrees of doubt about the viability of article 5 when push comes to shove. If even those nations, which are the 2nd line, proper line of defense are a bit scared.. what does that tell you about article 5 and the Baltics?

This post was edited by ownyaah on Jul 23 2022 09:23pm

The golden age of power politics brought us the first world war as a result of the assassination of the archduke by terrorists and the subsequent declaration of war on Serbia by Austria-Hungary. The fate of Serbia was inconsequential to Imperial Germany, but their security guarantees to Austria-Hungary, and the prospect of a two-front war weren't.

The reality is that the United States has given clear assurances to the Baltic states via NATO. The United States cannot abandon them without fatally undermining both NATO and American assurances to Japan. The fate of the Baltics is inconsequential by itself, but it is tied tightly to core American interests elsewhere. The United States will feel compelled to respond.

Furthermore, though, American troops are already present on a rotational basis, and that presence is set to grow. Can you imagine a news headline reading of American dead in Lithuania and an American politician not voting for war? They'd never be able to walk down the street safely again.

The stuff you are saying is sound from a historical perspective, but times have changed and the world is no longer unipolar. The Americans do not have that sort of power-defying ability anymore. The middle-east has already realized it and is realigning on all fronts as is large parts of Asia. In no longer than 5 years even the Saudis will have joined BRICS. The only ones who have been slow to understand the new statues quo is the Americans and the Europeans themselves.

As for popular opinion, the American people for the most part when it comes to geopolitics align themselves almost perfectly inline with what the politicians want them to. Considering not particularly long ago the American leadership with ease convinced the American population of the total destruction of Libya for no real legitimate reason but the fact that Libya wanted to create a African-union, tells you a lot.

Headlines like these are daily, but not very mainstream: https://www.arabnews.com/node/2127586 or more interestingly https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/6/27/iran-claims-saudi-arabia-ready-for-more-direct-talks

This post was edited by ownyaah on Jul 23 2022 09:37pm