Quote (ferdia @ Mar 1 2022 10:00am)
The crimean annexation was largely due to the same reason : security fears. one aspect was - Russia could not allow "their" port to be no longer "russian". I completely agree with you that their desire for protect themselves wasn't exactly uncalled for, but Russia had already "let" them be independent with the proviso, as i understand it, that they did not turn their weapons of war on Russia, which is exactly what would have happened, had Ukraine joined Nato. i.e. in seeking to prevent the worst from happening, they inadvertently accelerated that very event.
Re: removing Putin from within
There are a lot of parallels that can be used here. but ultimately alot of people in alot of countries get in power and abuse that power, or they people they (to my mind) they should be protecting. I dont care what kind of government you want to call russia has, but I see it as a dictatorship and therefore i do not agree the people can simply "vote" for him to be out of office.
i dont disagree with the timeline in retrospect, its just that EVERYONE was pretty surprised by the invasion. no one expected this would happen. hard to be naïve about something no one foresaw.