So, russia has casus belli because NATO wanted Ukraine and Georgia to join (lets roll with this), yes?

That means NATO has casus belli to attack russia because it tried to prevent Georgia and Ukraine joining? Surely it works both ways? And you would defend NATO attacking russia because it had the right to defend its geo-politics?

Sure, Georgia, Moldovia, Ukraine or Chechnya is huge strategic importance, unlike... much bigger and richer Finland with huge land border, yes? 5 Dimensional chess I'm telling you. Surely it made sense.


The "three day" operation comes from russian state media, which is official russian propaganda channel eg. Solovyov https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6oB2XhTVz0 (6:30), as well as Lukashenka https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1FbxvnsUeI . And of course the fact that calling it a war was illegal in russia, it was "Special operation" lol




would you like to live there? Simple yes/no will suffice

Yeah countries do decide which alliances their neighbours can join all the time.

If their neighbours represent a potential threat - they get bombed back to Stone Age. It’s not new or unique to Russia. Just look at how many people Poland has murdered and displaced in illegal invasions in the past 20 years. This makes Poland in particular a security threat to Russia as they illegally attack other countries for the fuck of it.

It was a geopolitical mistake for Russia to agree to withdraw from Germany and to let Poland and Baltics join NATO as now they are protected by nukes. Gorbachev was a fool and got played like a fiddle. Not much can be done unfortunately, but to prevent creeping spread eastwards.

Re “post-Soviet shitholes” you are welcome to refer to earlier lectures of Jeffrey Sachs (before he became popular/ controversial due to his Ukraine war stance) on why eg Poland got bailed out and supported after collapse of the Warsaw pact and hundreds of billions were invested by eg Germany compared to post-Soviet Russia which was being actively robbed and torn apart by unscrupulous “democratic” foreign investors.

He is a multi, don't waste your breath. All of what he is saying can be countered by the Cuba crisis. NATO is a military alliance. Ukraine was that progressive and pro EU leaning because Russia didn't bother. Russia also didn't care whether Ukraine joined the EU or not, just like all of the baltic states.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Missile_Crisis
Calling a country a shithole is disrespect of the highest order. I wouldn't bother with such a person in IRL much less in an online forum.

This post was edited by babun1024 on Nov 28 2024 03:20am

Wait what country has Poland invaded? I am only aware of ... stupid troops taking over a religious statue in Czech Republic for a day like 2 years ago (its true, lol). Or do you mean Iraq and Afghanistan? Those I wouldn't defend and I think it was stupid to join those wars. That wasn't Polands' war, only stupidly joined one.


I used the post-soviet shitholes after the guy I quoted. Thats his term he used. I believe they should have nice lives as well, and not under russian shoe. Look at Poland today and before soviet union collapse, where would you rather live?

OH NO, Poland is protected from russia, THE HORROR xD

This post was edited by nuvo on Nov 28 2024 03:26am

I’m glad you see my point. The fact that Poland lets itself and its territory be used in “stupid wars” that its citizens do not support and these wars go on to devastate millions and displace tens of millions, flooding Europe with refugees from those wars - literally makes Poland a security threat. Germany did not join Iraq war, yet suffers refugee crisis now because of Polish decision, but keeps supporting Poland through de-facto reparations via EU budget. What if Poland picks a fight with Russia or Iran and gets nuked. Does Germany have to bail them out again through Article 5?

Re 2nd point - I think you confuse economic prosperity with xenophobia. Making fun and hating poorer nations doesn’t make you morally just. Collapse of the USSR was a tragedy for hundreds of millions of people as their savings, pensions and livelihoods were wiped out overnight and they had to adjust to new and foreign laissez-faire unlimited robber baron capitalism never before seen on this planet. People got stuck in all kinds of wierd places as infrastructure projects got cancelled. Russians got stuck in building an unfinished hydro plant in Tajikistan, Latvians got stuck building a particle accelerator in Siberia, Azeris got stuck pumping oil from the vast fields of Komi.

Almost 3 decades have now passed and post-Soviet nations have started accumulating capital. A new generation has come of age that never lived under the Soviet system that has different perspective on things.

Take for example Poland - Polish emigrated en masse to Europe and elsewhere in the 1990s due to poverty and economic distress after the collapse of the Soviet block. People made fun of poor Polish plumbers and construction workers. This trend is being reversed now as Poland managed to stabilize and pull ahead of its neighbours creating economic incentives for Poles that went to for example UK or The Netherlands to return home and prosper.

There are many authoritarian countries around the world that people absolutely love - because they are safe, rich and are great destinations to work and live (eg UAE, Singapore). People do not really complain that Singapore elects the same party for 70years now that selected LKY and then his son over and over again, while jailing and executing foreign citizens that break their laws.

This post was edited by Malopox on Nov 28 2024 03:50am

Like I've said before, it's not just the loss of cheap Russian energy. Starting in 2021-2022, Germany got hit by a multifaceted whammy, but you try to pin the blame exclusively on one singular factor, because that would support your broader argument.


1.: Even if Germany had refused to join the Western sanctions, it would still have lost most access to Russian energy.
2.: Even if we still had access to Russian gas, the repercussions of the Ukraine war affected the global energy market and sent oil and gas prices from any source or country of origin soaring. The US are near-self-sufficient on oil these days and their customers were still bled dry at the gas pump.

3.: The German economic boom of the 2010s was fueled in no small part by the ultra-loose fiscal policy of the ECB. The sudden interest rate hikes were always gonna stiffle our economic growth, and these hikes would have been necessary due to the post-covid inflation anyway, even in a hypothetical world in which the outbreak of the Ukraine war had been averted.
4.: Our country had been betting on the wrong horse in terms of energy policy for 2 decades and this miscalculation is now coming home to roost.
5.: Dito for the climate craze and the transition to EVs, which is hitting our core industry hard right now and has nothing to do with Ukraine/Russia. Other western carmakers like Ford aren't doing too hot right now, either.

6.: Our lack of innovation and R&D investment as well as our crumbling infrastructure have now reached a point where it's impacting growth.
7.: Almost a decade of misguided public spending on "refugees" has drained our public finances with little to nothing to show for it.
8.: The sputtering global economy post-covid is hitting all export-focused nations particularly hard. Japan and South Korea didn't lose access to Russian energy and are still bogged down in economic malaise. China isn't technically in a recession, but their growth rates are also several percentage points below their usual baseline.


Was the Ukraine war a disaster for us? Absolutely. But this simplistic narrative that we would be thriving if only we weren't so "stupidly loyal to the US" and would align more with our benevolent friends in Russia doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Nov 28 2024 04:01am

The immigration crisis is from Syria, which guess which country invaded in 2015? Which country now ships hundreds of thousands of immigrants to Belarus-Polish border to try and destabilize the region?

Again, I used the term after the guy I quoted and explicitly said they too deserve nice lives and they too can choose their future for themselves. Maybe I shouldn't have because people now took that part from my post and think I'm the mean one, eh.

I am very well aware of situation in current and past Poland. I live here. And I'm well aware of how lives were even 30 years ago, when my father had to go to germany (Then RFN :)) for months to make some money. My uncle went to UK and stayed, my cousin went to Ireland and stayed, my other cousin went to Finland and stayed there.

Yes, people (citizens) are happy in Dubai or UAE or so, but russia is unlike those countries. Hell, some dude saying that the countries will be enriched by russian occupation doesn't know that millions of russians in mainland russia don't even have running water. And he thinks they will help people in occupied Ukraine? LOL.

Also just because they are rich, doesn't mean they are all roses and skyscrapers. Indian workers in Dubai are literally slaves. How many people from poor countries died building the football village for football championship in Qatar? Being rich in UAE is nice, but so is being oligarch in russia or tajikistan probably. I am more concerned about normal people, where do you think they are better off? Democratic countries or dictatorships?

Current Syrian crisis was caused mostly by refugees fleeing Iraq war that were running away since the invasion in 2003 in all kinds of neighboring countries - Syria, Turkey, Lebanon, etc. This was further exacerbated by a.o. botched Operation Timber Sycamore which accidentally spawned ISIS unleashing unprecedented man made horrors beyond anyone’s comprehension. We can even dig deeper and ask ourselves the question as to why there was a need to overthrow Syrian democracy in 1949 and forcing the country into decades of authoritarian rule?

The tragedy of the situation is that you won’t be able to tell a Syrian from an Iraqi even if your life depended on it, while you can easily tell a Syrian from a Saudi because Saudis are stupidly rich - even though technically they all could’ve been one country if Hashemites didn’t lose and house Saud didn’t take power. Not to mention that while your average Syrian is genetically the same Arab as in Saudi peninsula - he has been sanctioned to death for the past decades for no fault of his own. People literally were unable to send humanitarian help across the border to Syria from Turkey when a recent devastating earthquake hit - out of fear of sanctions.

I’m glad you see my point about poverty. Your relatives moved away from Poland not because Poland was “undemocratic” but because it was poor and there were no jobs. So yeah, generally people choose what’s best for them and usually being able to feed yourself trumps living in a “democraric” state. Otherwise why would Indians move from free and democratic India to be a slave in Qatar?

Dubai, Singapore and Qatar all have de facto slavery, however that doesn’t bother people travelling there it seems. My Instagram is full of girls posing from Dubai marina and hustler-influencer types showing off Rolexes and Lambos.

This post was edited by Malopox on Nov 28 2024 05:02am

A well thought out and balanced post, thank you.

in response:

My main gripe is that Germany refuses to act as a leader in Europe. it is on board a ship instead of steering the ship. I wanted Germany to steer, unfortunately it is not in control of its own fate. Heretofore we (well me) in europe saw Germany as a powerhouse, and assumed it looked at the Ukraine situation realistically and realized (as Mrs Merkle did) that Ukraine in Nato was a non-runner. As you are well aware, I am a fan of Angela Merkle. While she was not perfect (no one is) my position is that the West (notably the United States) betrayed her legacy. Mrs Merkle had made attempts, via Nord Stream etc, to strengthen ties and co-operation with Russia, as a safe guard, to ensure lasting peace. She was literally just out the door when the US Russia talks broke down and Russia invaded Ukraine. My argument is that if Germany told the US to stop supporting/creating (pick your word) conflict between Ukraine and Russia, then Russia would not have invaded Ukraine, Nord Stream would not have blown up and we would not have an energy crisis to this degree. i.e. her policy re: energy was sound, she just did not factor in her allies blowing up her legacy. Blaming her for what was done to her and Germany, by her allies, is a great injustice. This is my response to 1, 2 & 4.

3. I agree with you, its an irrefutable fact that the ECB has gone up and there are knock on consequences.
5. I would balance my response by stating that Germany's position is not helped by its allies (US) dealings with China. Germany is screwed in that it either trades with China, (understand there is a spectrum when i use the word trade) and suffers the wrath of the US, or it does not trade with China and its position declines, either way there are issues that it is struggling with.
6. No comment (neither agree nor disagree, tend to agree)
7. No comment (neither agree nor disagree, tend to agree)
8. Yes, fine

My argument is Germany would be in a much better position if Russia did not invade Ukraine, that germany could have been more forceful to ensure that, and that germany would be in a much better position if a certain country did not blow up Germany's cash cow. here i refer to international trade (NS, China).

This post was edited by ferdia on Nov 28 2024 04:43am

Syria had always had simmering confessional conflict between the Alawi (Shia) minority which was overrepresented among the country's elites and ruling-class, and the poorer, less powerful Sunni majority.
Decades before 2011, Assad's father had an entire insurrectionist town flattened by his military to nip a brewing uprising in the bud. Assad was unable or unwilling to do the same in 2011 and lost control. Foreign meddling didn't help at all, but the conflict had strong roots in Syria itself.

Another factor for the outbreak of the Syrian civil war was the country's absolutely untenable population growth. Since 1950, the Syrian population had been almost doubling every 20 years. For example, from 12m in 1990 to 21m in 2011. In a country mostly consisting of desert and without too much industry, things were headed toward a breaking point sooner or later anyway.


Where Iraqis really played a role was the emergence of ISIS, whose leadership ranks were staffed mostly with ex-generals of Saddam's army. But make no mistake: ISIS filled the huge power vaccuum caused by the war; they are a symptom, not the conflict's root cause.

It should also be noted that Assad's troops were on the verge of defeat in 2015 when Russia decided to interfere with boots on the ground. Without Russia coming to the rescue, there would presumably have been a genocide of the Alawites - and thus a similar mass exodus of Syrian refugees. So for as critical as I am of the Russian actions in Ukraine, I reject the claim that they are singularly responsible for triggering the European refugee crisis, let alone having done it on purpose.

This post was edited by Black XistenZ on Nov 28 2024 05:07am