Russia Surrounded

[padraig (u.s.)]

He replied this at first which is not very satisfactory

ask him if he can maybe source someone who isn't basically an official Russian propaganda shill

(and also preferably not a virulently racist, anti-Semitic, xenophobe, etc)

 

[droid]

Its a strategic disaster with potentially disastrous long-term consequences, similar to many recent conflicts, but my primary concern is the ongoing slaughter and destruction and the potential for catastrophic escalation, which increases the longer a hot war continues.

 

[luka]

it's nice that droid and vimothy share the same position. a first? craner say we should fire a tatical nuke at Putin's bald head.

 

[Mr. Tea]

russia is doing pretty well.

Its a strategic disaster

it's nice that droid and vimothy share the same position.

 

[IdleRich]

ask him if he can maybe source someone who isn't basically an official Russian propaganda shill

(and also preferably not a virulently racist, anti-Semitic, xenophobe, etc)

My pleasure

 

[Mr. Tea]

@vimothy (if you haven't forsaken this thread for good): you've talked a lot about Russia's "rational self-interest" in this thread, and approvingly quoted people who are saying more or less the same thing. In all honesty, do you think Russia - or rather, the Russian state, or even just Putin himself, if you prefer - is stronger now than before the invasion? Or that NATO/'the West' is weaker, which in this zero-sum formulation amounts to the same thing?

 

[luka]

he only posts when he's drunk. give it a few hours

 

[luka]

vimothy has a point anyway. states have interests they consider zero sum. for one reason or another. thats why we'd never, ever forsake the falklands.
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[droid]

@vimothy (if you haven't forsaken this thread for good): you've talked a lot about Russia's "rational self-interest" in this thread, and approvingly quoted people who are saying more or less the same thing. In all honesty, do you think Russia - or rather, the Russian state, or even just Putin himself, if you prefer - is stronger now than before the invasion? Or that NATO/'the West' is weaker, which in this zero-sum formulation amounts to the same thing?

Where is the conflict in this suggestion? Russia may feel it acted in self interest at the time and their actions may also have weakened their interests. They fucked up. It happens all the time.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

my primary concern is the ongoing slaughter and destruction and the potential for catastrophic escalation, which increases the longer a hot war continues

for sure

as it stands now it seems there'd need to be some relevant major development external to the war itself - which is certainly possible - to get both sides to an official negotiation table sooner rather than later, and barring that a bitter protracted conflict seems quite likely

 

[Mr. Tea]

Where is the conflict in this suggestion? Russia may feel it acted in self interest at the time and their actions may also have weakened their interests. They fucked up. It happens all the time.

Well that may be obvious to you and me, but I was interested in vim's opinion, since he's the one who thinks the war is going well for Russia. I'm interested in how, if he thinks it has strengthened Russia, how he squares this with massive personnel and material losses, nearly a million men fleeing conscription, Finland and Sweden joining NATO, etc. And if he thinks it hasn't strengthened Russia, what he thinks this means for Putin's grasp on reality. (By which I don't mean I think he's 'mad', as such, but there's a good case to be made that in a dictatorship where deception and disinformation are the norm, the dictator is at risk of ending up more deluded than anyone else.)

 

[IdleRich]

Taras told me he got in trouble the other day at a party or something when he was chatting to a girl from Belorussia and this guy from England. The English guy asked if Belorussia was actually part of Russia and Taras tactfully jumped in with "Not yet" - girl went mental saying if you come to Belorussia we gonna burn you down and then stormed out.

 

[Mr. Tea]

Taras told me he got in trouble the other day at a party or something when he was chatting to a girl from Belorussia and this guy from England. The English guy asked if Belorussia was actually part of Russia and Taras tactfully jumped in with "Not yet" - girl went mental saying if you come to Belorussia we gonna burn you down and then stormed out.

I really don't understand the relationship between Russia and Belarus. Is Belarus the closest thing Russia has to an actual ally, as such? Or would client, or even puppet, be closer to the mark?

 

[vimothy]

a surprisingly poor performance by vimothy (perhaps illustrating the difficulty of expanding gnomic one-line utterances into actual positions)

we went through all this realpolitik biz fairly thoroughly last year shortly after the initial invasion







if you go further back you can find me comparing current Russian objectives to objectives of prior Russian rulers


and so on

but just expounding on it in realpolitik terms 1) doesn't really say anything everyone doesn't already know 2) doesn't offer any solutions

but apparently this is something no one agrees with, irrespective of whether it offers solutions or not

 

[vimothy]

a surprisingly poor performance by vimothy (perhaps illustrating the difficulty of expanding gnomic one-line utterances into actual positions)

we went through all this realpolitik biz fairly thoroughly last year shortly after the initial invasion







if you go further back you can find me comparing current Russian objectives to objectives of prior Russian rulers


and so on

but just expounding on it in realpolitik terms 1) doesn't really say anything everyone doesn't already know 2) doesn't offer any solutions

the issue really is that the biden admin is one of the most hawkest ever. it's already at war with russia and it's threatening war with china. why is that?

 

[vimothy]

wrt war with nato, russia is doing pretty well. i.e., it hasn't been defeated. it's still a live concern. was the invasion a good idea? no, obviously not.

 

[vimothy]

but that goes both ways. are we benefiting? is this as success of western strategy? no, it's not that either.

 

[vimothy]

what it is, is a complete disaster from every perspective

 

[vimothy]

@vimothy (if you haven't forsaken this thread for good): you've talked a lot about Russia's "rational self-interest" in this thread, and approvingly quoted people who are saying more or less the same thing. In all honesty, do you think Russia - or rather, the Russian state, or even just Putin himself, if you prefer - is stronger now than before the invasion? Or that NATO/'the West' is weaker, which in this zero-sum formulation amounts to the same thing?

both sides are substantially weaker. within russia, putin is probably stronger. which is fine.

 

[IdleRich]

the issue really is that the biden admin is one of the most hawkest ever. it's already at war with russia and it's threatening war with china. why is that?

I've no dog in this fight but that argument is very cheap. It's "at war" with Russia cos Russia invaded Ukraine during Biden's term and it has the same status with regard to China as it did under Trump.


Additionally I've got to say I'm surprised to hear that Biden is considering war with China cos I was under the distinct impression that he was a Chinese agent entirely under their control.