It's funny when the aggressor is "negotiating" to attack or not. The biggest bully in the region feeling "threatened" by its neighbours seeking any possible way to protect themselves from it.
Like a government-level "Why are you hitting yourself?"
Like a government-level "Why are you hitting yourself?"
There's a whole lot of the Southwestern US you are agreeing that Mexico can and should invade and occupy, with a much stronger case, if you claim that this justifies Russia in Crimea.
Cool, any invasion and occupation and annexation is justified if you stage a vote to retroactively justify it after the fact.
>All these regional problems are mainly due to the language. If Ukraine allowed Russian as it's second official (or at least regional) language, Donbas would return back in a blink. And Crimea might follow.
What? History goes back farther than the 20th century.
So Moscow should be handed back to Ukraine, the late seat of the Kievan Rus' [1]? Or perhaps the whole thing goes to Mongolia.
Originalist interpretations of border disputes are infinitely flexible, and justification for constant warfare.
And much farther than 18th century. Crimea has a long and rich history, Russian power is relatively young and not justified in the modern world. Wasn't one of the ideas of Helsinki's agreements to agree on non pursuing historical territorial disputes?
This is all hypothetical though. What happened in reality is that Russia rolled tanks into a neighboring sovereign country, invading it, and stole a part of it. It's a blatant and egregious act of war.
Not quite a take over but NATO bombing of Serbia does count as foreign interference.
Please tell this to many thousands of people who moved out and never looked back. Also, hundreds of Crimean Tatar and various active citizens were imprisoned during these years. The danger is very real if you are not willing to keep your mouth shut there.
What do you mean "now invading Ukraine"? Russia already did that, when they invaded Crimea, which is Ukraine.
I wonder how long it will take for russia to get tired of subsidizing crimea and they will beg to go back to the ukraine.
Starting already. I mean, more than before. I found Crimeans not very understanding Russia's realities, so now even thought money go to Crimea from the rest of Russia, the people in Crimea start to compare unfavorably to the alternative.
History moves slowly. However, Ukraine going closer to Europe would be a good illustration.
Care to provide examples? Crimea annexation was almost bloodless, right, but annexation nevertheless - ?
Russia invaded Crimea back when British red coats were stationed in New York City. The Russian military has been there ever since.
When did the US invade the Guantanamo section of Cuba?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guant%C3%A1namo#United_States_...
About 15 km away from the city lies the Guantánamo Bay, a superior natural harbor which has been utilized by the United States since 1898, when it was captured from Spain in the Battle of Guantánamo Bay. In 1903 Cuba leased it to the U.S. as it had committed to in the Cuban–American Treaty of Relations, and remains the site of a US Navy base, as well as the Guantanamo Bay detention camp.
As mentioned in article 2, the High Contracting Parties shall respect each other′s territorial integrity and reaffirm the inviolability of the borders existing between them
Does YCombinator ban trolls, these days?
I mean, isn't this also the tactic used in the late 1800s in the western U.S. to give a reason to pacify Native Americans? Promote U.S. citizens into frontier homesteads and then use the military to protect them/annex land?
What's the point of saying "America bad too"? So? America HAS done awful things in the past, that's not valid justification for a hostile annexation of another country's land.
Topics on Russia ALWAYS have whataboutism nonsense. It seems supporters of Russian actions so badly want the rest of the world to be shitty too, as if that would justify their actions instead of condemn them as well as everyone else
I made no claims that it changes whether the practice is morally or ethically correct. I also didn't claim "America bad too."
I merely pointed out another data point relevant to the GP comment about it being an old tactic to annex land.
*btw, it's Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, and parts of California. The book Blood and Thunder is a great read about the history of expansion of the West
Why? What purpose does this serve?
A Russian strategist might feel threatened because down the line Russia may have depend on its security from either China or a European alliance. In either case it could have less independence and influence in the world.
It sounds insane to risk the disaster of war because your country may lose influence or small amounts of autonomy. But if you think about things like Brexit or some economically undermining policies of MAGA, it seems possible that people -- even in a democracy-- attach more psychic weight to the idea of their nation and its greatness than they do to changes in material prosperity. Also, the pain of bad economic choices (war being an extreme on that spectrum) may not be felt as much by top leaders as the pain of a loss of prestige, which could cost them their jobs or even lives.
Not really. Napoleon invasion was a rather silly directed move for a battle, not a war - too much weight on one individual. Great Patriotic War was fought after failure to prevent Hitler from amassing power and nurturing plans to conquer Europe (by Russians) - USSR needn't to repeat Daladier and Chamberlain mistakes, but Stalin had other plans. And since WWII there weren't aggressions against USSR/RF.
> the concern that Germany would become more of a client state than an independent power was not insane with historical hindsight
And after badly failing at war, Germany now is a leading European nation, one of the world leaders. Surely Russia should be relieved regarding falling to client state?
> A Russian strategist might feel threatened because down the line Russia may have depend on its security from either China or a European alliance.
That's a bad strategist, especially if he seeks possibilities only in realm of realpolitik and dismisses long-term trends both in Russia and worldwide.
> But if you think about things like Brexit or some economically undermining policies of MAGA, it seems possible that people -- even in a democracy-- attach more psychic weight to the idea of their nation and its greatness than they do to changes in material prosperity.
It sounds insane to compare the Brexit or the MAGA disaster to a war in Europe. If people attach more psychic weight - which in Russia they don't - what explanations of the position the Russian powers did to deal with that?
How the Great Britain deals with the idea of their nation and its greatness?
How come Russian decision makers avoid straightforward approaches which helped so many others in recent and not so recent past - like in Eastern Europe or among the Asian-Pacific nations? Not wanting to understand the consequences of autocracy does hurt badly - maybe not directly to the autocrat, but to the people for sure.
Entangling alliances are like abstraction. The only thing that solves it is more of it.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/jun/17/russia.iantray...
https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/molotovs-proposal-t...
NATO is a mutual defence pact. Russia is the most militarily aggressive country in Europe. Agreeing to defend the bully when their chickens come home to roost is a tough sell.
It's not such a crazy idea really, but I'd rather we just abolished NATO entirely.
I'm no fan of Russia, but I don't want to go to war just because they shoot down a Turkish fighter plane in Syria, etc.
NATO has ensured 70 years of peace in Western Europe. There hasn’t been a period this peaceful since the Pax Romana, which still had plenty of wars. Why mess up a good thing? Less people die in wars now. And while the value in trade and infrastructure compared to land is certainly a part of ensuring the peace, that was also true for the decades preceding the Great War. The modern international order is simply more peaceful.
Once the guarantee of NATO becomes a maybe then you start having a lot of incentives for the members to make their own agreements that they can depend on. Then you would be back to regional alliances and from there rivalries. Germany's security agreement partners may not agree with Turkey's security agreement partners about what to do in Syria. Part of what made NATO work was the common interest and values of the members. As you spread it you loose that cohesion.
This is why all the baltic states have multi-country forces in them. Literally small Canadian and Italian forces are in those states, so if there is ever an invasion, those troops will the first casualties that will win the hearts and minds of the rest of NATO countries to defend because of the losses of their own countrymen.
The reason Ukraine hasn't been allowed to join NATO already is because the rest of the alliance isn't willing to make that promise (that they'll go to war with Russia to protect Ukraine).
It's doubtful Russia would go to fight Ukraine even now (it would be rather disastrous), but even more doubtful if Ukraine would join NATO.
Ukraine has its own internal problems for now.
Unfortunately it's still possible that Putin will cling to power for a rather long time.
The fact that they (professionally) can't do anything else, and that a pro-democratic alternative to Putin would likely severely cut their numbers (Russia has one of the highest if not the highest number of siloviks per capita) or even conduct lustrations against them for protecting the autocracy, plays into Putin's hand. They are also not that demanding, higher ups known to "live of the land" (protection racket etc), and Russian economy even under sanctions still a capitalist economy, so it won't be as bad as in the 80ies.
Also Russia coming under isolating western sanctions would effectively make Russia a China's tributary state, since it's the only other power with manufacturing capability Russia would be able to trade with. So that adventure would be exchanging Putin's and silovik interests for Russian future BIG time.
Also, Russia does not want to join. They want the USSR back
No, they don't, and I don't understand why people (Americans in particular?) seem to think this. Is it just nostalgia for the first Cold War?
And that weakness comes from the complete lack of the political culture needed for a functional democracy. The elite of the Russian empire that had a prototypical form of that culture had been eradicated by the communists, and about 10 years of relative lack of authoritarianism in the 90s and early 2000s wasn't nearly enough to form even a semblance of such culture. An ordinary Russian doesn't know what separation of powers is for, how freedom of speech/expression protects their interests, that it's their taxes that Putin spends, not government's money, the norms of civil debate, the individualist thinking etc etc.
In his recent easy he claimed Ukrainians and Russians are the same nation
In fact there was such a historical precedent. Turkey and Greece, both NATO members, fought a war in Northern Cyprus in 1974 [0].
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish_invasion_of_Cyprus
Now, there is exactly zero appetite anywhere in NATO for invading Russia. But Putin doesn't understand that - doesn't understand that, when the leaders have to answer to the voters in elections that they could lose, the leaders have to be very wary of body counts. So Putin is terrified of a fantasy, but his terror is still at least somewhat real. It's not all bullying.
It is.
>launched their invasion
You are reproducing Russian propaganda planted all over the English speaking internet. About Russia's desire to secure itself through buffer zones, when in reality it's just plain old imperialism.
Geographical buffer zones and natural borders like mountains are mostly irrelevant for modern air-superiority dominated warfare. It's not 1940s anymore. US expeditionary force is delivered by the sea. An attack could already be launched from the Baltic states, since about 2004. And Putin perfectly knows that nobody would attack a state that has the highest number nuclear warheads in the world.
Ascribing some level of care for Russian interests and security to someone like Putin is the height of naivete. Putin will leave Russia much much weaker and thus less secure after his death, than the 99 other timelines, where it isn't ruled by an egotistical wannabe tsar. He only cares about himself, his family and his friends, and that's it.
If he truly cared about Russian future he wouldn't have started the current conflict with Ukraine that's been going on since 2014, because the economic losses from that over 2-3 decades are tremendous. A difference in 2-3 percentage points of GDP growth results in several times the economy size of losses. And further escalation would cripple the economy even more.
Or are you saying that it's propaganda the Putin is worrying about that? I've never heard them say so, so I don't think it's a common theme of their propaganda.
The propaganda insists that that kind of thinking is still relevant in 2022 and that Russian elite truly believes that, and not using it as an excuse for imperialistic/revanchist expansion.
Besides - Ukraine haven’t been offered NATO membership have they?
One, Ukraine hasn't been invited to join NATO. Two, even if NATO had never entertained the idea, I'm sure Putin would pitch the existence of hats and teacups as clear evidence of Western aggression against Russia.
...and then I see comments like yours that just seem to want to make Russia into this mustache twirling always evil villian and to me its people like you destroying hopes for good conversation that seem like the real villians.
This purported promise is a myth, see my comments here [1]. (TL; DR No treaty or public comments. Russia, on the other hand, signed a treaty promising not to invade Ukraine when she denuclearised. Talk of broken promises is a red herring.)
Russia has a realpolitik interest in creating buffer nations between it and the West. What it's doing--invading Crimea and now threatening to take the rest--doesn't further that goal. It does, however, serve Putin's political agenda.
This is what Russia is promoting but it's a gross exaggeration. When the Berlin Wall fell, The Secretary of State at the time, James Baker, threw this out there to Gorbachev in early treaty talks as a "what if?", but others in US gov. said absolutely not, it never made it in the treaty, and Gorbachev never pushed for it. Gorbachev himself said that no promise or treaty was violated, but it was against the "spirit" of the assurances.
https://www.brookings.edu/blog/up-front/2014/11/06/did-nato-...
Sorry if I am destroying your good, nuanced conversation.
I can't imagine USA acting in cool and peaceful manner when sword of Damocles hangs near them.
NATO members are not annexed by America. Ukraine isn't part of NATO, and has had no realistic path to membership for some time. And a good way to get American bases in Ukraine is to threaten to invade it.
Sure analogy, ain't perfect, and it's too late to edit. But say they join Russian led pact and Russian build basses there. I'm pretty sure America would throw as big hissy fit as Russia did.
> And a good way to get American bases in Ukraine is to threaten to invade it.
It's a great deterrent as well. NATO members have a policy, attack one, you attack us all, yes. But they also prohibit members that have problematic borders with non-NATO powers.
Adding a member like Ukraine means essentially getting ready for (nuclear) war with Russia. And NATO is, and probably won't be ready.
Seeing list of NATO's recent "victories" seems like a compilation of US greatest fails (Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya). So Russia is calling NATO/US bluff.
NATO has never made a formal “promise” or agreement not to expand. This is a myth that refuses to die it seems.
But this is beside the point. Ukraine isn’t a member so can hardly be responsible for what NATO does. Nor is it offered membership. And they were invaded preemptively? This whole line of reasoning that NATO has anything to do with the invasion of Ukraine years ago is a fabrication.
> or is it offered membership. And they were invaded preemptively?
Kinda. A member with existing border dispute has little chance of being admitted.
> Kinda
Has it been formally invited to join, or formally applied? Otherwise they have not.
Putin has been a steady hand over Russia, but it's been at the cost of standards of living [1]. That's threatening neighboring regimes, which are only standing thanks to Moscow's support.
Putin isn't dumb. He sees the writing on the wall. The bet is likely that the wave of nationalism that would accompany a war will outweigh its massive costs, directly and indirectly, for long enough for Putin and his cronies to ride out the decade.
[1] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-05-17/russian-r...
"funny", but standard