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Comment by hgomersall | Hacker News Reader

The "west" has been trying to de-escalate the actions of Russia for the last two decades. When a foreign state can, with impunity, annex various chunks of its neighbours, carry out a proxy war through a seriously despotic regime and literally assassinate agents in said Western countries using both nuclear and chemical weapons, then it's difficult to argue that de-escalation hasn't been tried.

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> The "west" has been trying to de-escalate the actions of Russia for the last two decades.

We are now living in truly post-truth world.

We can condemn the Russia invasion without resorting to what is a complete inversion of the facts.

The US, for unexplained reasons, against the opposition of Germany and France has been stoking this fire since the age of the great neocons: Clinton and Bush Júnior and even after then it never really tried to de-escalate the situation or not try to isolate Russia from Europe. This is widely agreed between scholars and diplomats both from the right and from the left. It is not everyday when Chomsky and Kissinger agreed about something like this.

I keep saying this, but I am right back at the first Iraq war again, trying to unblind people of the propaganda just like I did back then. Only this time we have nukes.

Hilary Clinton literally gave Sergey Lavrov a big red "reset" button. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_reset

It wasn't the first nor the last attempt at a reset on relations with Russia. https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/bush-putin-the-end-of-the...

What changed with respect to Ukraine becoming a NATO member, the one thing Putin really cared about? For some time the Ukraine itself decided to no longer pursue a NATO membership but did NATO reconsider the Bucharest declaration that states Ukraine will become a NATO member if they desire so?

So why doesn't Russia attack US then? Europe was getting closer to Russia, you can't deny that. That this might not be in the best interest of US is possible.

But why should Russia start a war with Europe then? Please explain.

EU and Russia could be a very strong power, to offset the other powers in the world. But now Russia decided to fuck both EU and Russia. Nice play idiot(s).

While de-escalation may have been tried, the parent is pointing out that the attempts have ceased.

But what is the end-game if de-escalation is no longer the goal? Is the West ready to commit to that end-game?

De-escalation was abandoned because it appeared fruitless. The Kremlin must be willing to be diplomatic for diplomacy to work.

Sure, but that ignores the elephant in the room: if not de-escalation then what?

Then defense.

I don't see sanctions, insulation, and supporting Ukraine as military offense. It makes the Russian offensive much more costly though.

Defense doesn't work as a goal.

Lack of de-escalation is likely to mean further escalation. You can step into defense as you escalate a conflict, but you can't remain in defense forever as a conflict with a nuclear power heats up.

The elephant in the room is not escalation in itself, it's what comes at the end of the road.

If there are currently no attempts at de-escalation, and no one in the West wants to acknowledge that this leads to a nuclear conflict, what is the West actually hoping for?

Sure it does. Make the war cost more than its valued. It isn't a binary "things heat up or cool off". The motivations of all parties must be constantly re-evaluated.

Sometimes, deescalation is through escalation. 20/20 hindsight, but Europe should have never allowed Georgia and Crimea to happen with the responses they did.

I won't posture as an international policy expert, but I cannot believe there were no "stronger" responses to the initial seizures that would have prevented Russia from launching the Ukrainian invasion.

Sanctions are a least-politically-risky option for a democracy, from a popular perspective. Putin's takeaway was that he could invade sovereign territory with only an economic response from the west.

If you're going to pursue a course of action that Russia sees as endangering its strategic interests (promoting democracy and NATO membership in states that border Russia), then you need an equally strong threat (from Russia's perspective) to restrain their response.

I see the mirror of NATO interventionism and US exceptionalism deeply marked in your words.

Putin was too proud to enter NATO the bureaucratic way, he was asked to fill out the form. A big mistake hurting everyone.

Most would not agree with you. From Chomsky to Kissinger, political analysts and historians have been ringing alarm bells for decades on NATO expansion eastward. TL;DR: we had a west-friendly Russian government at the fall of the wall - but pushing east allowed hawks/imperialists to rise to power

Edit: I see a lot of you really struggling with this idea. The good news is you don't have to take my word for it! Please read analysis from both of the mentioned authors and more. They're much better sources than me and other hackernews posters

Stephen cohen also mentioned the military doctrine of Russia and how irresponsible and provocative obamas comments were when the whole Ukraine conflict kicked off.

Someone posted the following leaked cable here a while back from 2008

> Comment > 12. (C) Russia's opposition to NATO membership for Ukraine and Georgia is both emotional and based on perceived strategic concerns about the impact on Russia's interests in the region. It is also politically popular to paint the U.S. and NATO as Russia's adversaries and to use NATO's outreach to Ukraine and Georgia as a means of generating support from Russian nationalists. While Russian opposition to the first round of NATO enlargement in the mid-1990's was strong, Russia now feels itself able to respond more forcefully to what it perceives as actions contrary to its national interests.

https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/08MOSCOW265_a.html

>have been ringing alarm bells for decades on NATO expansion eastward

Do these historians have an answer that what should those countries in east Europe do? Just accept the fate that you will always be a vassal of Russia because you are at the wrong geographical place?

- Option 1: NATO

- Option 2: Vassal of Russia

- Option 3: "buffer state" which means you are free to be destroyed by both the NATO and Russia, see Ukraine and the former Yugoslavia

There is a reason people wants to have a life like "the west" and not like Russia.

> "buffer state" which means you are free to be destroyed by both the NATO and Russia, see Ukraine and the former Yugoslavia

Can you elaborate on former Yugoslavia ? Who has destroyed it ?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakup_of_Yugoslavia

I have lots of family there, some of them took bullets in that war. I’d say it’s mostly the death of Tito who caused this breakup. And the schismatic history. They don’t blame nato or Russia for that.

From your preceding comment I got the impression that you didn't know about Yugoslavia and might benefit from a Wikipedia link, but apparently I was wrong about that. Apologies.

You're assuming that Russia would feel like it needed to conquer its neighbors in a peaceful world. Again, analysts argue that we propped up the imperialist ideologues of Russia and created the current climate

Edit: I think most of you aren't really engaging with the substance of my comment. The idea being that all this bloodthirst that Russia currently has is due to conditions that we knew about and could have avoided.

Also, Russian government of 1991 =/= Stalin

Have you not heard that Putin lamented the end of the Soviet union and his goal has been building Russia into an empire again?

You are assuming that Russia will stop conquering it's neighbours. Or that it would be a good neighbour if "it was left alone by the west" - what ever that means?

>You're assuming that Russia would feel like it needed to conquer its neighbors in a peaceful world

I mean after 45 years of Soviet occupation of Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia etc. didn't know what people expect from those countries. Of course they don't want to see any russians ever again.

Or once again: is it their fate that they always have to be the vassal of Russia just because of their location?

Most of these countries were historically and culturally always closer to Germany, "the west", than Russia.

Russia always feels the need to conquer neighbors and its neighbors feel a need to not let it, hence we join NATO to stop the bad guys.

Since the start 1920s countries in central Europe are in constant fear of Soviet/Russian attack.

Go back to 1580 when Russia started to invade their fellow neighbors. Never stopped since.

Some analysts may argue that but Putin's own speech of recently clearly indicated that he wants to expand. I don't see how anyone could argue in good faith that his actions are defensive in nature.

NATO didn't conquer the Eastern European countries who joined — they applied of their own volition. A Russia that can't accept that and feels the need to brutalize neighbors who turn away just illustrates why those neighbors are absolutely justified in seeking shelter.

> I think most of you aren't really engaging with the substance of my comment.

That is because it doesn’t have any.

The idea that NATO expansion caused Putin to be have in this manner is simply not a credible argument. The countries of Eastern Europe have the same right to self determination as those of Western Europe, the US or Russia itself. Being an apologist does not make you a substantive debater, it makes you a patsy.

Please don't sink to ad-hom on hackernews. Nowhere in my comment is apologia, merely context. Ukraine should be defended and helped in any of way we can (without causing nuclear war) not in spite of our history of saber-rattling, but because of it. It is now our responsibility to clean up a mess that we are partially to blame for. People far more intelligent and credible than both of us are making these arguments so I think you're going to need something a bit stronger than sticking your fingers in your ears

"You're assuming that Russia would feel like it needed to conquer its neighbors in a peaceful world."

? Yes, Putin has been trying that for 20 years.

Putin + Kremlin believe that Ukraine is 'not a country' and is a 'vassal of Russia'.

Straight up.

They have been actively doing things to support this for a very long time.

See: Yanukovich, the laughably clown dirtbag who is the Belarus/Lukashenko analogue.

Here is a good articulation of the Geostrategic and Historical Russian Nationalism:

(Article was put up by accident in Russia but taken down)

https://web.archive.org/web/20220226051154/https://ria.ru/20...

here is the English translation:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1z7zQiS-99mhqmJqJ-r-a2MJc...

This is not about 'defence and NATO'.

On the other hand, what's the option? By not pushing eastward, meaning allowing Russia to install puppet head at those countries?

To be fair, NATO was initially opposed to expansion but the ex-Warsaw pact countries really pushed for it. They were afraid of Russia.

They wanted the money and prestige

Rightfully so, as it seems now.

>TL;DR: we had a west-friendly Russian government at the fall of the wall - but pushing east allowed hawks/imperialists to rise to power

I guess I would like some source arguments as to how it was the pushing east, i.e. allowing Nato membership in former eastern bloc countries, that allowed hawks/imperialists to rise to power.

Do you honestly believe that elections in Russia (if they were elections, and not just a show with predetermined outcome) were decided by NATO expansion? (which never happened without being signed off by Russian governments anyways)

Yes, NATO expansion has been used as an excuse by hawks/imperialists. But given recent experience there is absolutely no base for assuming that they would have had any trouble making up others.

All those people grew up in a time where the US had the rights to own the west and the Soviets the east and all their beliefs are forged to not trigger a direct war. Everything they say has the undertone of “don’t make the Russians mad” so I would acknowledge that put don’t put them in a pedestal, also since many of these “great minds” are among the worst death salesmen of the 20th century.

Putin has been playing this game since day one, he belongs to the group that wants Russia to be imperial again, ie. Right before the bolcheviques. The only “innovation” is he doesn’t see full on invasions alone as a viable option to accomplish that.

Propaganda mostly works by highlighting the convenient facts and omitting the inconvenient. Reading western media, one would get the impression Ukraine is a country inhabited by nothing but immaculate saints and heroes, who would never hurt a fly

In reality, every month of Zelenskyj's rule, the country moved further and further away from democracy and closer to autocracy. This is an annoying feature of western geopolitics - despite all the talk about democracy, we always prefer a western-aligned autocrat to any anti-western democratic outcome

Just an excerpt of Zelenskyj's rule:

* banned opposition's TV channels

* urged Apple and Google to remove apps related to those TV channels from app stores, as well as fairly innocuous Russian apps like Yandex (search engine) and vkontaktu (facebook-alike)

* an already atrocious state of minority rights turned even worse in many aspects

* refused Russian COVID vaccines despite having no alternative (this plummeted his approval ratings)

* after seeing Russia-aligned parties leading in the polls, he bypassed the judicial system and froze assets of his main political opponent by a presidential decree, and put him under house arrest

* casually throwing people to jail with accusations of treason, including previous president of Ukraine (democratically elected ethnic Ukrainian), opposition politicians, as well as diplomatic negotiators

and there's much more. As a citizen of a Western country, it's really difficult to get a good picture of the situation. Putin is lying lunatic directly responsible for this war. Zelenskyi is a lying lunatic indirectly responsible for this war. Why are we acting like one of them is a saint?

There is also the extremely oppressive language law that punished both the polish and hungarian minority (even though the main target were the russian speakers).

Zelensky himself is a native Russian language speaker. I do not condone the laws but they should be challenged through a democratic response, not a military response from a nuclear power.

I don't like these kinds of comments because the intent behind them always seems to be some sort of justification for the deaths of Ukrainians and annexation. The spirit of my comment, that I hope is captured by the reader, is that NATO/USA could have avoided war and loss of lives by being more careful in the past.

But we have the present and must deal with the immediate consequences with our best foot forward. The Ukrainian people are blameless and deserve our help - more so because we are partly to blame for not exhausting every option of diplomacy available to us. Please don't try to throw them under the bus.

Let's confront this tragedy while acknowledging context so that we don't make the same mistakes again

How can you be so naive as to condemn Zelensky for taking these actions (which were arguably retaliation for Russia annexing Crimea and a preventative measure to stop the same happening to Ukraine) yet willfully accept Putin's complete control of the media, poisoning and jailing of political opposition and many other repressive and aggressive actions? I don't particularly condone or like Zelensky's actions but I don't see why they are constantly judged differently to Russia's actions?

I guess the goal was not to condemn or to justify rather than to provide some context conveniently lacking in the mainstream media.

> How can you be so naive as to condemn Zelensky

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/11...

Adding

https://thegrayzone.com/2022/03/04/nazis-ukrainian-war-russi...

> we had a west-friendly Russian government at the fall of the wall - but pushing east allowed hawks/imperialists to rise to power

That's not accurate at all - the arrow of cause and effect cannot point backwards in time. The current powers in Russia are largely a result of privitization in Russia in the 90s. This privitization was deeply unfair to the average Russian, and was largely driven by the West's desire to turn Russia away from Communism. The result was the oligarchs and Putin (in charge since 2000). There's still blame for the West here, but NATO expansion came after Russia turned against the West; it wasn't the cause of it.

"Most would not agree with you. "

Don't agree.

1) The 'NATO' expansion issue is actually a distraction. This is absolutely not about 'NATO on Russias Borders'. While there is a kernel of truth there, it's used as propaganda.

2) Russia, specifically Putin, has been trying to grab Ukraine back for 20 years. There is 100% legitimacy in the fact UKR/RUS have a special cultural relationship - but - that's skewed through Russian Imperial Chauvinism in that they view Ukraine basically as a vassal. That Chauvinism is probably a couple centuries old.

More recently, we have the Soviet Dystopian Unreality machine, in which the Truth can be manufactured. Putin is using this to great effect, literally making his bid for Conquest into an issue of 'victimhood'. It's all a bit 'Mein Kampfy'.

Putin has been 'very directly intervening' in Ukraine with his laughable stooge Yanukovich for a very long time - rigging elections, killing journalists and protesters, supporting corruption.

The West has definitely been intervening and more or less on 'one side' but it has been a lighter touch - and most importantly - the West will ultimately accept the choice of Ukranians.

Here's the Paradox:

Putin is ex-KGB/Soviet counter intelligence - cynical, repulsive, fearful, skittish + nationalist + authoritarian.

But imagine of Putin was a charismatic man. A great speaker. Someone who talked about 'hope' and 'people'.

Putin has a giant advantage vis-a-vis the West in Ukraine! Ukranians see Russians as 'bretheren'.

If Putin were to have created a 'Positive Russia', messages of hope, clamping down on corruption ... then in 2014 he may literally have been able to give a speech to protesters instead of shooting them.

I have peers in Belarus that can flee to Canada - but they don't want to. They are going to 'Georgia or Latvia' - because it's closer to home. This speaks to their natural cultural ties and choices.

The 2014 'Revolution' was bloody and a lot of young people were just killed.

Police can sometimes get really, really out of hand and that indiscriminate shooting of protesters is something Ukranians will not forget.

When the Russians invade, that's what they know is in the future.

I honestly think that if Dimitri Medvedev came to power, Ukraine would have joined a 'Eurasian Economic Union', Belarus would have dumped Lukashenko.

Literally Putin could have had the Eurasian Union and a more united 'Rus People' by just retiring and shutting his fat mouth.

I appreciate this comment. I understand that there is a lot I'll never know or understand because I'm on the other side of the wall. I agree that much of the blame lies with Russia/Putin but I still feel that there is more that the West could have done to prevent disaster. Putin is a mad dog with nuclear capabilities and there's no telling where the future is headed now

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