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Comment by saiya-jin | Hacker News Reader

> There is a rumor that Putin had recently made a personal order to damage as much of Kharkiv as possible, to retaliate for breaking the hope of being “pro-Russian.” And however absurd it might sound, I am close to believing it because there seems to be no other point in doing what they do now.

I have the same impression, just old bitter fart and shadow of a man he once was, entrenched in his untouchable position, throwing childish deadly tantrums on a nation that decided to stood up to him as one.

An idea - even if they laugh on ICT in Haag, what if there would be international arrest warrant on all those sanctioned persons including him, no diplomatic immunity? Meaning they can't travel most of the world, forever. Just a nuisance maybe. but proverbial death by thousand cuts starts somewhere. And remove russia from permanent UN security council for the duration of 'special operation', since they just veto everything now.

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We should never violate the principle of diplomatic immunity, even if it's used by war criminals. The personal safety of diplomats is a crucial historical norm in the civilized world and is essential for preventing conflicts.

However just because someone has a diplomatic passport doesn't mean they have complete freedom of movement. Countries can deny them entry or deport them just like any other alien.

> An idea - even if they laugh on ICT in Haag, what if there would be international arrest warrant on all those sanctioned persons including him, no diplomatic immunity?

Maybe they would just implement their own “Hague Invasion Act”?[1]

[1]: Really the American Service-Members' Protection Act

It still seems illogical. Kharkiv had a huge Russian population. I had some friends from there who sighed "finally!" when they heard Putin started the invasion. They truly believed he would end the years-long conflict and finally they will live in peace on a territory more or less Russian. Today, there is no single Russian in Kharkiv who would support Putin or even believe what he says. He betrayed his own people.

Even some of my Ukrainian friends (we have a huge UA diaspora here in Prague) share the same sentiment.

They were heavily pro-Russian to start with. Strongly against the corrupted Ukrainian government & oligarchs, remembering the Odessa massacre during Maidan etc.

But they feel betrayed now – Putin seems to have lost all the goodwill there, the hearts of even those people.

The entire invasion is illogical. There was arguably some sense to Crimea - there is no sense in this invasion.

I think it's fairly straight forward. Ideally capture or if necessary destroy Ukraine as to prevent Ukraine turning into, from the Russian perspective, an 'anti-Russian Russia'. The vision is that both Belarus and Ukraine are extensions of the Russian state and as such a Western aligned Ukraine isn't going to be tolerated.

My knowledge of Russian bureaucrats comes mostly from watching Chernobyl on HBO, but I wouldn't be surprised if it isn't simply that Putin said he wanted Ukraine and nobody at the top could push back.

My knowledge of (not Russian but) post-Soviet bureaucrats comes from personal experience, I speak fluent Russian and follow their news/politics sporadically but over the past few decades. I think the way they are portrayed in Chernobyl is brilliant. It's a structure so permeated by apathy, corruption, bullying and grandstanding that it simply cannot effectively transmit information in either direction, whether top-down or bottom-up (but especially bottom up). It's clear that Putin was fed a steady diet of his own wishful thinking / propaganda, and he bought into it fully. If he had a realistic view of the world around him, he would have prepared a lot better for this war of aggression that he staked everything on.

And, as an aside, I think COVID started for the exact same reason as what's portrayed in Chernobyl. Chinese model of governance is not that different. When accurate sober assessments of facts on the ground are needed and speed is of the essence, its ineffectiveness takes over. Once the genie is out of the bottle and there's nothing to hide from superiors, and once Beijing sends over some adults to whip things into shape, the sheer scale of China's economy allows it to power through and suppress the crisis using draconian means. But for the first who knows how many weeks (certainly well before Jan 1 2020), it was much slower motion Chernobyl.

There certainly are reasons (not a value judgement), some of them cynical:

- Crimea wants to control the canal from the Djnepr, which had been shut off by Ukraine.

- Russia wants the coast line to control more gas fields in the Black Sea. The U.S. of course also want to control them by proxy (see Burisma/Biden). Snake island also controls some of the fields.

- Rightly or wrongly, Russia is scared of NATO expansion.

I think it may be the case that the great Russian empire theory is a pretext that is put forward by Putin for his own population and eagerly taken up by the West for propaganda. Attacks on Kyiv (stalled) and Kharkiv could be diversions from the south. As noted above, the Kharkiv attack does not make sense though.

The reasons for the immediate action might be logical, but looking at the medium term consequences it breaks down completely in my mind. The only two possibilities I can see going forward is either a forever-war as in Afghanistan, or a forever-sanction situation like Iran or DPRK.

I don't see how any listed benefits would outweigh the costs of either option. It troubles me a lot, because Putin has seemed to me to be a carefully calculating player up until this. It makes me wonder if he has truly lost it. Or if there is some grand plan which this is only a small part of. Both are scary.

How do you remove Russia’s permanent veto right if they have the permanent right to veto that?

Russia has a veto right only in the UN Security Council. For prosecution by the International Criminal Court (ICC) this is irrelevant. What matters is that Ukraine has accepted the ICC's jurisdiction over all alleged crimes committed on its territory since 20 February 2014.[1] The nationality of the perpetrator is irrelevant, and no one has immunity.

[1] https://www.icc-cpi.int/Pages/item.aspx?name=pr1146&ln=en

> the International Criminal Court (ICC)

The USA passed a law that its armed forces can invade the Hague if the ICC ever tried to charge the US.

It shows the farce of all of this - fresh from murdering Afghanis, Iraqis, Somalis, Syrians, and by proxy Yemeni, Palestinians etc., the US presses fir a "court" to try Russia in some sanctimonious exercise that it can not be a subject of.

That doesn't mean the rest of the world needs to give Russia and Putin a free pass.

Two wrongs does not make a right.

That said, Russia just as USA have nukes, so Putin will never go to ICC, and its waist of time discussing it.

It might not be nice, just or fair but if you have nuke, you are for all intense and purpose immune, unless your own country prosecutes you or gives you ower.

Theoretically the USSR is the entity which has a permanent veto right, and everyone has just allowed the Russian Federation to take the USSR’s seat.

In practice nobody is removing permanent veto power from the second largest nuclear power. The entire point of the UN was to give special powers to great nations so they wouldn’t fight out their grievances.

The only way to strip the Russia Federation of its Security Council seat would also call into question Russia even being in the UN. If they are kicked out of the UN entirely, would they even bother to reapply? Is it worth creating another League of Nations to have a temporarily more effective UN?

Soviet Union had a permanent veto right by statute. Russia only has it because people felt that Russia was the obvious successor despite leaving the Soviet Union before it was dissolved.

If enough important countries agree that Russia has no veto, then they can rewrite convention...

Well, in that case UN would just cease to exist, for good or for bad. We really don't need yet another international organisation that only pretends that the international law exists and apply it selective only to weak countries, leaving USA, Russia, China & other to be above the law.

Selective law is worse than no law at all, and selective justice is worse than no justice at all.

Which countries are the most important? What makes them important?

They have the largest militaries and nobody can really tell them what to do. Simple as that.

See: US invasion of Iraq, Russian invasion of Georgia and Ukraine.

Nukes and the power to use them worldwide.

Nukes. The unspoken requirement.

We go back to the lab and develop a superveto, harnessing cutting-edge quantum technology.

Lock the ambassador in the WC cabin when he goes for a break.

Quorum is established at the start of the SC meeting, after that, absention means abstention

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