Putin announces annexation of Ukrainian land, Europe's largest since WWII | Hacker News Reader

Putin announces annexation of Ukrainian land, Europe's largest since WWII

nbcnews.com

27 points_V_25 comments

The random segment about transgenders felt really out of place. I wonder where the speechwriters get their materials from.

The other interesting part is that he quite clearly accused USA/UK of bombing NS1+2, which I guess is now the Russian state position on the matter

It's just a laundry list of 'pick an argument against the West'. Every part of their public can find a part of the speech to agree with.

> The random segment about transgenders felt really out of place

It's really something that we actively discuss in these parts of the world (Eastern Europe), it's a "civilisational" topic that most of us (the majority, I would say) actively care about. Yes, many of us (the majority, I would say) are not ok with "parent 1/parent 2" instead of "mother" and "father", we are also not ok with kids as young as 7 or 8 years of age being taught about gender change, we are not ok with kids younger than 18 being allowed to take irreversible hormonal meds in order to transition.

And seeing as this is also a "civilisational" war I don't see how that statement was out of place, quite the contrary.

Is this one of those "actual majority" situations or one of those "vocal minority get's mixed up and thinks they are a majority" cases? I'm asking because typically when I see majority claims, far too often it is the later.

I honestly don't care about that at all. Noone I know really cares about that so I would say the "majority" really depends on your social bubble :-)

Right now I care whether we will get nuked. Everything else is a worry for a later day.

No way this is "actively discussed" in Eastern Europe. Maybe it comes up from time to time but it is no way a significant topic. BTW, I'm aware you are from Ro, so am I.

I did discuss this with close friends who have just become parents, he works for a FAANG company, she works for a big European retailer, no way any of them would discuss this publicly at their work-place or mention anything about it on their social media profiles, for obvious reasons.

True, though, we tend to discuss more about how expensive things became (this is more recent, though) and the perennial subject about real estate (and how expensive it is), but this is a general topic of conversation among the Western middle-classes.

Hi from Eastern Europe!

There are indeed many of you, but that is changing and I definitely wouldn't be so sure about you being majority anymore.

And now that Russia is all tied up and can't meddle in our public sphere as much, I expect you lot to thin out into obscurity :).

The "fun" begins. I don't think that Ukrainians will stop so we'll have to see how Russia will react when they start taking it back.

Quite a time to be alive, eh?

There's lot of chatter that Putin might start to use tactical nuclear weapons. Would be pretty crazy

If he continues to "loose" is the only thing he can do.

Currently in Europe visiting family. My flight back is in a month. Wondering if I should be flying back sooner...

This:

Russian senator Konstantin Kosachev warned that after the referendums, "protecting people in this region will not be our right, but our duty. An attack on people and territories will be an attack on Russia. With all the consequences." Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov did not rule out the use of nuclear weapons to defend annexed Ukrainian territories.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2022_annexation_referendums_in...

If Russia uses nuclear weapons against Ukraine, NATO will deliver a crippling response, as Jake Sullivan has said. There is no realistic scenario where Russia wins or holds on to its gains.

The problem is NATO keeps delivering crippling responses, but Russia has not backed down yet. I wonder what is the appropriate response to a tactical nuke. Hopefully not another one.

Even if it doesn't go nuclear, millions can die. See the 2nd Congo War for a recent example, 5.4 million excess deaths due to disease and starvation. The loss of life for combatants in that war is less than the total in Russia-Ukraine so far.

Putin isn't even the worst guy in the regime. The least bloody outcome would be a Russian revolution but I think that's asking for a lot of luck and hope. For a world that's ignored the risk of having nuclear weapons, we may now unwittingly be stuck in a trap in which using them is unavoidable.

https://human-rights.cmc.edu/2022/04/14/russias-genocide-han...

The only real deterrent to nuclear use is being serious about retaliations imo. I think a very strong statement such as "using nuclear weapons against whoever will be seen as a declaration of war against us" is necessary.

Countries actively avoid proliferating nuclear power because of the existing powers. Letting them be used against you is a strong signal and will weaken trust. It will become even more of an arms race.

That's the point, he won't use it """against Ukraine""" but to """defend Russian territory""".

Oh yes, I definitely want a neoocon warhawk like Jake Sullivan in charge of deciding if we descend into nuclear Armageddon.

Putin, go fuck yourself.

That'll show him the next time he opens HN!

He's a regular, if you didn't know. Even get's daily summaries when he's too busy to read it himself.

Also, sometimes things just need to be said. As a matter of principle. Enough bad things to worry about without nuclear catastrophe to sustain one man's ego to add to them. So, Putin, fuck off.

Biden and paid for, Zelensky, go fuck yourselves.

Bucha

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