Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack
worldpoliticsreview.com
worldpoliticsreview.com
Realistically, Russia is doing these antics to force as many European countries as possible to feel that they need their air defense inventory (eg MIM-104 Patriot interceptor stock) for themselves, rather than giving or selling that inventory to Ukraine. That has immediate material benefit for the current Russian war effort with almost zero cost (assuming EU countries don't shoot down anything important).
One thing that is new though is Russians waiting in mile long lines for petrol while they watch their refineries explode. Moscow may be trying to widen the war as a domestic distraction from that not looking good.
At least if they mix it up with NATO they can say sorry we're in a war with NATO rather than the embarrassment of we picked on a country 1/4 our size and now they are beating us.
1/28th rather.
https://energyandcleanair.org/financing-putins-war/
The first step when finding yourself in a hole is to stop digging.
• Hungary: 416 million euros ($488m)
• Slovakia: 275 million euros ($323m)
• France: 157 million euros ($184m)
• Netherlands: 65 million euros ($76m)
• Belgium: 64 million euros ($75m)
[2] suggests that China and India are the main buyers. I don't how reliable those sources are. There is also the problem of how to classify 'laundered' oil that was bought and resold by, e.g. India.
[1] https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/10/3/how-much-of-europes...
[2] https://energyandcleanair.org/june-2025-monthly-analysis-of-...
Europe is struggling with soaring energy costs and a lack of alternatives. Whether it's red tape or unfortunate geography, Europe cannot afford to turn off the Russian gas tap.
A benevolent US would see this and find ways to bridge the gap for Europe and lower its energy costs, further choking Russia.
A less benevolent US would see this and encourage it to continue, weakening both parties and sowing internal feuds within Europe.
It's not like we can make dozens of nuclear power plants appear out of thin air.
What is the plan today?
One good solution would be for wind and solar and other renewable power to be used for the creation of an easily storable fuel which can be used in e.g. gas turbines.
Although every country should invest in home-grown battery technology just in case China bites off Taiwan and we gotta cut them out of the global economy too.
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-lng-exports-surge...
LNG is a fungible commodity that is traded world-wide. Don't see much beyond symbolic value here in refusing it. Trying to enforce a price cap would be great there, but needs coordination.
We, as far as I know, also sadly import oil from Russia. I expect that to end soon too, because of a combination of political pressure and Ukrainian attacks.
Our current government is pretty close to Putin and Orban and it would be very welcome if the rest of EU attacked this issue more, as you mention.
https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/natosource/text-of-spe...
> Indeed, if current trends in the decline of European defense capabilities are not halted and reversed, Future U.S. political leaders– those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me – may not consider the return on America’s investment in NATO worth the cost.
>Europe’s Emerging Plan: Give Ukraine $200 Billion in Russian Money https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/europes-emerging-plan-give-...
Denmark and Sweden gave up thier investigations quite quickly, probably they arrived at the truth but couldn't say it, only Germany was strong-armed into keeping the charade going.
They can't sustain, economically speaking, a war against EU/NATO but Putin can definitely play on our fears much harder than we can play on Russians fears.
It's like with AI, that question doesn't really matter. It only matters if their leader wants to try.
This sort of rhetorics leads nowhere useful.
Putin only understands the language of power. European countries don't want Ukraine to lose but can't commit themselves to the billions it would cost to win.
What deal can you make with someone who just doesn't stick to the deals they agree to?
Rolling red carpets for putin is actually undermining EU efforts to isolate Russia. Russian should be welcome only within their allies: Eritrea and North Korea.
1. Usage of arms introduced 70+ years ago.
2. Assault troops equiped with civil cars and motorcycles.
3. Logistics powered by donkeys.
4. Begging North Korea to help with troops and ammo.
Conflicts in Putin's Russia end militarily, always (usually in victory or stalemate, though he for sure "lost" in Syria), or at best a lie in preparation for the next war. Negotiated peace is not a thing.
"This hasn't worked for 30 years, but this time it will for sure!" makes for pretty awful geopolitical strategy, historically. But you do you.
(Your broader point that Putin's actions are constrained by nuclear deterrents is obviously correct. But it's very clearly not a point about diplomacy!)
The drone sightings is a mix of Russian ops, and copycat actors. The jets that violate airspace, are probably a mix of intentional close flying, under the plausible deniability that navigation jamming in the area causes them to cross into neighboring airspace.
In the case of Russian aggression, it is to create more tension. Why on earth would Russia want to escalate this, you might ask? Well, now that pretty much every country west of their border is a NATO member, a Russian attack on NATO would likely trigger article 5.
If Russia can provoke any NATO countries to attack first by, say, downing some airplane of theirs (fighter jets, recon, strategic bombers, etc.), they can use this as casus belli, and use it as propaganda. One thing Russia learned after 2022 was that any larger scale mobilization is incredibly unpopular. They can't mobilize millions of soldiers without any real cause, and march into the west. If they can sell the idea (with "proof") that NATO is actively attacking Russia, that's another thing.
They're probably also banking on the fact that the heightened situation will scare people in the west, which in turn will make them vote for isolationist parties that don't want to commit. One thing is to talk about war, another thing is to actually see the writings on the wall.
I don't think European NATO members can do much other than to just keep reinforcing and fortifying their borders, build up their armed forces as if Russia will invade tomorrow, and dig in. And keep hammering Russia with sanctions.
The imperialist dreams of Russia is the expand into the ex-Soviet countries. They've tried election meddling, which worked to some degree, but I think they know that to achieve their goals, they need some larger conflict to happen - so that they can annex the desired areas when peace talks come up.
This has already happened, Turkey shot down a Russian jet in 2015, the Russian state very quickly tucked its tail in after that. The VKS can't afford to lose these planes willy-nilly.
> Erdoğan announced in an interview that the two Turkish pilots who downed Russian aircraft were arrested on suspicion that they have links to the Gülen movement, and that a court should find out "the truth".
Russia didn't tuck its tail, they deployed SAMs to their Syrian base, they deployed the late Moskva in the region, and they pressured Erdogan to punish the pilot.
Russia retaliated by disallowing tourism to Turkey in the summer of 2016, causing about $5 billion of damage to the Turkish economy.
https://carnegieendowment.org/static/media/images/202105-Pri...
I oppose the military support to Ukraine. I think it's responsibility of the stronger party, here NATO, to seek deescalation. I also disapprove that the military support for Ukraine was decided undemocratically, without any consideration whether this might escalate into a war. And here we are...
The blowback is not discussed. I am from Czechia, and Russians attacked Vrbětice munition factory, because it supplied Ukraine. That's the reason. But in media it's always portrayed without this context.
FWIW, I am not opposed to humanitarian and economic help to Ukraine. But I don't believe military support will end the war in a good way, whatever it means.
Btw., there is quite a bit on the 2014 attack in various places.
Representative democracies are supposed to work this way, a government is elected, and they represent their electorate. If the electorate disagrees with the actions the government took they will be voted out the next election cycle, in between it's in the hands of the elected government to make decisions in these matters.
> FWIW, I am not opposed to humanitarian and economic help to Ukraine. But I don't believe military support will end the war in a good way, whatever it means.
It means Ukraine falling in the hands of Russia, is that a better alternative for the rest of us? Have you considered the Pandora Box this opens up to? Without supporting Ukraine militarily they will be defeated, Russia will get a large border with Slovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and Moldova.
There is no consensus about Russia attacking Czechia (or any EU country) next. In fact many military experts agree that Russia doesn't even have military personel to occupy whole Ukraine.
It's also unclear why, if Putin's ambition is some kind of Hitlerian/Napoleonic expansion to Europe, he would wait 25 years (into his 70s) to do it. And to the extent he has reasonable goals, we can put something tangible on the negotiation table to see what he really wants, instead of guessing. We (I mean NATO) didn't - this indicates it's us who doesn't want to negotiate; because we don't want to reveal our colonial preference (Ukraine is already being described as a great next investment).
> In fact many military experts agree that Russia doesn't even have military personel to occupy whole Ukraine.
Doesn't really matter. Nazi Germany also didn't had the military personnel to occupy Central Europe for a prolonged time, this didn't stop them from trying.
> if Putin's ambition is some kind of Hitlerian/Napoleonic expansion to Europe, he would wait 25 years (into his 70s) to do it
Internal politics (NS Germany started the expansion when they got bankrupt), being busy in other parts of the world (Middle east), there is not a lack of incentive.
> because we don't want to reveal our colonial preference
We don't prevent countries from joining if there population supports it. This is different from taking colonies even if Russia claims to not understand this distinction.
I am curious what are you referring to. I have read some reporting based on BIS reports and Vrbětice is by far the worst incident (2 dead).
> Being an weapon source is also different form being in open war.
As long as you can maintain it, perhaps. But did Putin give us an assurance that he will not escalate to an open war? I am not Putin fan, but I don't see us trying to deescalate, which is the only realistic way to end the war.
> Nazi Germany also didn't had the military personnel to occupy Central Europe for a prolonged time, this didn't stop them from trying.
According to quick search, Germans during WW2 had >600k troops in Poland maintaining order. Russia doesn't have an army to fully occupy Ukraine.
Even if we accept that today's Russia has similar ambitions to Nazi Germany, and has to be defeated in a similar way, there are two important obstacles to that victory:
- Russia has nuclear weapons, WW2 Germany had not
- Today, there is no USSR helping to fight, which was significant
So it's a non-starter. And idea that you somehow put Russia on their knees and keep them there, for decades - not only it is morally abhorrent, but also bad for European security and economy (unlike U.S., we are their neighbor).
> We don't prevent countries from joining if there population supports it. This is different from taking colonies even if Russia claims to not understand this distinction.
Yes, but why should Americans care? See my other comments in this thread.
I think there is this mass delusion among Americans that they don't have any colonies, but I think Israel and Gaza shows that's not true. It's a different system, more adhoc, but U.S. maintains significant economic and military power in many parts of the world.
And U.S. have destroyed Middle East with these shenanigans, so I am not happy them applying similar divisive policies to Eastern European countries.
A lot of cyber attacks in the last decades, stuff like WannaCry, Kaspersky..., Navalny, threats to politicians, espionage for example the recent case about Maximillian Krah, Navalny, bombs in packets that were supposed to be in the air while detonating, drone attacks, purposed limitations in gas supply...
I mean now NATO is discussing responses, but these things aren't exactly new and have been going on for years.
> Russia doesn't have an army to fully occupy Ukraine.
As far as I understand it they are still not really using the official army, since they fear that might have consequences about the stability of the regime.
Also there is an asymmetry as we care about a nation as it's people, but the Russian leadership (it's not only Putin) doesn't feel like that. Troop loss isn't more to them than a number and they have a wast population that they are willing to burn for there own goals.
Ukraine was really underestimated, but I think we underestimate our military ability. We relied to much on the USA and dissolved our armies thinking there will never be another war.
> And idea that you somehow put Russia on their knees and keep them there, for decades
I don't think anybody plans for that.
>> Yes, but why should Americans care?
I don't understand what you want to say, this wasn't about Americans?
> I think there is this mass delusion among Americans that they don't have any colonies, but I think Israel and Gaza shows that's not true.
The USA are/were the major world power, yes they do have influence among the world. But the Israel/Gaza issue is mostly caused by having nationalists on BOTH sides. The other nations on the world also have agency.
> And U.S. have destroyed Middle East with these shenanigans, so I am not happy them applying similar divisive policies to Eastern European countries.
Russia wasn't exactly uninvolved either, but I don't see how Ukraine is that much comparable and EU countries investing in the military is very much the agency of ourselves.
> but I don't see us trying to deescalate, which is the only realistic way to end the war.
This always assumes that Putin has issues that are orthogonal to the war that we can just negotiate. What I perceive to be the case is that they just want territory expansion and control over the run away states of the USSR. The war isn't just a necessary nuisance and a means to the goal, but the goal itself.
They talk a big game, but their economy is smaller than Italy's!
Nuclear weapons are extremely sensitive and maintenance heavy devices. They have parts that need to be regularly checked and replaced or else the bomb will fissile. These parts are EXTREMELY precise and very high purity. The rockets have similar needs or else the engine will as likely blow up on launch.
Maintenance cycles are on the order of 10-15 years. We are now 35 years out from the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the nuclear and space industries have experienced massive brain drain and almost complete elimination of operational and maintenance budgets.
The likelihood that these strategic weapon systems have been adequately maintained is indistinguishable from zero.
For reference, that number of nuclear weapons is where China decided to draw the line as a nuclear deterrence against the US until recently.
A hundred modern nuclear weapons is plenty to fucking ruin a country, but no, it doesn't not take "just one". Most western countries would survive say, a smuggled terrorist nuke (or 4) just fine. Angry and mourning, but fine.
France alone has enough deterrent in their nuclear weapons. The UK has theirs in submarines, to ensure even if you magically erased the entire British Islands, you still take tens of nukes up the ass.
Nuclear deterrence is not complicated, and it's pretty well understood in public. I don't know why so many people here are so wildly off base.
Meanwhile, all this was always intended to be roughly "backup" to the US's absurd stockpile, including tons of literal gravity drop nukes so we can cosplay Dr Strangelove as the world ends. And the ending of the IRBM treaty means the US has recently told our defense industry that it gets to play with the cool rockets again.
Contrast this with many "advanced" nations such as UK, EU, Australia etc. that can't even get a rocket into space. There was a period recently where the US was relying on Soyuz rockets to get into space.
The Kinzhal is just a normal ballistic missile. If it is "hypersonic", so were the missiles the US has sitting in bunkers.
China has the first real "hypersonic" weapon.
Besides, Russia's super awesome hypersonic missile that will totally kill the west is regularly intercepted by the Patriot platform. Because it's just a normal ballistic missile, which is what the Patriot is designed to intercept.
Uh, by what metric?
>has continually bombed Kiev and other parts of Ukraine
Yeah, with primarily low sophistication weapons invented by a country that has to build everything from scratch in bunkers. This is only possible because Ukraine does not have much in terms of anti-air missile systems and cannot police its airspace.
Meanwhile, Kyiv is giving back plenty of half-assed weapons systems, including multiple jury-rigged light sport aircraft that Russia was unable to keep out of their airspace.
Both combatants are basically children playing with toys right now.
>There was a period recently where the US was relying on Soyuz rockets to get into space.
At no point was the US relying on Soyuz rockets to "get to space". The entire time the US was using Soyuz to ferry astronauts to the collaborative space station we were launching unmanned payloads with multiple launch vehicles, and the military has at no point lost the ability to put payloads into orbit.
Meanwhile in Russia:
>Despite the Russian claims that the missile is on 'combat alert', since its 2022 flight test, it [Sarmat] has experienced four failed tests, the most recent on 21 September 2024.
Russia is not the Soviet Union.
In terms of their nuclear vehicles, I'd bet on enough of them working to be a deterrent, but there's lots of open questions about what percentage. Russia has been running even their Rocket Force on a remarkably small budget compared to the number of warheads they are supporting. Unless they have magical efficiency, they are likely skimping somewhere, and in a military rife with outright fraud and every step of the chain pocketing money that is supposed to be used for procurement, why should we believe the Rocket Force is free of that behavior?
If not, where do you draw the line?
Because this isn’t the first time this has been analyzed, and the math is clear: the only winning strategy with terrorists not negotiate under any circumstances. You call their bluff, and you make known that you will always call their bluff in the future, and never back down. Do anything else and the terrorist can manipulate you into anything they want.
However, the idea that a conventional force would obliterate the capital of a nuclear armed power without escalating into full-on nuclear war seems unlikely to me.
I live in a nuclear armed country too.
Could you please come back to reality?
Every European nation can and has made their own decision on this matter. Spain, Portugal, Italy, some Balkan countries have contributed a lot less. Hungary, who are in NATO, have almost contributed zilch.
Thinking that de-escalating the war as-is giving Russia the strategic victory is a very dangerous thought. This will destabilize the Northern and Eastern parts of Europe, which we definitely can not let happen.
Russia started the war in Ukraine to stop the NATO expansion. It's against the international law, but this intent was made pretty clear also in Georgia.
EU and NATO then reacted with more NATO expansion, and supporting Ukraine militarily. They didn't offer any deescalation. (IMHO NATO should have kicked Turkey out of NATO - not a democratic country - in exchange for Ukraine to continue being sovereign neutral state.)
Neither side wants to deescalate. I think both sides behave as little children. But with rockets and nukes.
People join NATO in self-defence against Russia. They wouldn't have to if Russia didn't keep attacking its neighbours.
Morally you're correct, but on a practical level, Russia didn't want the NATO to be in Ukraine. Morality (or international law) doesn't always win - look at the Cuban missile crisis.
> People join NATO in self-defence against Russia.
Yes, the motivation of the joining countries is clear. What is less clear (and you should question), why they should be accepted - if such offers pose a risk of eventual escalation into a war. (I know it's not fair, but that's geopolitics.) It was the U.S. announcing in 2007 NATO expansion to Ukraine and Georgia, despite Germany and France being against and no public/democratic discussion of this in Ukraine and Georgia (or any other NATO member). Is it hard to believe this is done for any reason other than imperial vanity?
> They wouldn't have to if Russia didn't keep attacking its neighbours.
U.S. have attacked unprovoked countries all over the planet, why trust them more than Russia? Seems quite shortsighted.
Going along with this seems like a terrible idea, if you value the bully not slowly expanding until they're your neighbour.
It just seems to happen naturally when the violent bully starts attacking their neighbours.
That kind of club might be fine, but NATO simply isn't it. Again, you're not asking the question, what is in it for the U.S. (to promise protection - with nukes - to those countries).
Look at my country - Czechia. After the end of Cold war, in the context of NATO, we have done more for American security than America did for ours. We had soldiers in Afghanistan and 11 of them died. During the same period, no American soldier has died defending Czech Republic.
> It just seems to happen naturally when the violent bully starts attacking their neighbours.
NATO continued expanding after the end of Cold war, without Russia attacking anyone. I think it was a mistake - EU should have created its own defense, and start from a clean slate.
Anyway, I don't care much about the question of historic guilt. I commented here because I think western "leaders" should be honest about their goals vis-a-vis Russia and Ukraine, and they aren't.
Peace and stability for about 100 million people in Central and Eastern Europe, who will in turn consume American products and services and cheaply write code for American companies instead of designing nuclear missiles for Russians to target Washington DC. All that the Americans have to do is give a guarantee that essentially costs nothing, if it's believable enough.
> NATO continued expanding after the end of Cold war, without Russia attacking anyone.
NATO is not some loaf of bread sitting on a windowsill that expands on its own. Most countries in Eastern Europe worked feverishly to join NATO. Why? Because their leaders had seen the grainy VHS tapes from the 1994–1996 First Chechen War, showing horrific Russian atrocities against civilians, similar to what many had personally seen or even experienced in the 1940s and 1950s. These images dispelled any illusion that the Russian Federation was more civil than the USSR or that it would respect the sovereignty and self-determination of other peoples.
Since the dissolution of the USSR, the Russia has been almost continuously at war, and it was only a matter of time before its attention shifted from the Caucasus to Eastern Europe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_Russia#...
By the mid-1990s, Russia had already employed its strategy of setting up fake separatist movements to instigate armed conflicts in Europe, and a good chunk of Moldova remains under Russian military occupation to this day: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transnistrian_War
Nobody wanted to become the target of the next artificial "separatist movement" that would drain resources, hinder economic development, block EU integration, and leave the country vulnerable to full-scale invasion like Ukraine experienced in 2014 and then again in 2022. In an alternate timeline, Eastern Europe could have ended up like a series of Moldovas. Very poor, stagnating countries, constantly battling Russian meddling in their internal affairs.
Even 30 years ago, this threat was obvious to anyone familiar with Russia. For example, here's Chechen president Dudayev, a former commander of a Soviet nuclear bomber base, predicting the future in a 1995 interview as the Russians were hunting him: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IavEOx3hUAk
> Peace and stability for about 100 million people in Central and Eastern Europe, who will in turn consume American products and services and cheaply write code for American companies instead of designing nuclear missiles for Russians to target Washington DC. All that the Americans have to do is give a guarantee that essentially costs nothing, if it's believable enough.
Precisely what led to this conflict, the idea that the Eastern Europe (or now specifically Ukraine) should be "owned" by some superpower.
I am not a fan of Russia, in fact, I work for American company and I got rich thanks to that, and I generally like Americans, but if you don't see how incredibly patronizing this is, I don't know what to tell you. (I mean, Eastern Europe aside, the idea that for example Germany (or France), one of the largest economies in the world, needs some help from Americans to defend themselves is ridiculous.)
And paradoxically, the islamophobic sentiment is so strong in Eastern Europe today that most people would actually agree with the Russian approach to the Chechen war, unfortunately. Keep in mind Russia is not that different from U.S. when it comes to waging foreign wars.
The idea that war is in any case justifiable is just something that never works out as a consistent moral principle, and that's true for NATO's support for Ukraine as well (though I don't have a problem with Ukrainians defending their country, I think it's the right thing to do).
But once you start using violence as a means to revenge, or to regain the territory, you have morally lost it (which is what NATO is being asked by Ukraine). In Palestine, most of the world recognizes that the problem of Israeli colonization and apartheid has to be resolved through peaceful means (my preferred solution would be one state), not through Palestinian violence, despite all the Israeli violence (which is more than 10x) towards Palestinians. The same principle should be applied to Ukraine-Russia relations.
At the time fictions like "Russian-backed separatists" were made up to deny the reality: that it was a foreign invasion. Yet all the signs were there: for example, "separatist" leaders like Igor Girkin were citizens of Russia, not Ukraine; OSCE observers found military vehicles containing documentation indicating that the equipment had been maintained in Russia.
European leaders called for "deescalation", "political resolution"; seeing weakness and appeasement in the Minsk agreements, Putin escalated. That's the problem with aggressive leaders like Putin: if you look weak and vulnerable, they will attack you.
Russian leaders see Russia as an empire and regularly say Eurasia should extend from Lisbon to Vladivistok. Putin tries to terrorize us, stating that if we resist it will lead to "World War III" or "nuclear apocalypse". We must not fall for this, or we will gradually lose our freedoms.
Yes EU leaders called for deescalation, that is true. But the U.S., the most important NATO member, did not. There is a 2018 report from RAND that suggests Ukraine should be used as a tool to weaken Russia.
The Ukraine conflict, although there is a contribution from other causes (russian and ukrainian nationalism), is a proxy war between U.S. and Russia, a continuation of the cold war.
I don't disagree with you on Russia, but the US and EU (currently) is unfortunately not interested in deescalating.
What does Russia have that US would want to fight a proxy war over? Certainly isn’t technology or natural resources.
Now that Ukrainian resolve to fight is cooling off, you can see Trump administration planning more wars - in Palestine, Yemen, Iran, Venezuela..
These operations benefit wealthy class in the U.S. (the profit from government contracts) as well as a fat layer of middle class Americans who are involved in making wars.
Every country that exports weapons has this incentive, including Russia, but the U.S. is by far the largest country producing weapons it doesn't need internally. International arms trade should be IMHO completely banned, because it gives (capitalist) countries strong motivation to cause wars. It's a negative externality.
Or you think that Putin would be trying to swallow Ukraine, if Baltics would be outside NATO? Of course not, he would be going after Baltics. Easier prey.
PS: to anyone else reading this, the last NATO expansion in the Russian direction has happened 10 years before the invasion, when Putin was hugging western leaders and not bothered at all by the "scary NATO". This user is posting a retcon propaganda by a Kremlin. A lie.
So basically on one hand there is factual evidence that NATO did not expand towards Russia for 10 years before invasion, and that Ukraine got a firm rejection about joining NATO and resigned to it 4 years before invasion. And on the other hand is some remark of one person, no longer in charge of anything for a decade and who's remark contradicts all factual actions of his country and his government.
Yet again a kremlin lie, desperately trying to justify a war by looking for literally anything as a pretext and disregarding facts.
Also, there is no need to speculate about my opinions - I am on this forum and can answer questions. I am quite decidedly not imperialist. :-) I understand that some people have difficulty understanding that somebody might take a position that doesn't conform to tribalistic friend-enemy distinction; but I do (and I am not alone). I think I have morally consistent stance on Ukraine/Russia, which is in fact in line with my stance on Palestine/Israel, for instance.
Putin's former senior advisor Illarionov maintains that the idea of invading Ukraine goes back much further than the 2008 summit. He says that he personally first heard of the idea from Putin during a closed meeting of senior staff in September 2003, when Russia first violated Ukraine's sovereign territory during the Tuzla Island conflict.[2]
[1] Like Germany under Schröder, who was later rewarded with the well-paid position of chairman of the board of Rosneft, Russia's state-controlled oil company.
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_Tuzla_Island_conflict
You do realize NATO doesn't expand by itself? It's always a country that asks to join so that Russia can't attack it, not the other way round. NATO is not going around asking new countries to join. On the contrary: Ukraine already asked before the war and was rejected.
(Not to mention the absurdity of this argument when you consider why Finland and Sweden joined NATO.)
NATO isn't fighting in Ukraine, Ukraine is fighting in Ukraine and Russia is the stronger party in that conflict.
I think this view is delusional. NATO countries are supplying Ukraine with weapons, it's pretty conventional to consider this as being a party to the war.
The only reason we don't say it openly is that elites want to maintain pretense that we are not in a war (that's unpopular in Europe and US) and that NATO is defense-only organization.
USSR was fighting USA by supplying weapons to Korea and Vietnam?
Just a Russia Today style of whataboutism. Why you take any russian word as true? They can only lie. Whatever they say about Ukraine is a lie.
If you want to believe russians, why not believe that this Ukrainian 3-days special operation is going according 5 years plan of grinding Ukrainian soil treeline a day and pushing neutral neighboring countries to actually join NATO?
In some sense that remains true, but the war remains a stalemate after three years nonetheless. It's become clear that Russia's per-capita war fighting ability is basically garbage. They aren't a superpower, they're something more like Iran, a regional power that is big enough to be expensive to mess with but not a feasible threat to anyone but weaker neighbors.
Ukraine's infrastructure damage can be backstopped by robust trade with wealthy partners and supporters, while Russia is losing refining capacity and running out of gas. To the extent that the war represents an existential threat to either side, it's Putin that has to be more worried. Ukraine can keep this going for a decade or more, it seems like.
I'm not sure they are brainwashed, they could be a salaried russian who has task to spread RT narratives.
Not providing military support will actually bring a war to Europe much faster. If Ukraine surrenders Baltic states are next to be annexed by russians.
That makes you a russia supporter in my book.
Well, this won't end well for Russia. Germany is one of the biggest industrial producers in the world.
Russia is boxing way beyond it's weight.
It will collapse like in 1991 if we would even just put some tanks at the border ( eg. At Finland, Poland).
( Russia's banks are pretty vulnerable atm. )
So there are signs that the war helped Russia to resolve its "dutch disease" (a situation where a state relying on natural resource such as oil stunts its economic growth in other areas).
That is not a good thing. Nobody can eat a tank. You can't plow a field with a howitzer. Your economy suffers when you can make more money being a frontline soldier than you can being a skilled worker. Every single Shahed they build is a waste!
And Russia's demographics are fundamentally broken, even before they got hundreds of thousands of Russian young men killed.
They can't keep it going forever. Even if they won the war today, there would be serious repercussions. Russia is lucky they have a good central bank to manage these problems but that isn't magic.
Russia is burning dollars and real human lives for very little gain, again, even if Ukraine capitulated today. Putin already lost the war. Even gaining all of Ukraine, with a pacified populace, would be somewhat Pyrrhic, and just stave off problems.
Meanwhile, Russia's weapons export market, which was significant and meaningful, is just gone. Nobody wants what they sell anymore, and they can't make enough to export some of it anyway.
Also meanwhile, they have not fixed their "dutch disease" since Russia's economy is still entirely reliant on selling gas to people, and what little trade they had other than that is gone.
Instead, EU wants to embrace the same kind of (they call it) "military keynesianism". They think military spending will fix their economies. (In fact, attempt to use war as a way to prop up the economy was suggested as a reason why Putin started the war.)
It's also bad because longterm, it puts Russia on the same path the U.S. has been - a big weapons manufacturer that is looking to export a war somewhere.
Put tanks on the border and Russia will collapse on it's own.
Giving Russia what it wants will just create more problems in a couple of years.
All the wages were up, but are now coming down. They tried supporting the economy ( to not hit deflation), but that is crumbling soon
Note: I don't live there. But the central bank of Russia really has a competent head ( Elvira Sakhipzadovna Nabiullina ) that's worth listening too. She's so competent that Putin won't block/silence her too much.
Her latest statements are more grim: https://kyivindependent.com/russias-war-fueled-economy-is-ru...
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Munich_speech_of_Vladim...
It’s not like there was any warning signs…
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Georgian_War
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_17
Bullies exploit weaknesses. Time to grow a pair.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics#Con...
Don't pay for it, unless you want to fund what Wikipedia describes as a "Russian far-right political philosopher [and] strong supporter of Russian president Vladimir Putin".
The Baltics, Poland, and northern European countries don't have any illusions that NATO is already in a de facto state of asymmetric war with Russia already: hacking, sabotage, and election meddling of all sorts. The surface of concerns extend beyond that to Ukraine-like hot war scenarios especially for neighboring countries like Finland and the Baltics.
For jets argument you must first understand where Kaliningrad is: something akin to Alaska for US — open the map to see what European countries are invariably in between.
Even if they crossed momentarily the air border (though there was no objective visual proof from either side, which is why the story died), supersonic jet is not like crusing at 20 mph: if you sway for several seconds you can easily graze some border. It is unprofessional but not impossible.
As for a few drones: the key word is undentified.
Yet the piece is titled: Europe is under Russian Attack. Meh
> EU leaders meeting in Copenhagen backed plans to strengthen European defenses, including a proposed "drone wall," after recent drone incursions over Denmark raised fears of Russian hybrid attacks. Officials said the initiative would focus on eastern airspace protection and sit alongside projects for eastern flank security, missile defense, and a space-based shield . Leaders also began a first formal debate on using frozen Russian assets in Europe to fund aid for Ukraine.
Ah, those sweet-sweet frozen assets. Also see how this piece implies Russian without any proof.
Also the more you fear monger the EU population, the more you can continue the war: which is money for some elites; redeemeer of economic recession for others, etc.: war is universal resetter for social/economic issues.
Ah, they can't be behind it because they never, ever make mistakes and everything they ever do serves them somehow.
In the meantime, in real world russia hasn't made a single good decision in almost 4 years.
> Ah, those sweet-sweet frozen assets. Also see how this piece implies Russian without any proof.
When you talk about mountain climbing you also silently imply that gravity exists.
What's the alternative?
> Also the more you fear monger the EU population, the more you can continue the war:
It's not exactly fear mongering. Europe is gearing for war and I don't think even immediate russian surrender could stop it at this point. Europe will steamroll russia in the following decade or two. There are no decisions to be made anymore. Now the stage is fully set and history just plays out.
The idea you can lay down arms up to the last moment before conflict is a pipe dream. It pretty much never happens.
If you imply some country is stupid and every thing they do is a mistake, that — at very least — is grave mistake for any war.
Haven't you ever done anything intentionally that turned out to be a mistake?
It's pretty plain to see that everything russia did in recent years harmed it and strengthened its enemies. That's a mistake in my book unless your goal is a suicide.
Enemies getting stronger, russia growing weaker, and finally, trying to do something about it.
It’s like chicken and the egg situation.
The only dumb thing to do is escalate this even further. One should never “corner” the nuclear power, this is madness.
the fact that in 3 years of sabre rattling they didn't perform a single nuclear test, just for show, proves that conclusively
russia myth is pure PR made in USA
Even today money flows from US allies including NATO member states into Russia to buy gas rather than into the military and defense systems that might have prevented the bloodbath in Ukraine.
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/merkels-lack-of-regrets-i...
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/07/11/trump-germany-russ...
https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/new-atlanticist/the-tr...
Is there some reason European citizens should go to war to satisfy the desires of _political_ scientists - a dubious category at best?
Or to put it another way - why don't the political scientists at these American organizations put on their fighting gear and go fight in Ukraine?
That is the wrong question. The question is:
Is there some reason Europeans should go to war when Russia invades a European country in order to annex it by force?
The answer is yes. The reason is not letting force impose over things like democracy or rights. If Europeans do we(I am European) will become slaves.
It happened multiple times: The Ottoman Empire, Napoleon or Hitler and Stalin.
You don't have to explain that to a Polish person: They lived the occupation of Russia and Germany and all of them have family members that were exterminated by the germans first and then by the communists. Let alone they were subjugated over decades making then a puppet state of Russia making Russia richer and Poland poorer.
If Europeans do not oppose the dictator Putin controlling Russia, next time we will have to fight against Russia, Ukraine(occupied by Russia) and Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and all the new conquests(of the new Russian Empire) in the same way if you do not oppose the ottomans taking Constantinople, you will have to oppose them in Vienna, when they have become much stronger.
But both America and Europe are very inconsistent on the matter; for example, the EU has placed something like 19 sanction packages on Russia. But it has placed none on Israel, despite the fact that Israel, since even just 2023, has bombed the Yemen president, invaded Lebanon, Syria and well, and killed large numbers of Palestinian people; I will let the lawyers discuss what variation of war crime that counts as.
Furthermore, when Poland helped the US, the UK and Australia invade Afghanistan and Iraq there was apparently no concern about about turning people into slaves, occupation, making Afghanistan/Iraq poorer.
Allow me to quote: An estimated over 940,000 people were killed by direct post-9/11 war violence in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen, and Pakistan between 2001-2023. Of these, more than 432,000 were civilians. The number of people wounded or ill as a result of the conflicts is far higher, as is the number of civilians who died “indirectly,” as a result of wars’ destruction of economies, healthcare systems, infrastructure and the environment. An estimated 3.6-3.8 million people died indirectly in post-9/11 war zones, bringing the total death toll to at least 4.5-4.7 million and counting. https://costsofwar.watson.brown.edu/costs/human
Are you concerned about Western imperialism, and if not, why not?
As a historical note, the equivocation between Soviet/Stalin and Hitler is at best inaccurate. If you're Polish, presumably you know about "General Plan Ost" that aimed to eradicate 85% of the Polish population and similar numbers of other Slavic nations; while Stalin was a terrible dictator (which even Putin has mentioned in interviews), the crimes of the Soviets against Poland pale in comparison.
You can oppose Putin if you wish; but you will only destroy Europe's future, which the Americans will smile at as they buy up your industry and prosperity. Unfortunately, the hatred of Russians outweighs the Europe's comprehension of its own self interest.