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Comment by silisili | Hacker News Reader

This all just feels like typical sabre rattling to me. Except this time, the US is also rattling it at basically everyone, and Russia may take that as a good sign.

Make no mistake, Russia does not have the ability to fight a world war with Europe, so would requires allies. Basically, China. And that would be enough to set the US off.

Trump talks a lot, too much, trying to use bullying and threats to effect changes he wants to see. But at any hint of war with Europe, we'd be right there with them.

I don't worry about any of this now personally, because Putin is more calculating than that. And even if he's gone completely bonkers, Jinping is way too careful to be openly associated with them at this point.

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I think what makes this feel different isn’t the sabre rattling, which i agree has always happened. But just how many large economic powers are at it concurrently.

America is using rhetoric that threatens a civil war right now.

Israel is attacking all of their neighbours.

Europe is shifting to the most nationalist versions of parliaments we’ve seen since the Second World War.

And we are see massive global economic decline, civil unrest, and a general atmosphere that things need to change. Unfortunately that often becomes a precursor for war because war is, initially at least, good for business.

As someone who’s middle aged and always watched the news closely until very recently, I’ve found I’ve had to stop eating precisely because the current climate feels the closest to another world war that we’ve seen since the previous one.

The Golf War was scary because of its risk of escalation, as was the cold war. But what we are seeing presently is actual escalation and by more countries. And seemingly with a population that’s not entirely against the domestic policies that lead to such escalation.

> Israel is attacking all of their neighbours.

That’s a bit of an exaggeration. Israel has not attacked Egypt or Jordan.

It has attacked Lebanon after the north of Israel had been evacuated for many months due to relentless rocket attacks from Lebanon.

The only preemptive attack on a neighbour was Syria, after the fall of the Assad regime.

They’re also attacking Iran too. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cdj9vj8glg2o

I don’t really care who started what. That’s just silly playground politics best left for historians who specialise in Middle Eastern foreign politics. My point is they’re at the “let’s show them our military force” phase of their foreign policies.

Iran is a thousand miles away from Israel. There are like 30 other countries within that radius.

I get that you’re trying to make a different point, but your exaggerated language presents a distorted slant, and such one-sided rhetoric, especially when repeated many times, actually contributes to the political shifts and the spirals of violence that you worry about.

I’m not going to disagree with your more general point, even though you’re missing my point, but now you’re the one being exaggerative.

I was actually trying to be precise.

The 27 UN member countries (within 1,000 miles):

Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Chad, Cyprus, Egypt, Eritrea, Georgia, Greece, Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Moldova, North Macedonia, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Sudan, Syria, Turkey, Ukraine, Yemen.

Additional non-UN / partially-recognized entities also within 1,000 miles

Kosovo, Palestine, Northern Cyprus.

Although my source occasionally hallucinates, I think this is approximately accurate, especially if you consider the distance Israeli jets actually travelled.

> your exaggerated language presents a distorted slant, and such one-sided rhetoric, especially when repeated many times, actually contributes to the political shifts and the spirals of violence that you worry about.

Definitely constitutes as you being exaggerative.

You knew what I meant. This wasn’t about a fallacy of understanding, it was a technical pedantry.

Hence why I said I agree with your general point but you’re also missing my point and exaggerating things: yes you’re right that Israel and Iran are not literal neighbours but my point was meant to be the general theme of their foreign policy rather than a literal geography lesson.

This discussion is getting rather silly now though. Especially when I don’t think either one of us disagrees with the actual point the other was making.

Your comment is one data point in a deluge of similarly slanted views across all platforms that, in conjunction, have real consequences and fuel the violence.

I don’t think that’s your intention, or that your comment on its own can have a significant impact, you are just one person I can reach out to. I think you agree that it’s wrong to make a negative exaggeration against a group of people, and I was just pointing out that that what you said was an exaggeration.

Bullshit. You’ve taken my comment out of context and warped it into some anti-Semitic remark that clearly wasn’t even remotely related to the point I was making.

I talked about multiple different countries all having their own national and international crises and you single out literally the smallest paragraph in the entire post as if that was the core premise and then accuse me of exaggerating…completely missing the irony of your own attack.

So the issue here is you, not my comment. I’m not making silly rhetoric, you’re twisting my comment because of your own personal prejudices.

I’m sorry that you’ve had to deal with idiots online but don’t project that onto everyone.

Ukraine is Europe. And what does US do? Threatens Ukraine into giving away land.

"Russia wants to see Ukraine succeed"

Geographically, so is Russia.

Perhaps I should have said the EU, of which Ukraine is not a member.

There's more of Russia in Asia, geographically.

And Europe isn't even a real continent, it's more like West Asia, a peninsula. Only politically it's a "continent."

But at any hint of war with Europe, we'd be right there with them.

There is no reason in the world to think that's true.

People forget how close the Trump family's historical ties to Russia run. "We get all the funding we need out of Russia" should have disqualified any presidential candidate, but...

Trump has some kind of magic aura that allows him to say the most ridiculous stuff that would be career ending for any other politician, and somehow have it received by the public as endearing.

It truly is a bizarre time in politics.

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