•  Truck_kun   ( @Truck_kun@beehaw.org ) 
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      8 months ago

      It’s obvious, and either many congressmen are an agent of a foreign power, or are truly dumb enough to not realize the unspoken obviousness of this simple fact.

      Prefix: I ended up ranting/venting a bit… our government is so frustrating at times:

      From a US perspective, it is more a time for other countries to step up in this regard (as they have been), as while continued funding and support from the US will happen, it may be a long time from the US (maybe even 2 to 4 years if this election cycle doesn’t oust/block some of these nutjobs that are either beholden to outside powers, or don’t understand anything outside our own borders).

      I’ll take this time to say what many keep unspoken, because Ukrainians have the balls to actually voice it to the world:

      No offense to Ukrainians, I want them to win, but even a loss in Ukraine after a sustained long drawn out battle, is of benefit to any country Russia considers an adversary, a place to oppress, or a country were attractive resources. Ukraine should be supported in their opposition to this invasion for as many years as it takes, no matter what. Twenty years, fifty years, however long; there should be no metric of ‘it’s been 2 years, and Ukraine hasn’t won; are they just wasting our money?’. That is just a dumb concept.

      • I’m not sure we should be dismissive of politicians trying to reduce interventionist foreign pokicy in the abstract. The “US as world police” paradigm is a difficult angle.

        From the US perspective, it’s expensive AF, delivers erratic results (see Iraq) and it’s created a lot of enemies over the years, basically handing Russia and China a support base on a silver platter.

        On a global level, it does seem a bit weird for everyone to come calling to one nation for support, which doesn’t really encourage a multi-voiced and spirited debate if everything breaks down to “whoever has US backing wins”.

        There’s definitely a “we wrote a cheque we no longer want to cash” lock-in factor on this conflict, but maybe it’s also time to stop writing so many cheques.

        •  Truck_kun   ( @Truck_kun@beehaw.org ) 
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          8 months ago

          Unless all countries come together, the idea of a ‘world police’ by any number of select countries is silly.

          One nation being the ‘world police’ is even crazier.

          We rely on coalitions nowadays to do much (Iraq, Haiti, Yemen, …maybe Yemen again soon…, etc).

          Coalitions are better than a single nation, but should really be an organization independent of any nations, that people trust; in the modern world, ideally would be the UN, which has peacekeeping forces, but I don’t know if the trust is currently there with the UN, and a number of ‘bad actors’, namely because the UN doesn’t serve that purpose, it is supposed to be a dialog between nations, not a unifying power, or protector/military force.

          The good news on the US front, is for many coalitions to step in, the US is trying to take a back-seat, and have other nations lead them. Not that those other nations don’t have concerns. I’m not up to date on it, but I believe Kenya was being sought to lead the coalition to Haiti to restore peace and order, but I believe there were concerns about the history of Kenyan police treatment in past coalitions. Still, the US should not be the one in-charge of world policing, though that is not to say they shouldn’t be involved in any such action, just they are a piece of the puzzle, not the solution in and of itself.

          I’m rambling too much. I think it’s time for me to get off Lemmy for the day. Peace out.

  •  jaeme   ( @jaeme@lemmy.ml ) 
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    8 months ago

    Ukraine is never going to win this war no matter how hard western libs keep praying.

    This is the fate of any country that sells itself out to the imperial core including the EU states who facilitated this bloodbath instead of peace and diplomacy.

    I hope Russia does take over the whole of Ukraine because I don’t trust a Ukraine left to its own devices after this humiliating defeat.

    Who’s ready for the Ukranian 9/11?

    • That’s pretty much what the non-western corporate media reports. But I learned that no one in the west is ready to face it.

      In Arabic we do say المتغطي بأمريكا عريان so I’m not surprised Ukraine is being hollowed out by the US and left out naked in the cold

    • Tell me how exactly Russia benefits from the prolonged war with amounting financial cost and casualties that future generations of Russians will pay?

      Russia is experiencing demographic crisis before the war, and many men either fled or died, and the country have become beholden to China, Iran and North Korea. And Russia has only issued partial mobilisation, but imagine if the entire country then mobilised more for total war just to try to beat another country that is 1/10th the size and couldn’t do so for two years.

      Ukraine mobilised for total war already and they’re willing to die for a bigger goal and for their homeland. Are you yourself willing to be complicit to your country’s decline for handful of rubles that is depreciating in value over time?

      • https://intellinews.com/russian-sanctions-boomerang-effect-means-a-year-of-stagnation-for-europe-in-2024-308348/

        Russian sanctions boomerang effect means a year of stagnation for Europe in 2024

        The boomerang effect of the Russian sanctions on the EU member states is having a mixed impact. Germany, France and Italy are worst affected as the pain from the changes in energy and input supplies impact their economies, dragging them down into recession, while the less dependent on Russia like Spain and Portugal are already showing signs of recovery, according to ING analysis.

        Overall Europe is headed for a year of stagnation that could be worse than in 2023. By contrast Russia reported growth of 3.5%, according to the preliminary results. And on January 18, an ebullient Russian President Vladimir Putin said that growth could come in at over 4% after revisions. The Russian Ministry of Finance (MinFin) also revised its GDP growth outlook for 2024 up to 3.5%, much improved from the earlier Central Bank of Russia (CBR) forecasts of around 2% for this year.

        Currently, sanctions seem to be doing more harm to Europe than they are to Russia.

        • Russia sanctioned-proof themselves in anticipation of the consequences of invading Ukraine. They have long history and experience after all since the Soviet days of international sanctions. However, autarky always shows to only have short term effect but in the long run, the severe consequences always catches up in the end. Just look at how Soviet Union led to its eventual demise and the war in Afghanistan accelerated that collapse. The war in Ukraine will do the same to the current regime.

          Conversely, even though the EU had been dependent on Russian fossil fuel before, the boomerang effect you mentioned is only short to medium term because disruption in trade is always expected during a war. But this only pushed the EU to import American gas and accelerate the EU Green New Deal to compensate for the loss of Russian gas and oil.

          With Russia only having 1/5th the GDP of Italy and endemic corruption, the failure to subdue Ukraine is only going to eat at the Russian economy and political prestige. Even if Russia wins or gets concessions, it will be a Pyrrhic victory. Because loss of demographics (Russia is experiencing population decline before the war) will have severe consequences to the workforce and economy, the sanctions after the war will continue to hit the Russians, and the country will become more economically reliant to China and by extension politically as well. More importantly, the claim to stop NATO expansion just had the boomerang effect of just admitting two new nations into the alliance. With Russia tied in Ukraine, they loss influence in CSTO as member states resumed border clashes, especially with Armenia becoming frustrated on the issue of Nagorno-Karabakh.

  • This is just Zelenskyi’s government in Kyiv sacrificing everyone else to maintain the notion of a Ukrainian state for the wealthy elite who (coincidentally) live in Kyiv. Look at where the rich are. Look at where most conscripts are from.

    Ukraine is split into the ultra wealthy (Kyiv), the moderately well-off (Dnipro, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv), and everywhere else (which is remarkably poor). Kyiv has more than double the GDP/capita of the next richest administrative region. This war devastates the eastern economic centers and solidifies power in Kyiv… And for what?

    Ukrainian nationalism have sent hundreds of thousands of men and women to their death for no clear gains. Now, they want to send hundreds of thousands more, because the lives of Ukrainians mean nothing to the people in the white ivory towers of Kyiv. Is the sacrifice of more Ukrainian lives worth it to pursue the Western ideal of crushing Russia (so that the West can collectively focus on the Middle East and China instead)?