War in Ukraine

Which is why we get mad when someone invades someone else. What do you expect, people should just auto-surrender if invaded to avoid war?
Gosh... why haven't humans thought of that before? And if people don't auto surrender, will gee whiz, how dumb of them - they're bringing it on themselves.
SMDH...

 

Yes, all of that comes with war. The difference is when it is essentially sanctioned or encouraged, by the leadership of one of the combatants.

 

I expect Ukraine and Europe to take care of their problems. It's that simple. When it happens here we will take care of our own problems.

 

It's war and the object is to win and part of winning is inflicting the most damage and psychological pain on your opponent. Neither side are saints when it comes to the execution of war.

 

that’s a particularly galling invocation of a “both siderism defense of Russia. It also 100%BS.

 

BS.

Wars generally have strategic objectives, obviously in this case they are after the ports and natural resources of Ukraine, in addition to some likely aspect of “reuniting an empire” as part of Putin’s legacy.

Putin wouldn’t be inflicting “psychological pain” if his military had rolled into Kiev and toppled the government as expected, if all that loot and industrial infrastructure was simply being doled out to Russia’s chosen oligarchs. The military invasion failed, so what you are seeing is a gangster state resorting to terrorism, and coordinating with another state sponsor of terrorism (Iran) to help make that happen. Putin is forced to do this because he, like all authoritarians, cannot afford to simply take the L or walk away from the failed invasion. The only way he stays in power is if he appears in command and able to inflict pain on his enemies. At this point I guess that means making sure Ukranians suffer more pain and hardship than Russians. What a genius!

 

It’s falling on deaf ears ...

 

Crazy how much damage Ukraine is causing in Russia just to bring pain to Russian citizens. All those rockets and shellings and attacks…

 

Not that I have high hopes, but I’m going to try this one more time. It beggars belief to imagine that Russia envisioned taking Kyiv, by force, with 30k troops. Recall that it took NATO 108k troops and over NINE months to wrest Mosul from no more than 10k insurgents. And 40k civilians were killed during the seige.

Now, it may have been an intimidatory tactic on Russia’s part. It does appear to be the case that Zelensky was brought to the negotiation table in short order. The withdrawal, from Kyiv, was a good faith gesture. But Boris Johnson scuttled an impending peace agreement.

There is a theory that the early semi-encirclement, of Kyiv, was a fixing operation to enable Russian troops to assemble, in the south, unmolested. Whether true or not, it worked in that regard.

 

Europe is not prepared to take care of its own problems. Russia is too powerful for Europe to take on. It would be nice if Europe could take care of the situation, but they can't, at least, not by themselves. The U.S. has had an agreement with Europe since 1945 that their security problems are also our security problems, and we share in the responsibility for European security. The arrangement has worked very well so far, with none of the European countries outside of Serbia-Croatia going to war with each other since then. The Bear in Russia, which has been the biggest threat to Europe since 1945, stayed quiet for most of that time. Now the Bear is awake and looking for fresh meat.

The U.S. is very fortunate to have two large oceans separating us from most of the countries that might want to go to war with us, as well as most of the countries that want to trade with us. We live with all of the benefits of living in a global economy. Why do you think we should live without any of the responsibilities? As one of 2-3 superpowers on the planet, why would we not have any responsibilities to promote peace and democracy (especially when the other 1-2 superpowers are repressive, marauding dictatorships)?

Looking inward and ignoring the evils of the world would be a devastating decision for the U.S. over the long term. Once the only superpower strong enough to oppose subjugation and colonial invasions refuses to do so, the other two superpowers will have a green light to invade their neighbors, grab their resources, and enslave their people. Eventually, the Russian Bear and the Chinese Panda Bear (which is deceptively dangerous), will be at our doorstep. Before that happens, we will lose our trading partners as they become colonies of one of the other two superpowers. Our economy would be devastated as we lose key trading partners that we rely on for important products and services.

 

Wouldn’t “marauding dictatorship” more aptly describe a country with 150 military bases, in 80 countries, and which has no friends, only countries which it bullies less ?

 

Thanks Chem, seems Cape has completely forgotten or ignored the Geo-Strategic-Ideological-Economic-Political realities established at the end of WW2 and the struggle between the West and communist (failed) and now totalitarian regimes.

For someone so smart it boggles the mind unless of course he, and others on this board, are spinning their own false narrative as part of the disinformation Campaign that our enemies think we cannot see thru.

 

It was a joke, dude!! I apologize to those who didn't read it that way.

It was a joke, dude!! I apologize to anyone who took my post as anything but a joke. BTW, why are you responding instead of DD? One more thing, me joking about someone sharing a jail cell doesn't mean anything like I'm in favor of concentration camps, not anything close to that. Calm yourself down, dude!!

 

Projection

 

This is heartbreaking to read. Our young war fighters shouldn’t be anywhere near this.

1st Time In 80 Years, US Army Deploys 'Screaming Eagles' 101st Airborne Division Just Miles Away From Ukraine

 

And that's the perfect argument for sending Ukraine long range arms and air power. Thanks for providing it.

 

Your perfect argument not mine. If such an argument is so perfect why aren't we involved in every conflict on the planet?

 

Throwing someone in jail is not a joke but I am happy you clarified your remarks. As for my response it is obvious your intention was to draw attention to the entire board concerning your wishes with regards to DD. You make reference to the poster without including DD in the conversation. Rather crude don't you think?

 

Because not every conflict is started by a country invading another country because it wants to take over that other country, especially after recently annexing some of their territory. Doing so is a pretty dramatic challenge to the stability of the world order and allowing it is to encourage the behavior in the future, leading to more death and destruction around the world.

 

Because only the US gets to have something like a Monroe Doctrine.