That’s an idiotic statement. Does Russia own Ukraine? Does it own the Baltic states? Does it own Poland?.
1 Like
Why state facts together if you have no intention of them being linked by the reader?
Interesting phrasing. Maybe? We will see.
That’s also not what I said. Is disingenuous interpretation the best tactic you have? It seems to be a pattern here.
We don’t know Biden’s exact intention and it’s not provable. Some people are linking the two facts by claiming Biden wanted the prosecutor fired for not investigating Burisma and others stringently enough. That’s certainly possible. Do you think it’s likely?
Let me rephrase, do you view Putin more like Abraham Lincoln fighting to reunify the country or more like Adoph Hitler fighting to attain an empire.
So you just accidentally posted two facts in consecutive sentences with no intention of implying they were related, unlike how the right wing media has been pushing the Joe- hunter-burisma conspiracy by doing the same thing.
So Zelensky fired the prosecutor general a few weeks ago. Such a shame, having to fire these prosecutors because they won’t investigate corruption enough!
Separately, I and likely others wondered why the heck Russia was firing missiles into Ukrainian residential areas. What jerks! According to Amnesty International, Ukraine deliberately stationed troops in residential areas. Zelensky is big mad about the report.
Amnesty workers witnessed Ukrainian forces “establishing bases and operating weapons systems” in some populated residential areas during visits to several frontline areas in Ukraine’s east and south from April to July, the report said.
“We have documented a pattern of Ukrainian forces putting civilians at risk and violating the laws of war when they operate in populated areas,” the report quoted Agnès Callamard, Amnesty International’s secretary general, as saying.
For greater perspective on the accusation:
1 Like
Good article about the attempted censorship of the report by Ukraine. NPR admits they themselves saw things like are discussed in the report:
Like Amnesty International, NPR’s journalists also have witnessed some evidence of military presence near bombed civilian areas.
Ukraine hasn’t issued any official denial as far as I can tell, and their response is as silly as one would imagine in the midst of wartime propaganda campaigns. It’s also worth noting that Amnesty International has previously published numerous reports on Russian war crimes.
Ukrainian officials have claimed that their defensive posture against Russia justifies all tactics used so far, and that the report unfairly implicates Ukraine in war crimes. One top adviser to Ukraine’s president even accused the human rights group of being Russian propagandists fostering disinformation.
“Please stop creating a false reality where everybody is equally to blame [for the war]” said Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s foreign minister, in a video broadcast on television. He joined a chorus of others in saying that foreign observers should blame only Russia for any threats against civilians.
“Every single member of Amnesty’s Ukraine office knows that only the russian federation [capitalization-sic] bears responsibility for the crime of aggression against Ukraine, not the least of which because several of our colleagues had to leave everything behind to save themselves and their families,” reads Amnesty Ukraine’s statement.
I assumed they were just missing. You can only fire so many missiles before you kill someone.
We in the US have this problem too. And we actually try hard not to.
Russian economy continues to defy expectations of sanctions. The western politicians who imposed the sanctions don’t seem too concerned and, in fact, some are dealing with their own severe consequences of the sanctions.
Is it possible that the sanctions weren’t actually intended to crush the Russian economy and quickly end the war? After all, a quick end to the war stops the flow of aid to Ukraine. There is no inspector general overseeing how the funds are spent, so suffice it to assume 100% chance of graft occurring in one of the most corrupt countries in the world.
the war is still happening? seems as old as WWII now
1 Like
It’s a near certainty. I don’t recall anyone I’d consider “knowledgeable” thinking they would.
The primary benefit of sanctions is disconnecting our economy from the Russian economy so we don’t have profit-seeking firms lobbying the gov’t for a quick end. Also, just the bad taste of us doing business with the Russians while we are sending billions of dollars of arms to Ukraine to fight them.
Is there a way to definitively figure out the answers to your questions instead of expressing a vague and convenient paranoia?
2 Likes
What, and lose the Tuckerness?
Just asking questions.
I’m not sure you’re actually interested in an answer but in theory, yes. In practice? Probably not. The budgetary aid to Ukraine specifically is highly suspicious, since the funds are transferred and comingled via a World Bank account, which skirts transparency and auditability requirements according to the the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations. It’s probably just a coincidence. With the known level of corruption in Ukraine, why would you think differently?
“The Ukraine Supplemental Appropriations Act includes a regular reporting requirement on U.S. assistance being provided to Ukraine’s security forces by the United States and our allies and partners,” the members said. “These are statutory requirements, not suggestions. We thus were troubled to learn that the State Department and USAID had opted to circumvent the intent of the strict transparency and accountability requirements written into law for direct budgetary support.”
No, I love conspiracy theories. Especially those that undermine my own positions. But only to the extent that they can be proven or disproven.
At this point, you should break down your big ideas into smaller ideas.
What was the official expectation from sanctions? (from the various governments)
What was the most reasonable expectation? (from economists and other smart people)
What’s a reasonable public response to sanctions not doing especially well?
Are there other sanctions that would have done something else, that we chose not to implement?
Bigger sanctions? Smaller sanctions? Would these have been more typical/reasonable?
How do the choice of sanctions relate to type and amount of direct aid?
How would we typically track direct aid?
Is that a special exception to the way we are handling this military aid, or is it typical of the pentagon?
Why are we doing it this way? What’s the official explanation? What is the reasonable explanation?
What do the decision makers here think personally?
Is there some alternative way to track what happens to the aid? Ie. weapon stockpiles or big explosions or whatever?
If you can answer all these little questions, then we can get at your conspiracy.
Another advantage to asking little questions is that even if your crazy big evil conspiracy if false, the pentagon may still be wasting money.
1 Like
Many of these are questions you could already answer from my post or the short link I provided. Ergo, I still doubt you are actually interested in answers.
How would we typically track direct aid?
Link addresses this. The Ukraine Supplemental Appropriations Act requires direct budgetary aid to be kept in a separate, auditable account and subject to a bilateral agreement on use of the funds. The administration isn’t following either part of this. Why? I’m not 100% sure, but it’s not a good look from the admin whose son was embroiled in Ukraine corruption previously.
Is that a special exception to the way we are handling this military aid, or is it typical of the pentagon?
If you read my post carefully, you’d notice I’m not actually talking about military aid in this context, which often comes in the form of direct weapons transfers. Here I am talking about budgetary aid which is literally just a wire transfer of funds into an account that can’t be audited.
Why are we doing it this way? What’s the official explanation?
Comingling funds in the World Bank account is “easier” than what the law statutorily requires. Generally speaking, it being “easier” is not ever a valid reason to do this. Maybe instead of asking me all these questions, you should ask the Biden administration why they’re not following the law?
Is there some alternative way to track what happens to the aid?
Instead of auditing where the funds go, as required by law, you could ask Ukraine really nicely to just tell you how they spent it. I’m sure they’ll draft up a report lol.
Another advantage to asking little questions is that even if your crazy big evil conspiracy if false, the pentagon may still be wasting money.
Yes, it’s crazy to think a corrupt country like Ukraine would take advantage of lack of oversight over their budgetary funds. And you still don’t get the difference between the budgetary aid, literally just billions in cash transfers, and the military aid which tends to be weapons.
It answers nothing about sanctions, which is the point of your post. And the letter is super vague and has no response. So it’s impossible to tell from it whether anything happening is actually noteworthy, or it’s just typical partisan nonsense.
There’s often other ways of finding out where money goes.
I just like to know the answers to things. You sounded interested yourself. I’ll just wait till someone who is better at this kind of research does some investigative journalism.
I realize you have very big feelings about the Ukraine, but IMO we could equally waste money anywhere on Earth. There’s probably good examples of waste and fraud with every multi-billion project ever. Whether the money is going to Africa, Medicare, or the Moon.
So while I share your guilty until proven innocent attitude, I have different reasons behind it.
I’m not sure that this is really a reliable means of getting good information.
At least based on many of the current major media outlets.
1 Like