O no u didn’t.
We should respond by sending a dog into space.
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Maybe we can send a dog to Putin. He looks like he needs a friend.
Seems inevitable. Putin and his advisors have a world view that makes it so. An excerpt by a Russian writer, in the Economist, helps one see the world in their eyes.
Excerpt from article
When it comes to Ukraine, people in Moscow and the West can be forgiven for assuming that the Kremlin’s policy is informed by a dispassionate strategy derived from endless hours of interagency debate and the weighing of pros and cons. What actually drives the Kremlin are the tough ideas and interests of a small group of longtime lieutenants to President Vladimir Putin, as well as those of the Russian leader himself. Emboldened by perceptions of the West’s terminal decline, no one in this group loses much sleep about the prospect of an open-ended confrontation with America and Europe. In fact, the core members of this group would all be among the main beneficiaries of a deeper schism.
Consider Mr Putin’s war cabinet, which is the locus of most decision-making. It consists of Nikolai Patrushev, the head of the Security Council; Alexander Bortnikov, the head of the FSB (the main successor agency of the KGB intelligence service); Sergei Naryshkin, the head of Russian Foreign Intelligence Service; and Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu. Their average age is 68 years old and they have a lot in common. The collapse of the Soviet Union, which Mr Putin famously described as the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 20th century, was the defining episode of their adult lives. Four out of five have a KGB background, with three, including the president himself, coming from the ranks of counterintelligence. It is these hardened men, not polished diplomats like Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who run the country’s foreign policy.
Sanctions…well the sanctions for the Crimea fiasco actually made many of the oligarchs richer. The embargo’s are not unlike tariffs. They make domestically produced goods more attractive, and that demand fuels growth. Agribusiness in Russia boomed after Crimea.
So, those making the decisions are not all that worried about sanctions. Heck, it may be desired. Putin and his entourage see the West as in decline, a result of multiculturalism and the corresponding lack of national identity, thus paralyzing the democracies. The future belongs to nationalistic authoritarian political systems. Xi is totally on board with that.
I’m glad we were at least able to get the pipeline on the table. That by itself could make it a somewhat unpopular decision, and could similarly deter china.
One might also add Trump.
Too funny to pass up, IMO:
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Yep
So it’s Russia and China vs the world. I feel like we’ve been here before, apparently we never left.
Reports that Ronald Reagan ended the cold war are premature
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As we have lost our Putin fan boy and rt poster we need someone to pick up the slack. Here we have proof of Ukrainian aggression against Russia:
https://www.rt.com/russia/550157-fsb-video-ukrainian-vehicles/
Let’s see how many need to die before the world takes action this time. Let’s hope it’s not more than a million.
Your post is too cryptic for me to discern what you are actually supporting as to a response to Russian aggression:
- say some things but do nothing
- economic sanctions against Russia and providing defensive military hardware to Ukraine
- boots on the ground
Just curious to know what you support.
Russia knows how to play the west very well.
They’ve created a pretext to bite off another digestible chunk of Ukraine, and the only consequence will be some sanctions.
The only unknown to me is if the Ukrainian military has enough force to dissuade further incursions.
I think if we went around the world, we’d find plenty politically powerful people who think that nationalistic authoritarianism is a better model for them than messy civil democracy.
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I don’t have a response. I just find it humorous that people are watching a repeat of WWII but appear numb to it.
Get serious, NATO isn’t going to attack Russia militarily.
I know they aren’t. Just like they didn’t before until it’s too late.