I just love how putin tells the media "we have to do everything to stabilize stuff over there!", to comfort people like zeo and his friends, so they can point at something in a discussion - while sending troops and troopparts that only can be used offensively. Way to de-escalate.
On March 01 2014 23:58 Gorsameth wrote: And so it is once again shown that EU protection is a fucking joke. We will happily promise our protection but as soon as something bigger then a fly shows up we tuck our tails between our legs and run away.
Sickening to see how spineless our leadership has become.
EU protection means something if it's backed up by US power, which in practice it usually is. TBH, I don't think Russia can effectively go through with this, they will have to back down at some point. No point in sending troops to Ukraine and risk an armed conflict when there are less direct means to achieve the same goals.
Except that seems to be what is happening at this very moment.
On March 02 2014 00:03 Twoflowers wrote:
On March 01 2014 23:58 Gorsameth wrote: And so it is once again shown that EU protection is a fucking joke. We will happily promise our protection but as soon as something bigger then a fly shows up we tuck our tails between our legs and run away.
Sickening to see how spineless our leadership has become.
What EU protection? We have no treaties with the Ukraine that would justify a military intervention. We also have no forces in Ukraine, while russia has a fucking naval base near the biggest crimean city. Economic threats at russia would probably not be enough to stop an invasion. So what exactly shoulod teh EU do?
The Budapest Memorandum is why atleast the US and UK have a duty atm.
And what we should do? How about following Russians example when they moved there army to Ukraine's borders and showing them that we will respond if they invade instead of flinging harsh words. This is a game of chicken by Putin and we pulled out before it even started.
http://www.ezilon.com/maps/images/europe/political-map-of-Ukraine.gif <-- to which border do you want the uk move forces? Shit is going down a bit too fast to organize a movement of UK troops to romania, poland etc. and they would have to go through turkish territory for acces to the black sea. Also these movements would have been interpreted as agression towards russia.
And Russia moving its army to Ukrains border isn't a sign of aggression? Is it a sign when there flying military helicopters across the border? Is it a sign when they approve "war"?
Would the troops need to be there in an hour? no ofc not but when you have your people mobilizing for the move it shows Russia your serious
We're seeing the effects of doing next to nothing right now.
Internet-tough-guy act is not how real world works.
Real situation is that Russia has big amount of leverage on the situation. They can threaten to cripple Ukarainian economy even without the use of force. They have in some areas popular suppport. They have a military base on Ukrainian territory. They can hit Europe economically also. They can also block Western diplomacy on issues more important to the West than Ukraine is.
US has some leverage due to being US. US can hurt Russia economically somewhat and actual threat of force would put Putin in a bad position. But US capability to posture is limited due to last 13 years.
EU has some leverage as they can hurt Putin back economically. Militarily most likely not as Putin would know it is a bluff.
Neither of those parties wants war with one another. Putin can always ignore economical threats as his position in Russia is not weak. So he knows that if he limits himself to small gains he will risk nothing as nobody will do squat, because it is in nobody's interest to do anything.
Of course there is another possibility, very unlikely one, that Putin sees that Ukraine is lost and might be admitted to NATO and decides that it is inacceptable to him and goes for full-on aggression. But that would be such a risk and he never showed any inclination to risk too much.
Though considering that for Russia limiting NATO influence was always a priority, not restoring USSR territorially as you claim, who knows.
Tell that to the people of Ukraine im sure there interested in the political situation of why there being abandoned.
I know they aren't. But your solution is not realistic and thus will not help them either. You can view the situation ethically or geopolitically. In neither of those views is your suggestion any good. There might not even be good solution at all, because all parties that can make decisions have conflicting aims and neither of them actually cares about Ukrainian people.
US cares mostly about what all imperial powers care for, and that is limiting all possible rival powers and protecting their economical interests. So of course they will support anyone who will do anything they can to limit Russian influence, no matter what kind of group it is. They also do not want EU to get too strong in the region.
What Russia wants was discussed enough. New Ukrainian government wants power and money and would not be willing to do anything that might limit it. Like letting those parts of Ukraine that do not want to stay go. Nationalists in the government would not let them do it anyway.
EU is most benign of those actors most likely because they are not one country and thus conflicted, but they still have their own agenda, not necessarily aligned with good of the people on those territories.
Best for the people there would most likely be to get rid of the fascist influence in Ukrainian politics and force Russia to back off. But that is not realistic scenario. Your suggestion is worse and not realistic either.
I'm starting to think that if US don't get involved, then they may settle with divided Ukraine as it will ultimately result in weaker pro-Russia power. Kind of like "divide & conquer". Hopefully this isn't the case though.
My main question would be how putin stops this logic: You take crimea because there's russians to protect, but there's also russians in the neighboring regions and the regions next to those, and he can't just annex the entire ukraine.
On March 01 2014 23:51 zeo wrote: Local government buildings taken by anti-junta protesters
I don't understand how can you post images with Russian flags on Ukrainian teritory and call all this crap anit-junta movement. Why don't you put some swastikas above Kiev to make it look even better?
The people of Ukraine want Russia to protect them. Carrying around Russian flags is no different than carrying EU/US flags at Maidan
Does your fixation on the belief that the Russians are always the good guys (atleast that's what I've been reading out of your posts) come from a general dislike of western countries, or from liking Russia in particular? Don't take it the wrong way, it's a genuine question, since you sided with Russia on every point of discussion here for soon to be a hundred pages, starting with this post (you made one or two before this one, but those were mostly about criticizing the american foreign policy in similar cases if I remember correctly):
On January 27 2014 07:07 zeo wrote:
On January 27 2014 06:43 DeepElemBlues wrote: okay well the one side is a bunch of people who put other people in jail for no legitimate reason, have the police attack protesters for no legitimate reason, pass fascist laws trying to scare people who disagree with them into submitting, and are basically a bunch of capos for Don Putin's Ukrainian interests
the other side is a bunch of people who don't want any of the above and want a free trade agreement with the EU
so there are two sides, it's just that one is crap and one isn't.
You seem to be forgetting that the last time these 'revolutioners' came to power they brought the country on the brink of economic collapse with their irrational russophobia. Practically the only thing the current president could do to save the country was turn to the only party willing to save Ukraine's ass. Russia.
Dav1oN has it right and I've said it before in this thread, the whole landscape needs to change. That won't happen as long as these hard-core nationalists, football hooligans and nazi sympathizers keep brainwashing the people in the streets to destroy their own country. Its so easy to be an internet freedom fighter circlejerker these days on TL.
Whatever a fascist wants, I want the opposite. When it became clear that the Nazi-colaborator wannabe's had taken over maidan the only logical course to take would be anti-maidan. Simple.
But they were always just a small group and even now have nearly no political power.
In a sense they were a smaller group but at the end of the day they were the one doing 90% of the fighting/killing/dieing and are now at the top of the junta as a result. Maybe Right Sector don't have anyone in parliament but they are the ones with guns standing outside the parliament building making sure the revolution goes as they planned it. While the wannabe Nazi collaborators have powerful positions in the junta government now.
They are a cancer and Russia sending troops into Crimea is what happens when you come to power on the backs of fascists.
What's wrong about using them to help the revolution if their extreme ideas don't make it into the nation's politics? You're basically punishing people for using a shovel because you don't like what a shovel would be able to do if it would come into power, but the shovel will still be a shovel. And nobody believes in the shovel and that shovel will never have any power, so you want Russia to invade another country for things that won't happen.
No political power ? Their "political" wing has control of ministries in the new government. I am not agreeing with him on the whole Russia liberation nonsense. But saying the fascists have no power seems wrong. Also who has the guns has power.
On March 01 2014 23:58 Gorsameth wrote: And so it is once again shown that EU protection is a fucking joke. We will happily promise our protection but as soon as something bigger then a fly shows up we tuck our tails between our legs and run away.
Sickening to see how spineless our leadership has become.
EU protection means something if it's backed up by US power, which in practice it usually is. TBH, I don't think Russia can effectively go through with this, they will have to back down at some point. No point in sending troops to Ukraine and risk an armed conflict when there are less direct means to achieve the same goals.
Except that seems to be what is happening at this very moment.
On March 02 2014 00:03 Twoflowers wrote:
On March 01 2014 23:58 Gorsameth wrote: And so it is once again shown that EU protection is a fucking joke. We will happily promise our protection but as soon as something bigger then a fly shows up we tuck our tails between our legs and run away.
Sickening to see how spineless our leadership has become.
What EU protection? We have no treaties with the Ukraine that would justify a military intervention. We also have no forces in Ukraine, while russia has a fucking naval base near the biggest crimean city. Economic threats at russia would probably not be enough to stop an invasion. So what exactly shoulod teh EU do?
The Budapest Memorandum is why atleast the US and UK have a duty atm.
And what we should do? How about following Russians example when they moved there army to Ukraine's borders and showing them that we will respond if they invade instead of flinging harsh words. This is a game of chicken by Putin and we pulled out before it even started.
http://www.ezilon.com/maps/images/europe/political-map-of-Ukraine.gif <-- to which border do you want the uk move forces? Shit is going down a bit too fast to organize a movement of UK troops to romania, poland etc. and they would have to go through turkish territory for acces to the black sea. Also these movements would have been interpreted as agression towards russia.
And Russia moving its army to Ukrains border isn't a sign of aggression? Is it a sign when there flying military helicopters across the border? Is it a sign when they approve "war"?
Would the troops need to be there in an hour? no ofc not but when you have your people mobilizing for the move it shows Russia your serious
We're seeing the effects of doing next to nothing right now.
Internet-tough-guy act is not how real world works.
Real situation is that Russia has big amount of leverage on the situation. They can threaten to cripple Ukarainian economy even without the use of force. They have in some areas popular suppport. They have a military base on Ukrainian territory. They can hit Europe economically also. They can also block Western diplomacy on issues more important to the West than Ukraine is.
US has some leverage due to being US. US can hurt Russia economically somewhat and actual threat of force would put Putin in a bad position. But US capability to posture is limited due to last 13 years.
EU has some leverage as they can hurt Putin back economically. Militarily most likely not as Putin would know it is a bluff.
Neither of those parties wants war with one another. Putin can always ignore economical threats as his position in Russia is not weak. So he knows that if he limits himself to small gains he will risk nothing as nobody will do squat, because it is in nobody's interest to do anything.
Of course there is another possibility, very unlikely one, that Putin sees that Ukraine is lost and might be admitted to NATO and decides that it is inacceptable to him and goes for full-on aggression. But that would be such a risk and he never showed any inclination to risk too much.
Though considering that for Russia limiting NATO influence was always a priority, not restoring USSR territorially as you claim, who knows.
There's one little detail you're leaving out: The US has made a commitment to defend Ukraine against aggression. Of course the US has ignored some of its commitments before but that was always to extend their influence. The idea that they would give up something that they have promised to protect anyway is extremely unlikely.
TBH, I'm not even sure there's anything more important to US diplomacy than Ukraine. Dominant powers tend to honour security guarantees (unless they are the aggressors). It might be an inconvenience and they might make small concessions to avoid conflict but ultimately the logic of power kicks in. Ignoring a US security guarantee is a direct challenge to the US, no matter how important the country itself is.
There's the little detail of Russia's nuclear arsenal, of course. In the end if Russia said: "We are invading Ukraine and if you try to stop us we'll nuke you", then there's a reasonable chance even the US would back down. But than they would have other options.
US has an out as long as Russians do not go outside of Crimea and maybe few parts of eastern Ukraine. If they don't, US can silently pretend that Russia is just "protecting" their compatriots. And yes currently Ukraine is the most important issue, but unless the situation goes full retard, it will become old news very quickly.
On March 01 2014 23:43 zeonmx wrote: Shocking News : Federation Council unanimously approves sending troops to Ukraine.
/sarcasm how shocking /endsarcasm
Putin is playing a very dangerous game here...
what do you think could happen to Putin if Russia loses the control in Sebastopol?
Putin is a corrupt president, but he still maintain some strategic places for Russia, Syrian Government has been firmly backed by the Kremlin, Russia still has its naval base in the Mediterran.
He can suffer a coup if Russia loses control over Crimea.
I expect the west approves the new "Khanate of crimea" in exchange of Syria, else there will be too many deaths.
On March 02 2014 01:16 Derez wrote: My main question would be how putin stops this logic: You take crimea because there's russians to protect, but there's also russians in the neighboring regions and the regions next to those, and he can't just annex the entire ukraine.
In those other areas the pro-Russians are not majority and do not want to join Russia.
On March 02 2014 01:16 Derez wrote: My main question would be how putin stops this logic: You take crimea because there's russians to protect, but there's also russians in the neighboring regions and the regions next to those, and he can't just annex the entire ukraine.
He is doing this precisely because no one is stopping him. And yes he will keep doing actions like this when the opportunity presents itself in the future until someone tells him "no, you cant". Thats why im saying there should have been a reaction when Russia started its posturing.
Russia's economy is not strong enough to stand on its own, and the moment sanctions hit is the moment that Putin reconsiders his estimation of Russian power. Even if Russia gets Crimea, this won't end well for them.
On March 01 2014 23:43 zeonmx wrote: Shocking News : Federation Council unanimously approves sending troops to Ukraine.
/sarcasm how shocking /endsarcasm
Putin is playing a very dangerous game here...
what do you think could happen to Putin if Russia loses the control in Sebastopol?
Putin is a corrupt president, but he still maintain some strategic places for Russia, Syrian Government has been firmly backed by the Kremlin, Russia still has its naval base in the Mediterran.
He can suffer a coup if Russia loses control over Crimea.
I expect the west approves the new "Khanate of crimea" in exchange of Syria, else there will be too many deaths.
How is he losing control of anything except the Ukrainian puppet government that has already fallen? No one is attacking Russia's bases in the Ukraine. No one is attacking the Russian minority He isn't responding to any actual threat...
On March 02 2014 01:16 Derez wrote: My main question would be how putin stops this logic: You take crimea because there's russians to protect, but there's also russians in the neighboring regions and the regions next to those, and he can't just annex the entire ukraine.
In those other areas the pro-Russians are not majority and do not want to join Russia.
No way to determine that without elections and no way putin will allow free elections to take place in any of the regions he'll be taking.
The U.N. Security Council will hold an urgent meeting on the crisis in Ukraine on Saturday after Russia announced plans to send armed forces into the autonomous Crimea region of the former Soviet republic. A diplomat from Luxembourg, president of the 15-nation council this month, said the meeting would take place at 2:00 p.m. EST (1900 GMT) and was being convened at the request of Britain.
EPT
