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Northern Ireland25397 Posts
On February 22 2022 18:51 Biff The Understudy wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2022 14:53 Jealous wrote:On February 22 2022 14:41 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote:On February 22 2022 14:35 Jealous wrote:On February 22 2022 12:46 Grackaroni wrote:On February 22 2022 09:57 iFU.spx wrote:On February 22 2022 09:29 Gorsameth wrote:On February 22 2022 09:24 iFU.spx wrote:On February 22 2022 09:03 Sermokala wrote:On February 22 2022 09:00 iFU.spx wrote: [quote]
True. But.
Don't hate the player, hate the game.
Disclaimer: i do not suppot any politician's vision. I don't support any politicians vision but I also don't think you should blame putin and biden doesn't know what he's talking about. Yeah that's not the neutral stance you think it is bud. I didn't say that putin or biden doesn't know what they talkng about, they pretty much does. I said that they both can't find compromise. What is there to compromise? One is invading their neighbour, the other doesn't want them to. There is no 'compromise' when 1 party is clearly in the wrong. You are trying to explain politics from single person view point. It doesn't work like that. You always have influencers who force those vision. In this case we have: 1. one politician is afraid of NATO be a threat to "russian world" 2. other one acting like he doesn't understand what (1) talking about or want NATO be closer as threat to "russian world" I am not argue which statement or whos right in this situation. I just wanna tell how i think Putin sees this situation as far as i understand it lol Putin is not afraid of NATO threatening Russia. Russia has the second largest nuclear arsenal in the world. It would be suicidal for NATO to do anything aggressive towards Russia, which Putin knows. This is just pretext for annexing territory. If there were dozens of military bases around my country, and I knew that in the past when my predecessors tried to set one up next to the owner of those military bases and it failed due to the hypocrisy of the now most-heavily funded military complex in the world ten times over, I would be a bit paranoid too. It may not be the most important element of the equation in this context, but it certainly exists and I don't see how more people don't see that. The abject lack of objectivity, whether due to patriotism or genuine propaganda that rivals that of Russia, has always boggled my mind. I fail to see what that has to do with what Russia is currently attempting to do to Ukraine. Ukraine joining NATO poses the threat of even greater and more encompassing foreign military presence on Russian borders, which has been a point of contention for Russia for decades, as described above. The point of contention is not Russia being threarened, it can blow up the entire planet. What’s at stake is wether or not a country can leave Russia’s sphere of influence. Russia wants neighbours it can submit into oblivion if they fall out of line. It’s done it times and times and times again and is doing it now. It considers Ukraine like it considered Georgia: a vassal falling out of line. This hasn’t built up overnight though, we’ve had a span that neatly encapsulates my entire life since the Berlin Wall came down to collectively deal with the issue.
In the immediate and in recent times absolutely Putin’s Russia is brazenly aggressive.
Over a longer span though it does seem a damning failure of wider diplomacy that we’ve ended up at this point.
Europe are all pretty pally despite many of its constituent nations knocking 7 bells out of each other in the 20th century. Korea, Japan etc are pretty respected members of the international community.
Russia, for whatever reasons has been relatively peripheral since the further cooling of the Cold War, with an explicitly anti-Soviet military alliance not just left intact but expanded.
As things stand of course that looks wise, but we didn’t go from David Hasslehoff atop the Berlin Wall straight to Putin’s brand of nationalism. There’s just a marked contrast between post-conflict normalisation with Russia and a multitude of other examples, and if that had been negotiated more smoothly perhaps that nationalist sentiment longing for the old days isn’t sufficiently large for Putin to tap into in the manner he has.
I don’t like caveating every other point I make but this current scenario is obviously egregious with Russia being wholly in the wrong. Merely that wider past failures have at least in part lead us to this point as well.
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On February 22 2022 22:40 WombaT wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2022 18:51 Biff The Understudy wrote:On February 22 2022 14:53 Jealous wrote:On February 22 2022 14:41 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote:On February 22 2022 14:35 Jealous wrote:On February 22 2022 12:46 Grackaroni wrote:On February 22 2022 09:57 iFU.spx wrote:On February 22 2022 09:29 Gorsameth wrote:On February 22 2022 09:24 iFU.spx wrote:On February 22 2022 09:03 Sermokala wrote: [quote] I don't support any politicians vision but I also don't think you should blame putin and biden doesn't know what he's talking about.
Yeah that's not the neutral stance you think it is bud. I didn't say that putin or biden doesn't know what they talkng about, they pretty much does. I said that they both can't find compromise. What is there to compromise? One is invading their neighbour, the other doesn't want them to. There is no 'compromise' when 1 party is clearly in the wrong. You are trying to explain politics from single person view point. It doesn't work like that. You always have influencers who force those vision. In this case we have: 1. one politician is afraid of NATO be a threat to "russian world" 2. other one acting like he doesn't understand what (1) talking about or want NATO be closer as threat to "russian world" I am not argue which statement or whos right in this situation. I just wanna tell how i think Putin sees this situation as far as i understand it lol Putin is not afraid of NATO threatening Russia. Russia has the second largest nuclear arsenal in the world. It would be suicidal for NATO to do anything aggressive towards Russia, which Putin knows. This is just pretext for annexing territory. If there were dozens of military bases around my country, and I knew that in the past when my predecessors tried to set one up next to the owner of those military bases and it failed due to the hypocrisy of the now most-heavily funded military complex in the world ten times over, I would be a bit paranoid too. It may not be the most important element of the equation in this context, but it certainly exists and I don't see how more people don't see that. The abject lack of objectivity, whether due to patriotism or genuine propaganda that rivals that of Russia, has always boggled my mind. I fail to see what that has to do with what Russia is currently attempting to do to Ukraine. Ukraine joining NATO poses the threat of even greater and more encompassing foreign military presence on Russian borders, which has been a point of contention for Russia for decades, as described above. The point of contention is not Russia being threarened, it can blow up the entire planet. What’s at stake is wether or not a country can leave Russia’s sphere of influence. Russia wants neighbours it can submit into oblivion if they fall out of line. It’s done it times and times and times again and is doing it now. It considers Ukraine like it considered Georgia: a vassal falling out of line. This hasn’t built up overnight though, we’ve had a span that neatly encapsulates my entire life since the Berlin Wall came down to collectively deal with the issue. In the immediate and in recent times absolutely Putin’s Russia is brazenly aggressive. Over a longer span though it does seem a damning failure of wider diplomacy that we’ve ended up at this point. Europe are all pretty pally despite many of its constituent nations knocking 7 bells out of each other in the 20th century. Korea, Japan etc are pretty respected members of the international community. Russia, for whatever reasons has been relatively peripheral since the further cooling of the Cold War, with an explicitly anti-Soviet military alliance not just left intact but expanded. As things stand of course that looks wise, but we didn’t go from David Hasslehoff atop the Berlin Wall straight to Putin’s brand of nationalism. There’s just a marked contrast between post-conflict normalisation with Russia and a multitude of other examples, and if that had been negotiated more smoothly perhaps that nationalist sentiment longing for the old days isn’t sufficiently large for Putin to tap into in the manner he has. I don’t like caveating every other point I make but this current scenario is obviously egregious with Russia being wholly in the wrong. Merely that wider past failures have at least in part lead us to this point as well.
To what extent it is a failure of wider diplomacy as you put it, and to what extent it is a Russia's own choice to not integrate themselves into the wider international community?
What I mean is that all sorts of olive branches were handed and (primarily commercial) relations flourished through 90's and early 00's. Putin was a democraticly elected leader as well, and I don't think his policies were this expansionalist and nationalist-conservative to begin with. At some point he was able to concentrate power in a way that had/has been rejected in other former Soviet republics in Europe (with the exception of Belarus) and subsequently started this project of bringing back the 'Russian people' under one flag.
In Ukraine for example the kind of oligarchic development was twice rejected via popular uprisings (still not completely gone afaik) but similar things never happened in Russia. Maybe Putin is, or at least was, just about popular enough that he never had to face that serious of a wave of resistance and opposition, or maybe he was able to suppress them from so early on that they never developed to the point that we've seen them in other former Soviet republics.
I guess the point of this rambling is to ask at what point (and how) the wider diplomacy would have prevented Putin from turning Russia into a de-facto single party state and dictatorship?
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Northern Ireland25397 Posts
On February 22 2022 23:11 Oukka wrote:Show nested quote +On February 22 2022 22:40 WombaT wrote:On February 22 2022 18:51 Biff The Understudy wrote:On February 22 2022 14:53 Jealous wrote:On February 22 2022 14:41 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote:On February 22 2022 14:35 Jealous wrote:On February 22 2022 12:46 Grackaroni wrote:On February 22 2022 09:57 iFU.spx wrote:On February 22 2022 09:29 Gorsameth wrote:On February 22 2022 09:24 iFU.spx wrote: [quote]
I didn't say that putin or biden doesn't know what they talkng about, they pretty much does. I said that they both can't find compromise. What is there to compromise? One is invading their neighbour, the other doesn't want them to. There is no 'compromise' when 1 party is clearly in the wrong. You are trying to explain politics from single person view point. It doesn't work like that. You always have influencers who force those vision. In this case we have: 1. one politician is afraid of NATO be a threat to "russian world" 2. other one acting like he doesn't understand what (1) talking about or want NATO be closer as threat to "russian world" I am not argue which statement or whos right in this situation. I just wanna tell how i think Putin sees this situation as far as i understand it lol Putin is not afraid of NATO threatening Russia. Russia has the second largest nuclear arsenal in the world. It would be suicidal for NATO to do anything aggressive towards Russia, which Putin knows. This is just pretext for annexing territory. If there were dozens of military bases around my country, and I knew that in the past when my predecessors tried to set one up next to the owner of those military bases and it failed due to the hypocrisy of the now most-heavily funded military complex in the world ten times over, I would be a bit paranoid too. It may not be the most important element of the equation in this context, but it certainly exists and I don't see how more people don't see that. The abject lack of objectivity, whether due to patriotism or genuine propaganda that rivals that of Russia, has always boggled my mind. I fail to see what that has to do with what Russia is currently attempting to do to Ukraine. Ukraine joining NATO poses the threat of even greater and more encompassing foreign military presence on Russian borders, which has been a point of contention for Russia for decades, as described above. The point of contention is not Russia being threarened, it can blow up the entire planet. What’s at stake is wether or not a country can leave Russia’s sphere of influence. Russia wants neighbours it can submit into oblivion if they fall out of line. It’s done it times and times and times again and is doing it now. It considers Ukraine like it considered Georgia: a vassal falling out of line. This hasn’t built up overnight though, we’ve had a span that neatly encapsulates my entire life since the Berlin Wall came down to collectively deal with the issue. In the immediate and in recent times absolutely Putin’s Russia is brazenly aggressive. Over a longer span though it does seem a damning failure of wider diplomacy that we’ve ended up at this point. Europe are all pretty pally despite many of its constituent nations knocking 7 bells out of each other in the 20th century. Korea, Japan etc are pretty respected members of the international community. Russia, for whatever reasons has been relatively peripheral since the further cooling of the Cold War, with an explicitly anti-Soviet military alliance not just left intact but expanded. As things stand of course that looks wise, but we didn’t go from David Hasslehoff atop the Berlin Wall straight to Putin’s brand of nationalism. There’s just a marked contrast between post-conflict normalisation with Russia and a multitude of other examples, and if that had been negotiated more smoothly perhaps that nationalist sentiment longing for the old days isn’t sufficiently large for Putin to tap into in the manner he has. I don’t like caveating every other point I make but this current scenario is obviously egregious with Russia being wholly in the wrong. Merely that wider past failures have at least in part lead us to this point as well. To what extent it is a failure of wider diplomacy as you put it, and to what extent it is a Russia's own choice to not integrate themselves into the wider international community? What I mean is that all sorts of olive branches were handed and (primarily commercial) relations flourished through 90's and early 00's. Putin was a democraticly elected leader as well, and I don't think his policies were this expansionalist and nationalist-conservative to begin with. At some point he was able to concentrate power in a way that had/has been rejected in other former Soviet republics in Europe (with the exception of Belarus) and subsequently started this project of bringing back the 'Russian people' under one flag. In Ukraine for example the kind of oligarchic development was twice rejected via popular uprisings (still not completely gone afaik) but similar things never happened in Russia. Maybe Putin is, or at least was, just about popular enough that he never had to face that serious of a wave of resistance and opposition, or maybe he was able to suppress them from so early on that they never developed to the point that we've seen them in other former Soviet republics. I guess the point of this rambling is to ask at what point (and how) the wider diplomacy would have prevented Putin from turning Russia into a de-facto single party state and dictatorship? I would imagine it’s extremely multifaceted, as such things are. And some of these things are very much internal. There’ll be examples and counter-examples to most things.
In a very crude framing, post-war European reconstruction was with mutual alliance and prosperity in mind. Can’t make a buck if everyone’s broke. Russia, you don’t see that same process nearly as much, people have many differing, sometimes intersecting theories as to why.
It may be that replicating those successes wasn’t actually possible, but the concerted effort and planning and mutual cooperation seems oft conspicuous in its absence. The transition to capitalism of course is going to be tricky, but at times it was a way for Western companies to make a quick buck more at Russia’s expense than the more mutual exchanges we’ve seen elsewhere.
And yes corruption is at S tier, certainly doesn’t help. Equally I mean where did quite a few of the oligarch class end up living after falling foul of Putin. We’re pretty good at housing a class of people who made off with huge chunks of wealth that should have spread to the wider populace.
Oligarchic rule certainly never stopped us in cosying up to various other nations. Perhaps you merely end up with a non-expansionist Putin, happy to rule as a King within a sizeable but smaller kingdom.
With some conflicts there was a full mea culpa and a (re)building of relations, a process that has never really happened with Russia. It’s merely that parallel I’m drawing, of course there are many practical impediments to doing that. Much of the post Cold-War period feels like two partners who when prompted say ‘no I’m not mad at you, of course not’ while seething the whole time.
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Anyone else feel like these sanctions are at the moment nowhere near enough? I don't mean I want warfare, but there needs to be more
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Possibly moneyed interests who dont want to see their foreign investments impacted? Thats the only real thing I can think of that should have an impact on having more serious sanctions, but also Im obviously cynical and biased about that sort of thing.
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United States42716 Posts
The nuclear option would be closing the Bosporus but Russia would treat that as an act of war.
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I imagine they'd view certain sanctions as an "act of war" too assuming they affected Russian interests too heavily, basically Russia just goes "but WAAAAAR" at any serious action as a way to ward it off it feels like.
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On February 23 2022 04:07 KwarK wrote: The nuclear option would be closing the Bosporus but Russia would treat that as an act of war. How much further would Russia have to go for that option to be implemented?
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They only wanted to join to destroy it from within, is my bet. Plus, can article 5 be triggered against a fellow NATO member?
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On February 23 2022 06:09 maybenexttime wrote: They only wanted to join to destroy it from within, is my bet. Plus, can article 5 be triggered against a fellow NATO member?
Yeah, that was probably their goal.
On another note, I've listened to western statements today. It's nice to see UK, USA and EU united. If Russia escalates, I'm for tougher sanctions. If we start to think that too many sanctions = war, then we'd enter a dangerous zone where one hostile party is allowed to do whatever as long as they have nukes. Please don't forget that Soviet Union pretty much self-sanctioned itself by being a closed market. Have more trust in sanctions They bite but they won't kill Russia and that's the point.
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United States42716 Posts
On February 23 2022 04:18 ZerOCoolSC2 wrote:Show nested quote +On February 23 2022 04:07 KwarK wrote: The nuclear option would be closing the Bosporus but Russia would treat that as an act of war. How much further would Russia have to go for that option to be implemented? It’s the nuclear option. They wouldn’t do it. You’d have the Russian Black Sea fleet sailing to the straits within hours and you’d need to be prepared to sink them.
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United States42716 Posts
On February 23 2022 06:30 SC-Shield wrote:Show nested quote +On February 23 2022 06:09 maybenexttime wrote: They only wanted to join to destroy it from within, is my bet. Plus, can article 5 be triggered against a fellow NATO member? Yeah, that was probably their goal. On another note, I've listened to western statements today. It's nice to see UK, USA and EU united. If Russia escalates, I'm for tougher sanctions. If we start to think that too many sanctions = war, then we'd enter a dangerous zone where one hostile party is allowed to do whatever as long as they have nukes. Please don't forget that Soviet Union pretty much self-sanctioned itself by being a closed market. Have more trust in sanctions  They bite but they won't kill Russia and that's the point. The Soviet Union developed its own internal industry over decades. Russia’s native industry has been destroyed by external competition and foreign currency from gas sales, when you can buy German cars with German euros you’re less likely to buy Russian. You can’t spend 30 years in a global marketplace without establishing dependencies.
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On February 23 2022 03:45 plasmidghost wrote: Anyone else feel like these sanctions are at the moment nowhere near enough? I don't mean I want warfare, but there needs to be more I think the US wants to leave themselves room to expand the sanctions in response to further aggression. You don't want to run out of options and find yourselves with no further responses except large scale armed conflict.
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On February 23 2022 06:30 SC-Shield wrote:Show nested quote +On February 23 2022 06:09 maybenexttime wrote: They only wanted to join to destroy it from within, is my bet. Plus, can article 5 be triggered against a fellow NATO member? Yeah, that was probably their goal. On another note, I've listened to western statements today. It's nice to see UK, USA and EU united. If Russia escalates, I'm for tougher sanctions. If we start to think that too many sanctions = war, then we'd enter a dangerous zone where one hostile party is allowed to do whatever as long as they have nukes. Please don't forget that Soviet Union pretty much self-sanctioned itself by being a closed market. Have more trust in sanctions  They bite but they won't kill Russia and that's the point. Why should I have trust in these 'light' sanctions when all the previous ones appear to have done nothing at all?
And why are we talking about 'if Russia escalates'. They already escalated from annexing Crimea to annexing Donesk, are we waiting until the invade the rest of the Ukraine? Until they invade the next former USSR country?
Why is this not the line in the sand? (other then "we don't care about Ukraine")
Do we really think these sanctions will do anything to deter Putin?
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On February 23 2022 06:45 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On February 23 2022 06:30 SC-Shield wrote:On February 23 2022 06:09 maybenexttime wrote: They only wanted to join to destroy it from within, is my bet. Plus, can article 5 be triggered against a fellow NATO member? Yeah, that was probably their goal. On another note, I've listened to western statements today. It's nice to see UK, USA and EU united. If Russia escalates, I'm for tougher sanctions. If we start to think that too many sanctions = war, then we'd enter a dangerous zone where one hostile party is allowed to do whatever as long as they have nukes. Please don't forget that Soviet Union pretty much self-sanctioned itself by being a closed market. Have more trust in sanctions  They bite but they won't kill Russia and that's the point. Why should I have trust in these 'light' sanctions when all the previous ones appear to have done nothing at all? And why are we talking about 'if Russia escalates'. They already escalated from annexing Crimea to annexing Donesk, are we waiting until the invade the rest of the Ukraine? Until they invade the next former USSR country? Why is this not the line in the sand? (other then "we don't care about Ukraine") Do we really think these sanctions will do anything to deter Putin?
From a UK perspective as well as massive sanctions we should just take all the property in London and Manchester owned by Russian oligarchs and use them to house the homeless. This would add up to billions of pounds. Fuck you Russia and do something good at the same time.
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On February 23 2022 06:41 KwarK wrote:Show nested quote +On February 23 2022 06:30 SC-Shield wrote:On February 23 2022 06:09 maybenexttime wrote: They only wanted to join to destroy it from within, is my bet. Plus, can article 5 be triggered against a fellow NATO member? Yeah, that was probably their goal. On another note, I've listened to western statements today. It's nice to see UK, USA and EU united. If Russia escalates, I'm for tougher sanctions. If we start to think that too many sanctions = war, then we'd enter a dangerous zone where one hostile party is allowed to do whatever as long as they have nukes. Please don't forget that Soviet Union pretty much self-sanctioned itself by being a closed market. Have more trust in sanctions  They bite but they won't kill Russia and that's the point. The Soviet Union developed its own internal industry over decades. Russia’s native industry has been destroyed by external competition and foreign currency from gas sales, when you can buy German cars with German euros you’re less likely to buy Russian. You can’t spend 30 years in a global marketplace without establishing dependencies.
True, it wasn't sudden. However, Soviet Union still collapsed on its own and what makes China more successful than Soviet Union is its open market. 90s were very difficult times for former Russia allies. Bulgaria alone had 2 periods of banks going bankrupt, mafia was on the rise, etc. I think at some point we hit 3,000% inflation. I'm not talking about nostalgia, it was difficult economically. So I'm hoping sanctions would start to bite Russia hard so they either choose the democratic path (unlikely with Putin at the front and his comrades) or face economic damages.
On February 23 2022 06:45 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On February 23 2022 06:30 SC-Shield wrote:On February 23 2022 06:09 maybenexttime wrote: They only wanted to join to destroy it from within, is my bet. Plus, can article 5 be triggered against a fellow NATO member? Yeah, that was probably their goal. On another note, I've listened to western statements today. It's nice to see UK, USA and EU united. If Russia escalates, I'm for tougher sanctions. If we start to think that too many sanctions = war, then we'd enter a dangerous zone where one hostile party is allowed to do whatever as long as they have nukes. Please don't forget that Soviet Union pretty much self-sanctioned itself by being a closed market. Have more trust in sanctions  They bite but they won't kill Russia and that's the point. Why should I have trust in these 'light' sanctions when all the previous ones appear to have done nothing at all? And why are we talking about 'if Russia escalates'. They already escalated from annexing Crimea to annexing Donesk, are we waiting until the invade the rest of the Ukraine? Until they invade the next former USSR country? Why is this not the line in the sand? (other then "we don't care about Ukraine") Do we really think these sanctions will do anything to deter Putin?
Yeah, sanctions are not that tough yet although there are notable ones in my opinion. My guess is we'll see if there will be more or de-escalation after Thursday when officials meet. As I said a page or two back, and a big note that I'm not expert in Russian history, problem with Russia is it always was an empire, kingdom, authoritarian and a facade democracy. It never understood western values... Actually, I thought about this last night as well. Even if Russia was to take the democratic path, I don't see them holding this vast territory for long before facing separatism. Maybe one reason they lean so heavily towards authoritarian regimes is to have a tight grip on their land, but I could be wrong here. Another interesting point I've read lately is that unlike democratic leaders who run for like 5-10 years and then fade, a new one comes up with 'fresh'/'reset' mind, etc, the Russians have a leader who stays for years (e.g. Putin currently) who plays "the long game". So that NATO hatred from him was growing for years and years. Does that make his stance justified? Absolutely not, just food for thought while current confrontation is on focus 
Edit: Actually, no Thursday meeting: https://edition.cnn.com/2022/02/22/politics/blinken-cancels-lavrov-meeting/index.html
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United States42716 Posts
On February 23 2022 07:09 Jockmcplop wrote:Show nested quote +On February 23 2022 06:45 Gorsameth wrote:On February 23 2022 06:30 SC-Shield wrote:On February 23 2022 06:09 maybenexttime wrote: They only wanted to join to destroy it from within, is my bet. Plus, can article 5 be triggered against a fellow NATO member? Yeah, that was probably their goal. On another note, I've listened to western statements today. It's nice to see UK, USA and EU united. If Russia escalates, I'm for tougher sanctions. If we start to think that too many sanctions = war, then we'd enter a dangerous zone where one hostile party is allowed to do whatever as long as they have nukes. Please don't forget that Soviet Union pretty much self-sanctioned itself by being a closed market. Have more trust in sanctions  They bite but they won't kill Russia and that's the point. Why should I have trust in these 'light' sanctions when all the previous ones appear to have done nothing at all? And why are we talking about 'if Russia escalates'. They already escalated from annexing Crimea to annexing Donesk, are we waiting until the invade the rest of the Ukraine? Until they invade the next former USSR country? Why is this not the line in the sand? (other then "we don't care about Ukraine") Do we really think these sanctions will do anything to deter Putin? From a UK perspective as well as massive sanctions we should just take all the property in London and Manchester owned by Russian oligarchs and use them to house the homeless. This would add up to billions of pounds. Fuck you Russia and do something good at the same time. You don’t get to be a centre of global capital by fucking with global capital. People put their money in London because they trust British greed.
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On February 23 2022 06:09 maybenexttime wrote: They only wanted to join to destroy it from within, is my bet. Plus, can article 5 be triggered against a fellow NATO member? A member can't find itself in that position without having broken the treaty already. They can be expelled by unanimous agreement and have it used against them, but if the offending member has the support of at least one other member then the whole treaty is dead and needs reformation.
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