Why are we rushing to defend Ukraine? [merged threads]

[Boiler 43,760]

Just now, Mike E said:

At the time none of those 4 countries had nuclear weapons.  

I would need to check the dates, US was on the verge, but I do not think the first nuke had been tested.

[Mike E 11,727]

9 minutes ago, Boiler said:

I would need to check the dates, US was on the verge, but I do not think the first nuke had been tested.

Regardless,  nukes as a tool for deterrence of conventional attack did not become a thing until after Japan surrendered.  I don’t think your  precedent applies today.  
 

The point and opinion of article I quoted is that once Putin believes NATO wants Russian territory, he will go nuclear.  This is because as we’ve seen from  his invasion of Ukraine, Russia’s conventional military isn’t up to par.  

Edited March 4, 2022 by Mike E

[Boiler 43,760]

This is from somebody I have followed for a long time and like his take, so many unknowns. I can not believe how bad the coverage has been, perhaps I should not be surprised.

 

 

[millefleur 5,039]

7 minutes ago, Boiler said:

This is from somebody I have followed for a long time and like his take, so many unknowns. I can not believe how bad the coverage has been, perhaps I should not be surprised.

In the famous words of Carl von Clausewitz, who is credited with the "fog of war" theory: "Many intelligence reports in war are contradictory; even more are false, and most are uncertain.... In short, most intelligence is false."

[Boiler 43,760]

4 minutes ago, millefleur said:

In the famous words of Carl von Clausewitz, who is credited with the "fog of war" theory: "Many intelligence reports in war are contradictory; even more are false, and most are uncertain.... In short, most intelligence is false."

I understand that but for some reason with modern technology I was expecting better coverage, it was not to be.

[Dashinka 23,382]

Just now, Boiler said:

I understand that but for some reason with modern technology I was expecting better coverage, it was not to be.

Modern technology also helps with the propaganda war which is being waged on both sides. 

[millefleur 5,039]

3 minutes ago, Dashinka said:

Modern technology also helps with the propaganda war which is being waged on both sides. 

Yes, I was also at first expecting it to be better like @Boiler but then when I saw how easy it is now to fake videos, I realized that this might be the largest and most rapid unleashing of propaganda and disinfo (on both sides) that the world has ever seen? First social media war and all. When the dust settles and it's all over, I'm curious if there will be an effort to comb through what was real and what wasn't. I guess it'll be up to the historians to handle that.

 

The information war has undoubtedly been a Ukrainian victory. Russia is very weak at soft power and it's always been a weakness for them. Most of the convincing or "good" Russian propaganda I've only seen on Russian speaking media, and even then they're not doing as much as Ukraine is. Did anyone hear about the "Ghost of Kiev" yet? It seems some are still debating whether it was true or not. 🤔

[Boiler 43,760]

Sainsbury’s is renaming its chicken kiev to chicken kyiv and is joining Waitrose and Morrisons in withdrawing a Russian-made vodka from the shelves in the latest action by British retailers to signal solidarity with the people of Ukraine.

[millefleur 5,039]

4 minutes ago, Boiler said:

Sainsbury’s is renaming its chicken kiev to chicken kyiv and is joining Waitrose and Morrisons in withdrawing a Russian-made vodka from the shelves in the latest action by British retailers to signal solidarity with the people of Ukraine.

Actually, I feel these kinds of "protests" are very minor, I don't care about the "Kiev" vs "Kyiv" spelling, it's so minor and most people don't even understand it since it's some inside baseball linguistics battle. The Russian vodka bans are just silly but I'm sure Russia factored it in that they'd take hits on exports like that.

 

What does bother me is ordinary Russians, especially those living/working abroad, getting punished. Not to mention anything to do with Russian culture. Some university in Italy banned Dostoevsky's books. Russian restaurants and stores being vandalized. An online language learning platform just banned Russians....this is all insanity to me. How is any of this going to "hurt" Russia? Also most Russians who live/work abroad are very anti-Putin/do not support the war. So much hatred and raw emotion going around, and they're actually doing damage to be people who are on "their side"...it's very baffling.

[Dashinka 23,382]

19 minutes ago, millefleur said:

Yes, I was also at first expecting it to be better like @Boiler but then when I saw how easy it is now to fake videos, I realized that this might be the largest and most rapid unleashing of propaganda and disinfo (on both sides) that the world has ever seen? First social media war and all. When the dust settles and it's all over, I'm curious if there will be an effort to comb through what was real and what wasn't. I guess it'll be up to the historians to handle that.

 

The information war has undoubtedly been a Ukrainian victory. Russia is very weak at soft power and it's always been a weakness for them. Most of the convincing or "good" Russian propaganda I've only seen on Russian speaking media, and even then they're not doing as much as Ukraine is. Did anyone hear about the "Ghost of Kiev" yet? It seems some are still debating whether it was true or not. 🤔

Heard about the Ghost of Kiev, seems a bit unbelievable in my mind, but who knows.  I also heard about the 13 Ukrainians on Snake Island who were declared martyrs by the Ukraine President, only to find out they weren't actually killed.  That one smelled to me from the start, off-shore shelling even with modern warships is pretty survivable.  I remember all those shells the US used to pound the Pacific islands for days/weeks, and when the landings started, there was still pretty tough resistance.

[Boiler 43,760]

AirBnB has got into the act banning Russia/Russians. But they do like posturing.

 

The US is offering TPS for Ukrainians but not Russians. which seems illogical.

[Dashinka 23,382]

5 minutes ago, millefleur said:

Actually, I feel these kinds of "protests" are very minor, I don't care about the "Kiev" vs "Kyiv" spelling, it's so minor and most people don't even understand it since it's some inside baseball linguistics battle. The Russian vodka bans are just silly but I'm sure Russia factored it in that they'd take hits on exports like that.

 

What does bother me is ordinary Russians, especially those living/working abroad, getting punished. Not to mention anything to do with Russian culture. Some university in Italy banned Dostoevsky's books. Russian restaurants and stores being vandalized. An online language learning platform just banned Russians....this is all insanity to me. How is any of this going to "hurt" Russia? Also most Russians who live/work abroad are very anti-Putin/do not support the war. So much hatred and raw emotion going around, and they're actually doing damage to be people who are on "their side"...it's very baffling.

This worries me a bit as well.  I see Russian media is being shut off here.  My wife lost her channel.  I am wondering if ATT will give us a refund?  Now Russian media is certainly biased, but I don't remember the CBC being banned after they took the government's side against the peaceful protests.

[millefleur 5,039]

3 minutes ago, Dashinka said:

This worries me a bit as well.  I see Russian media is being shut off here.  My wife lost her channel.  I am wondering if ATT will give us a refund?  Now Russian media is certainly biased, but I don't remember the CBC being banned after they took the government's side against the peaceful protests.

I would ask for a refund, that's absurd as I assume those foreign language channels cost extra. The banning of media has been a pretty weird turn in all this, we're not even officially "at war" with Russia so I don't get why any of this even applies, I would've assumed it to be protected under freedom of speech here. Also, there are tons of Russian speaking Ukrainians and other former-Soviet people here in the US, so we're just going to punish them too? I know a man here from Uzbekistan but he's half ethnically Russian and he's a native Russian speaker, so does that mean people like him now are also "the enemy" and deserve punishment?

 

 

[Dashinka 23,382]

33 minutes ago, millefleur said:

I would ask for a refund, that's absurd as I assume those foreign language channels cost extra. The banning of media has been a pretty weird turn in all this, we're not even officially "at war" with Russia so I don't get why any of this even applies, I would've assumed it to be protected under freedom of speech here. Also, there are tons of Russian speaking Ukrainians and other former-Soviet people here in the US, so we're just going to punish them too? I know a man here from Uzbekistan but he's half ethnically Russian and he's a native Russian speaker, so does that mean people like him now are also "the enemy" and deserve punishment?

 

 

All these "woke" corporations "standing" with a corrupt government are a bunch of hypocrites, but for them it is easy.  They most likely get very little revenue from Russia, so they can alienate those that speak the 7th most spoken language in the world, but look the other way at China's humanitarian concerns.

[Boiler 43,760]

McDonalds is still operating in Russia.