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Unless Putin has a vision of restoring the USSR's Balkan slave states to the 'motherland'. I doubt any of this is a recent, knee jerk reaction. I'd wager it's been in motion at least several years.
Thoughts on Ukraine?
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If NATO allows Russia to invade and annex the Baltic states, then NATO is pretty much done. I really can't see that happening, but I guess you never know for sure.
I'm going to go out on a limb here and make some crazy predictions. Then I'll come back to this thread in a year or so and see how I did.
1). Russia will conquer Ukraine in relatively short order. There will be civilian resistance which will be crushed with draconian measures.
2). President Zelenskyy will be declared a 'war criminal' by the Russian government. They will capture him and put him on trial for 'genocide' and 'crimes against humanity.' They will manufacture evidence to support these charges, convict and execute him. They have already adopted the left wing USA/Canada playbook on this by calling him a 'nazi'.
3). Ukraine will become a de facto (or perhaps de jure as well) part of Russia. So will Belarus.
4). We will enter a new Cold War.
5). Russia will invade Moldova to 'protect ethnic minorities in Transnistria' and the outcome will be more or less the same as Ukraine, with Russia absorbing Moldova. If I were in charge in Moldova today I'd recognize Transnistria as an independent state, dissolve Moldova and merge into Romania (a NATO member). But I doubt the Moldovan government will do that.
6). Russia's next military expansion will be in Central Asia, against other former pieces of the Soviet Union. The Chinese will support this and no one will come to the aid of those nations. It's possible the Chinese will also gain some territory in that area as well. This may embolden China enough that it attacks Taiwan.
Let's see how I do...
I'm going to go out on a limb here and make some crazy predictions. Then I'll come back to this thread in a year or so and see how I did.
1). Russia will conquer Ukraine in relatively short order. There will be civilian resistance which will be crushed with draconian measures.
2). President Zelenskyy will be declared a 'war criminal' by the Russian government. They will capture him and put him on trial for 'genocide' and 'crimes against humanity.' They will manufacture evidence to support these charges, convict and execute him. They have already adopted the left wing USA/Canada playbook on this by calling him a 'nazi'.
3). Ukraine will become a de facto (or perhaps de jure as well) part of Russia. So will Belarus.
4). We will enter a new Cold War.
5). Russia will invade Moldova to 'protect ethnic minorities in Transnistria' and the outcome will be more or less the same as Ukraine, with Russia absorbing Moldova. If I were in charge in Moldova today I'd recognize Transnistria as an independent state, dissolve Moldova and merge into Romania (a NATO member). But I doubt the Moldovan government will do that.
6). Russia's next military expansion will be in Central Asia, against other former pieces of the Soviet Union. The Chinese will support this and no one will come to the aid of those nations. It's possible the Chinese will also gain some territory in that area as well. This may embolden China enough that it attacks Taiwan.
Let's see how I do...
I think that Trump told Putin that if Russia invaded Ukraine the US would go to war. Something along the lines of 'if you do that, we will nuke you.' Putin believed that Trump was actually willing to start tossing nukes around, and laid off.
Trump was much more supportive of Ukraine than either Biden or Obama. The Biden and Obama administrations restricted military aid to Ukraine to 'non-lethal' items. The Trump administration upgraded that to 'lethal' military aid.
I also think that the Afghanistan 'withdrawal' (more like surrender) of the Biden administration sent a clear signal to the Putin administration that the White House would not support their allies with real force.
Anyone want to lay odds on the future of Taiwan?
Putin’s boy got the boot because it was known he was Putin’s boy. He wanted to take Ukraine into closer ties with Russia while the majority of Ukraine wanted to move more towards the EU because of the likelihood of greater prosperity. As an addendum they also figured out the election had been rigged.
Zelensky is definitely for the people and for Ukraine to move more Westward. He really isn’t interested in becoming part of NATO though NATO would like Ukraine to join them. Pretty much all Ukraine wants is to be free to determine it’s own destiny.
Yes the Donbas is ethnically mostly Russian they moved there because of the jobs. Eastern Ukraine speaks mainly Russian while Western Ukraine speaks both, but prefer Ukrainian.
After the fall of the Soviet Union things pretty much went in the crapper all over. You have to remember that the way the Soviets were able to claim full employment was having four guys for one job. After the fall the spate three got fired. There were a huge number of suicides and alcoholism went way up. A quote from a pensioner I once talked to “ Under the USSR we had money, but there was nothing to buy. Now there is much to buy, but no money.” So much of their discontent is likely focused on “ the good old days” even though most of them are probably not old enough to remember them.
Ukraine in general is pretty poor, average wage is something like $6,000 yr USD. After the Orange Revolution 2007 ( my first trip was in 2005) dealing with high level corruption (Soviet Oligarchs) trying to find their way and figure out who they are as a nation they were finally starting to move in a positive direction.
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Well let’s see Putin was looking for an excuse to implement his plan that was in place when he took Crimea. He perceived Biden for the weak spineless moron that he is and decided that this was the time.
If you listen to his, what is essentially a declaration of war against Ukraine. It is literally similar to the type of speech Hilter would have made. Full of imagined facts. NATO was only mentioned like an after thought. As the British say it was as if he had gone full Tonto.
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If anyone cares to donate, the Ukrainian government can receive donations (in less than ten minutes, with very minimal fees) here:
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War Propaganda About Ukraine Becoming More Militaristic, Authoritarian, and Reckless
Every useful or pleasing claim about the war, no matter how unverified or subsequently debunked, rapidly spreads, while dissenters are vilified as traitors or Kremlin agents.
greenwald.substack.com
A good read....
Another one imbedded in the link:
"Fuck it!" Russia's Final Break With the West
US-Russian joint tactical victory, European and Ukrainian defeat
niccolo.substack.com
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RIP steel case anything
The first casualty of war is the truth.
So much propaganda and it really depends on where you live as to what narrative you are fed.
On my local news site the amount of comments of people who believe we should go to war with Russia proves it's working.
It's not like our media or government isn't capable of stretching/fabricating events to further their agenda. It's expected everything from "they're throwing babies out of incubators" to WMD's
I fear where this is going
Emotionally, I'm very sympathetic to the Ukrainians. That may be as a result of having lived in Eastern Europe at the tail end of the soviet era and seen how bad things were there. Or it might just be my natural aversion to bullying. 
Still, I can see pretty clearly the major media bias at work here. I end up cross checking multiple sources trying to get a reasonable facsimile of factual information. Most of the reports are dripping with obvious bias, unfortunately.
Still, I can see pretty clearly the major media bias at work here. I end up cross checking multiple sources trying to get a reasonable facsimile of factual information. Most of the reports are dripping with obvious bias, unfortunately.
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Error | VK
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Yeah, hard to make any sense of the info coming out. What I don't understand is this prevailing mindset in primarily western social media among conspiracy theorists that somehow disregards or discounts what we know to be true....that Russia invaded a sovereign nation and is killing its people. I mean, are we at a point where some people dispute even that? It sure sounds like it....making the conspiracy theorists just as unhinged as the war hawks.Emotionally, I'm very sympathetic to the Ukrainians. That may be as a result of having lived in Eastern Europe at the tail end of the soviet era and seen how bad things were there. Or it might just be my natural aversion to bullying.
Still, I can see pretty clearly the major media bias at work here. I end up cross checking multiple sources trying to get a reasonable facsimile of factual information. Most of the reports are dripping with obvious bias, unfortunately.
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Wasn't the PSA steel cased x39 out sometime late next year... supposed to be domestically produced? Or were they just buying it from Russia and rebranding it?
At this point, I'd just as soon not support Russian aggression....too bad we're still buying their oil.
SMH.Interesting article: Ukraine: Watching the war on Russian TV - a whole different story
It's incredible that a mainstream western media outlet printed this without realizing it's incredible irony. The Russians are starting a 'Ministry of Truth'? Didn't the Biden administration talk about doing that last year? The Russian media is bemoaning the fact that people are turning to alternative news? Doesn't the US media do that constantly? The Russian media has been caught lying and people no longer trust them? That has never happened to western media outlets?
It's incredible that a mainstream western media outlet printed this without realizing it's incredible irony. The Russians are starting a 'Ministry of Truth'? Didn't the Biden administration talk about doing that last year? The Russian media is bemoaning the fact that people are turning to alternative news? Doesn't the US media do that constantly? The Russian media has been caught lying and people no longer trust them? That has never happened to western media outlets?
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Quite the read....exactly the opposite of what we're hearing here (as we've discussed).
Seeing articles like this: https://en-volve.com/2022/02/28/bom...gical-experiments-on-ukrainian-soldiers/?s=09
Muddy the water further, but the links provided don't seem like substantiated proof either if you look them over.
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Either way there's a huge psyop from both sides. Notice how all discussion of the kungflu, truckers etc stopped. I wonder what they are hiding, world economic forum infiltration of governments?
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No that'll be domestic, but who knows how long it'll take them to get spun up.
KUSA announcement on the other hand looks like repackaged vympel
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