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View Full Version : The Ukraine/Crimea/Russia.........



CathyA
3-8-14, 7:56am
On some news I hear that lots of people in Crimea/Ukraine actually want to be part of Russia.
I'm not sure of the percentage. But if that's the case, is it right of the U.S. (and other countries) to force them not to be part of Russia?
And I can't believe we're offering Ukraine at least a billion dollars to help them. Why don't we use that money to help our own citizens?
Mostly.....I'm wondering about getting involved, if some of the people in the Ukraine actually want to be part of Russia.

Lainey
3-8-14, 10:55am
Also, I think a lot of people are wondering, where are the Europeans in this? but it appears that because they get a lot of their natural gas from Russia they don't want to interrupt that energy, so the Ukrainians may have to be sacrificed to the energy gods.

of course, our Rep. Senator McCain is agitating for the U.S. to get involved - easy to say when you're almost 80 years old and it's not you or your family members who would have to go to war.

ApatheticNoMore
3-8-14, 12:23pm
The Crimea probably does want to be part of Russia as 60% of the Crimeans are Russian speaking. The rest of the Ukraine seems to be divided geographically between the half that want to be aligned with Russian and the half that wants to be aligned with the west (I'm not sure if a majority of even the latter support some of the neo-nazis used to get the job done though). It trade and economics (which have led to war after war for the U.S.) instead lead Europe to peace, placing trade over war making, it would be a great victory.

I think it's several billion for the Ukraine/ By the way has anyone noticed that the homeless seem to have doubled or tripled since 2008? Well just from what I see every day. I don't think our brilliant elite realized this: that if you reduce the whole country to poverty, you cant even sell them wars anymore. What if they had a war and noone could afford it?

creaker
3-8-14, 12:33pm
What if they had a war and noone could afford it?

We have - and we borrowed to pay for it.

jp1
3-8-14, 2:13pm
I know people like John McCain like to hurl the "I" word (isolationist) like it's some evil taunt, but frankly I don't see what's so bad about wanting the US to mind it's own business. I realize that the political hacks like him have been in bed with the military industrialists for so long that for them the solution to everything is a war, but frankly I wish we'd let the rest of the world solve their own damn problems instead of trying to "solve" everything to the benefit of US corporate interests.

Gardenarian
3-8-14, 2:18pm
I know people like John McCain like to hurl the "I" word (isolationist) like it's some evil taunt, but frankly I don't see what's so bad about wanting the US to mind it's own business.

+1

IshbelRobertson
3-8-14, 3:18pm
Ahem.... The UK is part of the EU. our Foreign Secretary has had much to say re Russia/Ukraine.

Perhaps the finger should be pointed at Ms Merkel?

early morning
3-8-14, 5:12pm
But isn't NATO obligated to assist if Ukraine is invaded? Didn't both NATO AND Russia promise to safeguard Ukraine if they gave up their nukes back in the early 90s,- which they did? Doesn't the west have a moral and legal obligation here?? Obviously Russia's promise here is pretty worthless, but does that mean the rest of the world (or at least NATO countries) should turn their backs? I'm not in favor of war - but I'm not in favor of making promises and backing out later, either.

Gregg
3-10-14, 10:55pm
Mr. McCain can call me any "I" name he chooses, but I personally feel that NATO has outlived its usefulness and that the goings on between former Soviet states are not something I can support US involvement in. Unless we're asked. And even then only maybe...

Yossarian
3-15-14, 6:48pm
Mr. McCain can call me any "I" name he chooses, but I personally feel that NATO has outlived its usefulness and that the goings on between former Soviet states are not something I can support US involvement in.

Sorry Gregg, I can't agree there. It would be naive to think things that happen in the world outside our borders shouldn't matter to us or won't affect us. Sometimes it is better to address problems when they are small rather than wait until they get so big they are forced on you. Even some people that have been declared idiots by the local experts here have known that, perhaps better than our current leaders.

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timstanley/100262116/ukraine-sarah-palin-and-mitt-romney-were-right-about-russia/

First, Sarah Palin. In 2008, the Alaskan conservative warned that Putin was on the prowl. Quote: "After the Russian army invaded the nation of Georgia, Senator Obama's reaction was one of moral indecision and equivalence, the kind of response that would only encourage Russia's Putin to invade Ukraine next."

Wow. Mrs Palin not only got the country that Putin would threaten right, she also predicted the reason behind it. Obama's "indecision and equivalence" over Iran, Egypt and, most importantly, Syria, has probably encouraged Putin to believe that there would be next-to-no Western response to an attack on Ukraine. If Vlad expands his power anymore, Russia won't just be visible from Sarah Palin's house. It'll be visible from the White House, too. Okay, so that's a gross exaggeration – but you get the point. Mrs Palin certainly does, after all she was parodied for her Russophobia in 2008 and is now wallowing in the schadenfreude. "I'm usually not one to Told-Ya-So," she wrote on Facebook, "but I did!" Let her wallow. She's earned this one.

Second, Mitt Romney. Romney's foreign policy approach was broadly mocked in 2012. The country was keen to withdraw from overseas conflict in the wake of Iraq and Afghanistan and Mitt's vague neo-conservatism seemed out of step with the public mood. Sometimes, said the critics, it came off as something that his advisers were coaching him to say; a nod and a hint to AIPAC rather than a strongly held belief. Rachel Maddow concluded, "It’s not just that Romney is uninformed; it’s that he hasn’t figured out how to fake it."

Romney confirmed the sceptics' worst fears when he described Russia as America's "number one geopolitical foe." Barack Obama lashed out with some adolescent sass: "The 1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back because … the Cold War’s been over for 20 years.” Oh no he didn't! Obama might have added that the 1950s wanted their hairstyle back, too, girlfriend.

But, again, Romney turned out to be right. He never denied that the biggest threat to American lives still came from al-Qaeda, he was simply stating – accurately – that the world power with the ambitions that most directly threatened American political and military predominance was Russia. It has taken the Ukrainian crisis to show he was correct.

jp1
3-16-14, 8:58am
So, what is your concern for the US if Russia takes over Ukraine. Are you really concerned that eventually that Russia will invade America? Seriously? And assuming that you are, does that mean you think we should go to war with Russia over Ukraine?

Yossarian
3-16-14, 10:57am
So, what is your concern for the US if Russia takes over Ukraine. Are you really concerned that eventually that Russia will invade America? Seriously? And assuming that you are, does that mean you think we should go to war with Russia over Ukraine?

You should have read to the end:

Of course, no one actually wants a new cold war with Russia. The point is that Obama's best hope of avoiding one was to be intelligently aware of Putin's ambitions and act appropriately. That response might either be to a) directly confront and check Russian hegemony or b) accept that a Russian sphere of influence exists, leave Putin to govern it and push him back whenever he tried to extend it. The worst thing to do is what Obama did when he blended those contradictory approaches: accept Russian dominance in some conflicts, resist it in others – without any clear rationale behind either action and all the while confusing everyone involved. Threatening to do something but never delivering, and so only encouraging risk taking by America's competitors.

Maybe you can remind me- how many actual wars did NATO and Russia fight and why that leads you to conclude false red lines and unlimited appeasment is a winning strategy.

Alan
3-16-14, 11:12am
Maybe you can remind me- how many actual wars did NATO and Russia fight and why that leads you to conclude false red lines and unlimited appeasment is a winning strategy.
This is a chess game being played on a global scale, the problem is, our Commander In Chief is playing checkers. I'd hate to think the old Soviet Bloc may be revived during this administrations tenure.

jp1
3-16-14, 1:48pm
What exactly will Russia be able to do if they take over former Soviet countries that they can't do now.

Alan
3-16-14, 2:04pm
Keep advancing. Perhaps build an even bigger Iron Curtain to prevent citizens from escaping. Renew the arms race, knowing that whoever they can intimidate is less likely to resist.

The US and our allies once provided a check for that sort of thing. Now, not so much.

jp1
3-16-14, 4:17pm
I don't see how Russia having more territory will increase their ability to build nuclear arms. If they want to do so they could perfectly well do so now.

bae
3-16-14, 6:18pm
I think some folks in their thinking are still intent on fighting the last war, or the one before it. Things have moved past that.

creaker
3-16-14, 6:54pm
I think the larger concern at this point is if the Ukraine is going to take a military stand against Russia. Or how non pro-Russian groups in the Crimea may be treated once the Crimea divorces itself from the rest of the Ukraine. It could turn into a bloody, ugly mess, but I think direct involvement by the US or NATO is highly unlikely.

ApatheticNoMore
3-16-14, 8:38pm
Or how non pro-Russian groups in the Crimea may be treated once the Crimea divorces itself from the rest of the Ukraine.

but there's also how various groups will be treated within the Ukraine being that there are real neo-nazi elements in the new Ukrainian government. So it's on both sides.

Things outside our borders may affect us (although that becomes unconvincing when things much closer to home that have much more affect on us aren't addressed) but I'm entirely unconvinced the U.S. is even on the right side here. Ok there really is no right side. And if there is the U.S. probably couldn't tell the difference between it and a hole in the ground since it almost never does. But seriously backing a coup with many fascist elements, that now want to make the Ukraine a nuclear power and amping up confrontation with an existing nuclear power. What could possibly go wrong? Obama is incompetent alright, but that's because he gets involved in these disasters instead of leaving well enough alone. I mean really pushing confrontation with a nuclear power. The Obama administration is off it's rocker.

LDAHL
3-17-14, 5:24pm
I don’t see this situation as a breath of 1938. We’re not so much seeing appeasement as indifference. Nor do I buy the Cold War analogy. This is less about a clash of ideologies than the vanity and greed of a single autocrat.

It looks more to me like a return to the Great Power politics of the nineteenth century. The objectives and strategies seem closer to the Franco-Prussian or Russo-Turkish wars, with stronger powers seizing on some threadbare pretext to grab territory or concessions from a weaker neighbor; counting on other powers being too craven or unconcerned to do much other than protest.

peggy
3-18-14, 1:13pm
I think some folks in their thinking are still intent on fighting the last war, or the one before it. Things have moved past that.

Agreed. I think the best thing to do is what we are doing. Register our displeasure with Russia, sympathize with those caught in the middle, and wait to see what happens. Those who advocate Obama doing 'something' never really say what. And to be truthful, there isn't much we can do. We, in fact, DON'T own the world, and Obama isn't King of it. Why is it whenever anything happens in the world, everyone looks to Washington saying, "Well, what are you going to do about that?"
People need to get beyond the thinking that says, 'Either you are with us, or against us." Nice sound bite but really the world is much more complicated than that.

ApatheticNoMore
3-18-14, 1:30pm
Why is it whenever anything happens in the world, everyone looks to Washington saying, "Well, what are you going to do about that?"

possibly because there's a decent chance Washington is already involved in some way :~) But yea U.S. involvement is not necessarily beneficial, or in any way relevent to lives of U.S. citizens (who have enough problems far more relevent to them to worry about).

LDAHL
3-18-14, 2:34pm
Agreed. I think the best thing to do is what we are doing. Register our displeasure with Russia, sympathize with those caught in the middle, and wait to see what happens. Those who advocate Obama doing 'something' never really say what. And to be truthful, there isn't much we can do. We, in fact, DON'T own the world, and Obama isn't King of it. Why is it whenever anything happens in the world, everyone looks to Washington saying, "Well, what are you going to do about that?"
People need to get beyond the thinking that says, 'Either you are with us, or against us." Nice sound bite but really the world is much more complicated than that.

The Neville Chamberlain strategy certainly seems to have been the method of choice in Georgia and Ukraine so far. I think we can do better by applying meaningful economic sanctions. Perhaps we can take some of the profit out of aggression like this.

ApatheticNoMore
3-18-14, 4:20pm
Oh great a financial advisor is sending me info on the Ukranian situation. Uh, I'm not sure how much I even want to know a financial advisors politics .... :~) (there's a time and place and I'm not sure it's there :)) Grrr. I haven't looked at it. Ok this is a daily gripe.