Will Russia Attack Ukraine?

[Archetype0ne]

"Sure its West's fault Russians are using thermobaric bombs on civilian infrastructure/civilians.
The West should have just barred Ukraine from joining NATO/EU. And kicked out against their will all member that entered it since 1990s."
^For the dumbasses that's sarcasm.

For the people using those talking points, dry your brain you still have soap left in there from the Russian propaganda.
At least from this thread I can tell who likes to lick fascist boots.

[Riverman]

"Sure its West's fault Russians are using thermobaric bombs on civilian infrastructure/civilians.

That's the kind of escalation nobody should want, but if the current Ukrainian government in Kiew encourages its military to hide in civilian areas and also encourages civilians to attack Russian soldiers with brutal means from the back, e.g. by using Molotov cocktails while driving by with civilian cars or from civilian buildings, that's exactly the kind of warfare which will inflict more and more civilian casualties and will make both sides more brutal and relentless. That's the typical guerilla and partisan strategy, to first use civilians to cause horrible incidents for the incoming soldiers and than blame the invaders on every reactive measure they take.
We know that from various places and settings throughout history, and it works primarily as long as the invaders restrain themselves from attacking civilians indiscriminately.

Its a strategy the Ukrainian government has chosen, as they have chosen to let no male between the age of 18-60 go, regardless of who they are or how they think about this conflict. They must fight, so they say and everyone else being treated as a traitor. This is also interesting to note for all the pacifists and draft dodgers in the West, because once more, nobody cares. As if every Ukrainian male is ready to fight and die for the Selenski regime!
And its now ok to attack all Russian citizens abroad, even artists and scientists, just for being Russian. Or that the Russian prisoners of war being obviously mistreated and forced to make all those great interviews they spread on the social channels, that's all not an issue for anybody.

Obviously the Russians won't let their soldiers run into urban traps all day long, until they revolt, so if the Ukrainian goverment decided to start an urban guerilla war, you have to expect this. I just hope they let the civilians go, flee from the cities, if they want to. I already heard reports that in some regions the Ukrainian forces might prevent people from fleeing. Which was, by the way, also an issue in World War II. When everybody knew the front will come closer every day, it was still forbidden for German civilians to flee, or even prepare for the flight. This was the "crime of defeatism". That's one of the main reasons why many Germans fled so late, some couldn't flee from the Bolshevists or were killed in unorganised marches. The evacuation started much too late and was held back by the NS administration as long as they could, to motivate the soldiers to fight to the death.

The Ukraine started with similar measures immediately, in the first hours of the conflict, deliberately blurring all lines between civilians and combatants, to maximise the bloodshed and get the popular and international support they need for a fight without compromise and mercy.

Putin should have known that, he should have anticipated this, and not even start the invasion, especially of the Western regions. That's why I also said its not worth it, considering the predictable human losses and suffering, the destruction and the danger for the world. But then again, even these actions are by no means caused by one side alone, because if a side does that early and radically, deliberately blurs all lins between civilians and combatants, its programmed to be a dirty war and that's exactly what the Ukrainian regime wanted. Its a chosen military and propaganda strategy of Selenski & Co.

Every military observer will tell that in the first days the Russians tried to be as careful as possible, but with the mounting losses and the consequent usage of civilian protection by some Ukrainian forces, it was foreseeable where this will lead to and it will just get much worse than it was in the last days. Selenski and his circle knew the only way to win this is to play as dirty as possible, and that's what they do. Putin should have known, that if this happens, the only way to win militarily is to fight as harsh and brutal as possible.

Does anybody need yet another reason for this conflict to end as soon as possible on the negotiating table? If one side plays as dirty and gruesome as possible, the other is ready to play it out as brutal as necessary - what does anybody need who doesn't want these two people to mangle each other. Its just horrible and we need a diplomatic solution, an acceptable compromise.

[firetown]

Russia needs to be disarmed and governed by an outside force.

[firetown]

The Russian people have proven unable to manage their own nation.

[Archetype0ne]

That's the kind of escalation nobody should want, but if the current Ukrainian government in Kiew encourages its military to hide in civilian areas and also encourages civilians to attack Russian soldiers with brutal means from the back, e.g. by using Molotov cocktails while driving by with civilian cars or from civilian buildings, that's exactly the kind of warfare which will inflict more and more civilian casualties and will make both sides more brutal and relentless. That's the typical guerilla and partisan strategy, to first use civilians to cause horrible incidents for the incoming soldiers and than blame the invaders on every reactive measure they take.
We know that from various places and settings throughout history, and it works primarily as long as the invaders restrain themselves from attacking civilians indiscriminately.

Its a strategy the Ukrainian government has chosen, as they have chosen to let no male between the age of 18-60 go, regardless of who they are or how they think about this conflict. They must fight, so they say and everyone else being treated as a traitor. This is also interesting to note for all the pacifists and draft dodgers in the West, because once more, nobody cares. As if every Ukrainian male is ready to fight and die for the Selenski regime!
And its now ok to attack all Russian citizens abroad, even artists and scientists, just for being Russian. Or that the Russian prisoners of war being obviously mistreated and forced to make all those great interviews they spread on the social channels, that's all not an issue for anybody.

Obviously the Russians won't let their soldiers run into urban traps all day long, until they revolt, so if the Ukrainian goverment decided to start an urban guerilla war, you have to expect this. I just hope they let the civilians go, flee from the cities, if they want to. I already heard reports that in some regions the Ukrainian forces might prevent people from fleeing. Which was, by the way, also an issue in World War II. When everybody knew the front will come closer every day, it was still forbidden for German civilians to flee, or even prepare for the flight. This was the "crime of defeatism". That's one of the main reasons why many Germans fled so late, some couldn't flee from the Bolshevists or were killed in unorganised marches. The evacuation started much too late and was held back by the NS administration as long as they could, to motivate the soldiers to fight to the death.

The Ukraine started with similar measures immediately, in the first hours of the conflict, deliberately blurring all lines between civilians and combatants, to maximise the bloodshed and get the popular and international support they need for a fight without compromise and mercy.

Putin should have known that, he should have anticipated this, and not even start the invasion, especially of the Western regions. That's why I also said its not worth it, considering the predictable human losses and suffering, the destruction and the danger for the world. But then again, even these actions are by no means caused by one side alone, because if a side does that early and radically, deliberately blurs all lins between civilians and combatants, its programmed to be a dirty war and that's exactly what the Ukrainian regime wanted. Its a chosen military and propaganda strategy of Selenski & Co.

Every military observer will tell that in the first days the Russians tried to be as careful as possible, but with the mounting losses and the consequent usage of civilian protection by some Ukrainian forces, it was foreseeable where this will lead to and it will just get much worse than it was in the last days. Selenski and his circle knew the only way to win this is to play as dirty as possible, and that's what they do. Putin should have known, that if this happens, the only way to win militarily is to fight as harsh and brutal as possible.

Does anybody need yet another reason for this conflict to end as soon as possible on the negotiating table? If one side plays as dirty and gruesome as possible, the other is ready to play it out as brutal as necessary - what does anybody need who doesn't want these two people to mangle each other. Its just horrible and we need a diplomatic solution, an acceptable compromise.

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/w...-b2026864.html

[firetown]

This war might have much deeper causes than just a dispute over some God-forsaken steppe in Ukraine.


Apparently Covid was made in a lab - and most likely "those at the top" have known this for a long time:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...na-patent.html

It begins to look more and more like "12 Monkeys", huh.

I am trying my best to translate your videos.

[Archetype0ne]

Its funny when safe space bunnies who never lived under communism defend war crimes on inocent civilians, as if Russian soldiers have any right to be in Ukraine.

Notice that in my post I did not call anyone by name, but the fascist clearly know who they are.
Riverman if you were from Czech republic you would understand, but you're from Austria. No one who faced communism wants to go back to that shithole system, not with fascist tendencies added to it.

[firetown]

Its funny when safe space bunnies who never lived under communism defend war crimes on inocent civilians, as if Russian soldiers have any right to be in Ukraine.

Notice that in my post I did not call anyone by name, but the fascist clearly know who they are.
Riverman if you were from Czech republic you would understand, but you're from Austria. No one who faced communism wants to go back to that shithole system, not with fascist tendencies added to it.

My only alternative answer:
What are we NOT paying attention to?

[Archetype0ne]

My only alternative answer:
What are we NOT paying attention to?

Was not referring to you firetown.

But what are we not paying attention to? I do not know. Maybe the hopelessness of the human condition. People carbonized to ashes due to some madman in a bunker who thinks he is playing chess. Then people with 10 degrees of separation regurgitating propaganda narratives here like pseudo experts.
Doubt they would be such useful idiots if it was the pictures of their relatives bleeding to death and circulating as propaganda material on social media. That quickly would remove the degrees of separation and make them realize this is not an empire building game, innocent people are seeing everything they have taken away from them.

[Riverman]

I responded because that claim of an indiscriminate attack on civilians being pushed by some mainstream media. But it couldn't be farther from the truth. All military strikes cause civilian casualties, "collateral damage" as the US PR teams called it.
Unless two armies meet on an open battlefield.
This has nothing to do with a regime, its military reality of war.
Unfortunately, it might get more brutal soon, because of the reasons explained.
And I said that the Russians shouldn't have invaded the way they did, but once they are in, to blame them for moderate fighting measures is inappropriate.
If this goes on there will be soon real reason to complain, because of the upcoming escalation.
Which is exactly why we need a peaceful, diplomatic solution ad hoc.
Btw, I might not have suffered from Communism directly, personally, but my family and relatives did, also in Czechia.
I try to look at things as they are or were, not like some want to make it for their own purposes.

[bicicleur 2]

This video was leaked. It betrays the targets of rocket attacks to be launched from Belarus.
Some attacks already happened, but some cities in Ukraine yet to be attacked are also marked on the map.
What is more important : there are also targets in Moldavia marked.
It looks like the intention is to also attack Moldavia.

[bicicleur 2]

I try to look at things as they are or were, not like some want to make it for their own purposes.

you obviously fail in that

[Angela]

The reason is also that Russia has or now had many good contacts to the general left from the time of the Soviet Union. We have a lot of German and Austrian, as well as other European politicians, also from the moderate left and essentially from the whole political spectrum, which ended up in Russian companies, having excellent relationships with Putin. Take the most prominent example of Gerhard Schroeder:
https://www.politico.eu/article/gerh...a-ukraine-war/

He's not by any means a radical left or right, but was a rather opportunistic and Neoliberal oriented (Hartz IV etc.) Social Democrat and is now, up to this point, an opportunistic friend of Putin.

Also, a lot of people, left and right, those more critical of the current "elite" and its policy in the West, even if its from different positions, know how overblown, how overwhelming the power and propaganda of the establishment in the USA and UK has become. They are fighting against windmills, reasonable and rational debates became nearly impossible under this social and economic, more and more judicial pressure and persecution. Regardless of what anyone thinks about Covid otherwise, the Pandemic very clearly accelerated that trend towards a more totalitarian and suppressive stand in the West also.
So they reach out for alternatives and allies which might help them, since their own leaders and "elites", their whole system are clearly against them. And Russia was kind of smart to appeal to both sides of the more classical European political flanks, left and right. Russia had the mentioned good ties to the Left from the past and present, as well as having a more conservative and clearly "anti-woke" stance appealing to the right. Putin never really positioned himself, up to this point, clearly against one of these two classical European political positions and everything in between. He is only clearly positioned against Libertarians and Liberals, as well as the New Left, the Chimaera from the American universitites, sponsored, guided and supported by the American big capital.

Because of his careful positioning in this respect, he could appeal to both oppositions in the West and he actually directly and indirectly supported various of these groups and positions in the West.

However, he now split with his recent actions both the right and the left, moderate and extreme alike. Simply because of the brutal consequences his actions have and the massive pressure built up against him, which forces even many critical voices to shut up for the moment or being crucified by the media mafia instantly. However, he was kind of trapped into this, also. I recently heard that he had kind of contacts, practically a team in Ukraine, standing ready to be politically more active for him. But the recent propaganda efforts and covert-ops of the Ukrainian government, with support of the Western secret services and propaganda machine, were extremely successful.
Probably his actions would have been more successful if he had started already in 2014, but now it seems to late. I wonder if people get shot in Kiev by the Ukrainians if the Russians really move forward, similar to what happened to the Tsar once the "Whites" came closer in the war with the Reds. Many pro-Russian Ukrainian politicians being now under arrest as far as I know and the suppression of any pro-Russian voices in the Ukraine is massive and brutal.

The Selenski-regime really got the upper hand ideologically and in popular support, after all those years in charge and with billions being spent in the propaganda efforts, which means, if this is true and lasting, that only the most brutal measures can keep the Ukraine down for the time being. And that is obviously against the will of most Russians, to fight a war like in Chechnya or Syria against the Ukrainians. This is where it gets really nasty and dangerous, because Putin is now almost completely isolated, only China keeps him up. He made a decision which can't be taken back, as bad as it might have been. The Western interference really cornered Russia and Putin, giving him no way out of the strategical crisis, not even a solution for Crimea and the threat of a NATO membership of Ukraine in its current borders.

Now he is in this mess, and even though a lot of people want to see him going down, I think they should also consider that Putin and Russia as a whole need a way out of this. If there is no reasonable peace offer, they are likely to go in as brutally as necessary, until either the Ukrainian resistance being completely broken or the Russian people revolt, or even worse, it escalates to an international war with a potential nuclear crisis and even war. Even those which want to see Putin going down, should open up some sort of exit for him, because to corner a political leader with that kind of arsenal, especially of that arsenal of ABC weapons, might not be the best choice we got.
And its also not exactly helpful for the Ukrainians, because the maximal escalation is not in the interest of the common Ukrainian people, not at all, even if they could win this war.

I agree with much of what you wrote, but the highlighted statement shows a complete misunderstanding of how this worked in American. The Woke nonsense started on college or university campuses, yes, promulgated by Marxist leaning professors of the humanities and first taken up by POC, people of color there through affirmative action admissions, i.e. AOC and other members of the "Squad", who, having difficulty with the curricula, often remain for five and six years, and are subsidized by the government. It then spread to the larger part of the student body. They intimidated the administration and other professors to go along with their demands. I watched it all unfold; the classics banned, the teaching of history bastardized, professors who spoke up fired or "cancelled". Those who spoke up about it, including Razib Khan, and people on the right, were told it was limited to the colleges and was just post adolescent stupidity. Instead, it spread from the campuses with graduating students who worked for the "New Left", including in elementary and secondary schools. The BLM movement both partly grew out of it and fueled it. The trans mania was another outgrowth of it, destroying women's sports when so many of us fought to get our daughters equal access for federal funds for girls' teams. Now we're at the point twelve year olds can proclaim a sexual "identity" at odds with their genitalia and chromosomes being given drugs to stop puberty, and girls having their breasts lopped off.

This is no chimera. People have been "cancelled"; their livelihoods affected, and as per the above, their bodies irreparably damaged.

The corporations were among the last to be affected, certainly after the education system and government organs and the media. Have Europeans not noticed the bizarre output from Hollywood? The corporations responded as they have always done: they caved in terms of messaging, i.e. ads, and they paid "hush money" to these organizations, like BLM, as they had paid "hush money" to Jesse Jackson and all the other hucksters agitating in the name of equality but just seeking to line their pockets.

[Tomenable]

Riverman,

The truth is that South-East Ukraine voted for Yanukovych in 2010 not because they are Pro-Russian, but because they are afraid of Russia (while North-West Ukrainians are not afraid of Russia and more belligerent - so they voted for the Anti-Russian candidate). It is the same in Poland, people in the "Regained Lands" vote for Pro-German politicians because they are afraid of Germany, not because they love Germany.

[Riverman]

Riverman,

The truth is that South-East Ukraine voted for Yanukovych in 2010 not because they are Pro-Russian, but because they are afraid of Russia (while North-West Ukrainians are not afraid of Russia and more belligerent - so they voted for the Anti-Russian candidate). It is the same in Poland, people in the "Regained Lands" vote for Pro-German politicians because they are afraid of Germany, not because they love Germany.

But there is a genuine pro-Russian sentiment in some regions, especially Donbas and Crimea. This was true even before the staged coups, helped out and promoted by the Russians. And if that would be true, a peace which allows the locals to vote would be even more in favour of the Ukrainians. In fact, I don't expect, as things stand now, after what happened, that the popular support is generally pro-Russian outside of the areas they held before the invasion started. A peace agreement should consider both sides.

[Tomenable]

^^^
I'm talking about this map:



People in South-East Ukraine were voting for Pro-Russian politicians to prevent Russian invasion.

Because they were afraid of the possibility Russian invasion (and they were right).

But there is no Pro-Russian sentiment there at all, as can be seen in current events.

[Tomenable]

But there is a genuine pro-Russian sentiment in some regions, especially Donbas and Crimea.

Yes but Crimea is the only region which is (and has been) actually majority ethnic Russian according to censuses.

As for Donbas, I don't know who those "separatists" actually were in 2014. Maybe they came from Russia Proper.

[Northener]

Yes Riverman why does Austria still exist? Sovereignty is so overrated.....
The elite is corrupt, see recently:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-58856796
the broom has to go through it.
And after all they are Germans who partly not know yet they are Germans but that's a matter of time. They look like a German, they talk like a German...so they are Germans. Vienna is a key part in Germanic civilization.
Anschluss with Germany is inevitable.

Doesn't it Riverman?????? ;)

[Tomenable]

For Austrians (or German Austrians) it became comfortable after WW2 to disassociate themselves from Germany, because everyone links the Nazis with Germany and they forget about Austria. While in fact Austria is just as guilty for crimes of the Third Reich, as Germany.


So the Third Reich's defeat in WW2 surely strengthened a separate Austrian identity.

[Northener]

For Austrians (or German Austrians) it became comfortable after WW2 to disassociate themselves from Germany, because everyone links the Nazis with Germany and they forget about Austria. While in fact Austria is just as guilty for crimes of the Third Reich, as Germany.


So the Third Reich's defeat in WW2 surely strengthened a separate Austrian identity.

All false Tomenable they were German then and now....;) so sovereignty what a joke ;)

[Malaparte]

That link doesn't work.

Apologies. I re-linked the article. For those unfamiliar with Kennan, he is credited with the "containment" strategy against the USSR, but his views evolved considerably over the years. Notably, he was an early advocate of German reunification (by early, I mean even before 1950), mainly because he did not confuse restoring a balance of power in Europe with removing power from Europe, i.e., neutering Europe.

Kennan described the 1990s expansion of NATO eastward as a "fateful error."

https://www.nytimes.com/1997/02/05/o...ful-error.html

[Malaparte]

For an overview of Kennan, a complicated figure, see ==
https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2...4/getting-real

[Angela]

I agree with much of what you wrote, but the highlighted statement shows a complete misunderstanding of how this worked in American. The Woke nonsense started on college or university campuses, yes, promulgated by Marxist leaning professors of the humanities and first taken up by POC, people of color there through affirmative action admissions, i.e. AOC and other members of the "Squad", who, having difficulty with the curricula, often remain for five and six years, and are subsidized by the government. It then spread to the larger part of the student body. They intimidated the administration and other professors to go along with their demands. I watched it all unfold; the classics banned, the teaching of history bastardized, professors who spoke up fired or "cancelled". Those who spoke up about it, including Razib Khan, and people on the right, were told it was limited to the colleges and was just post adolescent stupidity. Instead, it spread from the campuses with graduating students who worked for the "New Left", including in elementary and secondary schools. The BLM movement both partly grew out of it and fueled it. The trans mania was another outgrowth of it, destroying women's sports when so many of us fought to get our daughters equal access for federal funds for girls' teams. Now we're at the point twelve year olds can proclaim a sexual "identity" at odds with their genitalia and chromosomes being given drugs to stop puberty, and girls having their breasts lopped off.

This is no chimera. People have been "cancelled"; their livelihoods affected, and as per the above, their bodies irreparably damaged.

The corporations were among the last to be affected, certainly after the education system and government organs and the media. Have Europeans not noticed the bizarre output from Hollywood? The corporations responded as they have always done: they caved in terms of messaging, i.e. ads, and they paid "hush money" to these organizations, like BLM, as they had paid "hush money" to Jesse Jackson and all the other hucksters agitating in the name of equality but just seeking to line their pockets.

Let me clarify that. I agree with some of what you said about why certain people on the right and the left have taken certain positions.

I completely disagree with your take on Ukraine, the causes etc., and your militant anti-U.S. and anti-NATO stance. I will no longer respond to your posts and I don't understand why we have all been engaging with you. The fellow travelers like the John Reeds and Lillian Hellman's of the U.S. refused to acknowledge the truth about the Soviet Union even after it fell and all the filth came pouring out from their own archives.

There is nothing to be gained by discussions with ideologues and fellow travelers because they are immune not only to reason but to the evidence of their own eyes.

[Malaparte]

The extreme right is very much split on the issue, as you can see in the support of the Ukrainian resistance by some of the most extreme groups we still have in Europe. By now most of the extreme right is actually on the Ukrainian side. Its rather the populist right, which got more support from Putin, which was in favour of his Russia, but even that being no more, at least not as unified as it probably was before the invasion.

The left is not necessarily the most "extreme left", but those which still stand to the classical European left positions, being more interested in social justice and the control of the capital and big corporations, the prevention of violence, than brainwashing the population with identity politics while keeping them as obedient sheeple for the "elites". Much of the "left" in Europe is now nothing more than a copy of the American crap which spills over from the other side of the Atlantic. They care more for identity politics and the next big thing the US media and think tanks push forward than their old ideals and promises to the people ("working class").
This is not about being more or less extreme, on the left, but about the focus, like "traditional left" (social politics, strong state, focus on human needs, control of the big corporations and capital, anti-war and peace orientation) vs. "woke left" (identity politics, anti-male and anti-white, ecological and anti-anthropocentric ideas, social engineering, totalitarian state and surveillance, cooperation with the big capital, more likely to be pro-war if it suits them).

There is a naive tendency among anti-globalist & nationalist elements to imagine that the "enemy of my enemy is my friend." However, Putin is clearly no friend of nationalist parties within Russia, and I expect he will root-out and eradicate the most resolute & noble Ukrainian nationalists, at least in the east. Sad but true.

But viewed objectively, as a man, Putin towers above his contemporaries in the West. His courage, his steady patience (if the current crisis goes back to 2008, he waited nearly 15 years to make his move), his mastery of the issues, his practice of the martial arts. In Putin, the Davos crowd has met a formidable adversary.

As for developments in the West, I expect the traditional left (or what remains of it) and the populist right will eventually ally in opposition to what have become the nakedly tyrannical power moves of the globalists. At least in America, the common people simply do not believe the propaganda anymore, not one iota, and they quietly seethe.

[Malaparte]

If this report is true, Poland & Bulgaria have lost all sense . . . . Supplying Ukraine with MIG-29s? Combat sorties from Poland?

https://southfront.org/nato-countrie...ar-in-ukraine/

Looks like they came to their senses. This is a positive development === https://news.antiwar.com/2022/03/01/...ne-fall-apart/