Fortunately, there are many people who believe in money and lots of money to go around to the ones who don't die.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
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Fortunately, there are many people who believe in money and lots of money to go around to the ones who don't die.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
Seems like ressentiment to me. "I got hurt so I'm going to hurt you worse to prove my superiority!"Quote:
Originally Posted by godslave
I still can't believe anyone likes movies like American Sniper and Megan Leavey. At least your media shouldn't flatter your broken psyche. The worst thing about those is they portray no one as having any kind of desires or needs or relationships, they make everyone into a bunch of stereotypes. So just as the Iraqis and Afghans are the "terrorist Muslim savages in the new Wild West" the Americans are the "God-fearing, dog-loving, Zales-shopping, pork-eating crusader." While movies are not as good as books with characterization they don't all make their main characters into cardboard stereotypes enacting wanton violence against other cardboard stereotypes.
Yesterday as Putin’s military was taking heavy losses he was busy opening a Ferris wheel in Moscow.
Today the Ferris wheel is closed after breaking down hours after opening.
-Olga Lautman
"American Sniper" is the only Clint Eastwood movie that I don't like, because of the reasons you mentioned and that exaggerated Hollywoodian manichaeism.Quote:
Originally Posted by Coeruleum Blue
However, What I was referring to are those situations where you don't have the choice but to do the unthinkable because the alternative is death. Of course War is one of those situations but there are a myriad of other. For instance that "Miracle of the Andes situation" situation even if in that case one would have Time to consider. A situation when you act in self-defence, those kind of dilemma, being in the wrong place at the wrong time etc.. Extreme situations, matter of life and death are critical incidents, and as such they leave traumas on our mind and/or on our body.
How is it that the US can send less than one percent of its GNP to Ukraine in the form of weapons and those weapons counter the entire output of the Russian Federation for the past fifty years?
"I think many people don't realize how big the US economy is. Ukraine’s GDP is almost exactly equal to the combined GDP of Connecticut’s Hartford & Fairfield counties. Russia's is equal to the sum of LA county, San Diego county, Orange county, & Santa Clara county in California."
-https://twitter.com/emollick/status/1567326201638801408
Russia's GDP = GDP of four US counties. Putin was obviously counting on his buddy Trump being president.
Lest we forget, Trump called Putin's invasion of Ukraine "genius".
Russia is reaping what they sow:
O.Danilov, Ukrainian National Security Council Secretary: «Things changed. We will not be satisfied with neither the return of Crimea and Donbass nor the reparations for invasion anymore. In alliance with our allies, we want full capitulation and demilitarization of Russia."
If Russia is demilitarized, then Russian industry could retool away from producing exploding tanks and towards supplying Russians with toilets and washing machines.
However, in practice, the evil allies will never allow this.
What sunk the Moskva?
Worth watching. Entertaining and informative.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNEtlMSCiCI
Russia has retaliated. According to these pro-Russian military bloggers, Russia has bombed power plants, resulting in massive blackouts (https://t.me/boris_rozhin/63476) (https://t.me/boris_rozhin/63474) (https://t.me/rybar/38615).
Confirmed by Reuters (https://www.reuters.com/world/europe...ive-2022-09-11). Russia has also disconnected the Zaporozhye nuclear power plant from the electrical grid, removing 20% of Ukraine's energy.
“De-nazification continues.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
Call on Amnesty International to condemn Ukraine for building power plants in civilian areas underneath Russian missile strikes.”
-Darth Putin
That's not really Darth Putin. If military and weapons are being housed in civilian areas they really are a valid target for war. See: the Lusitania. If some church building that's not really being used for worship but just for training soldiers and smuggling guns is raided and it has a power plant underneath that's really on Ukraine for positioning their own people in order to have maximum casualties. Bombing a church that's being used for gun smuggling shouldn't lead to the entire several blocks around it getting blown up too and if Ukraine is doing that it's intentional. They are turning their own citizens into some kind of martyrs without their permission. That's vile and perverse. At the same time, Ukrainians probably know they're making themselves pointless martyrs for Ukraine just by staying in the area.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
Top management always thinks that the problem is with the generals and the troops.
https://mil.in.ua/en/news/defence-in...ts-in-ukraine/
https://nitter.net/wartranslated/sta...576223944705#m
To be fair, lobbing cruise missiles at vital infrastructure is something that Russia could have done from the start.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
It could have gone further than that by, say, erasing entire towns in the style of Guernica. But the Russian army didn't, and it suggests that Russia wasn't carrying out a total war.
The thing is Putin is making so many enemies for himself in his own country.
I doubt he makes it out alive to enjoy his personal billions.
@xerx, it suggests that destroying infrastructure wasn't as important as killing civilians. After all, Russians might want that infrastructure to be dismantled and taken back to Russia. They did steal a solar panel farm.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
Those missiles cost money, and there were lots of hospitals and schools to bomb first.
I mean, how many children can you kill by destroying a transformer? Directly, I mean?
Oh, but maybe I'm "dehumanizing" the Russians. Personally, I think they do a perfectly fine job of dehumanizing themselves through their deeds, but I'm open to listening to why I have misjudged them.
I would like to point out that I work with a number of Russians. One from Moscow, one from St. Petersburg, one from Tomsk, one now living in San Fransisco because she prefers it there, and they are all fine people.
No, it's the Russians who are attacking Ukraine that I'm objecting to.
The terrorist Girkin from the DPR said that destroying the Ukrainian electrical grid was planned to occur just before winter so it could have the maximum effect on civilians, but the advances of the Ukrainian army made it expedient to do it now. Nice guy.
https://nitter.net/pic/orig/media%2FFcc4zmbXEAAAEVR.png
*EDIT*
Wait. xerx, I just re-read your post. Are you saying that Russians didn't erase entire towns? Do you have internet where you are?
If they were that eager to kill civilians while preserving infrastructure, couldn't they have deployed chemical warfare?Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
Yes, Russia could have deployed chemical warfare, as they have done previously in Syria, but I think someone in the U.S. State Department might have had a talk with them this time.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
I predict that if Russia employs tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine, you will see a lot of conventional hardware come flying out of NATO bases towards Russian infrastructure very quickly, and I think that Putin knows this.
Doesn't mean that Putin won't do something stupid, but the US is giving him every reason and opportunity to back down gradually.
If Putin ends up being in trouble with his governors for starting this disastrous war, well, when you play stupid games, you win stupid prizes.
But the intentional killing of civilians via conventional weaponry is a war crime just the same, and it would also pique the attention of international lawmakers. Also, wouldn't Russia have an incentive to incorporate civilians as opposed to killing them? There are already reports of Russification efforts in captured territories.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
Every nation has to decide which parts of the law they can and will enforce. Law cannot reach where enforcement will not follow, and not all things are worth dying for. Syria's tragedy is that they don't have oil or gas.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
I think that the U.S. is drawing a soft line at chemical warfare and a hard line at nuclear warfare, but you know, the U.S. government is not absolutist. Its motto isn't Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
Russia has already sent thousands of Ukrainian child victims of its war to live in Russia. Presumably to make up for Russia's terrible birth rate. But no one asked the kids if that's what they wanted. Russia isn't taking the adults. Hell, they aren't even letting in their fleeing subjects from the Donbas.
Maybe they don't want subjects who can think for themselves, maybe.
Chemical warfare doesn’t really seem like something a country positioning themselves as ‘liberators’ of Ukraine would do.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
We all already know that the invasion’s initial bombardments were directed at civilians, but Russia’s domestic propaganda was claiming that they were collateral damage and not a main target.
Supposing that chemical weapons were on the table, how would it look like to Russian civilians if the army used weaponry explicitly intended to destroy human life?
Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
Alright, on close inspection, I probably overreached when I said 'chemical weapons'. That may have been too strong of a statement.Quote:
Originally Posted by Manatroid92
Still, deliberately targeting civilians, even with conventional weaponry, and for no strategic reasons, is also something that would-be `liberators’ don't do. Putin and his cohort are sociopaths that do evil for the sake of political gain, not comic book supervillains that do evil for the sake of evil.
EDIT: I'm not a Kremlin-bot, by the way. If there is evidence to the effect that the Russian Ministry of Defence deliberately ordered the killing of civilians, aiming to inflict casualties on non-combatants, I'll quickly concede the point.
Nice distinction in the bolded sentence, @xerx. If only Marvel writers would also make that distinction, their stories would be much better.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
You’re completely right, of course, would-be liberators would not be using weaponry on civilian targets, or would limit it is best as they could.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
However, if I were to be bold, it’s much easier for a pro-Russian narrative to say that those civilian targets were not civilian at all, or were harbouring hostile forces, and be believed by their own countrymen, when conventional weaponry is what was employed in the first instance.
Granted that narrative only works so long as the ‘de-nazification’ has gone as planned and you don’t need to fall back on other methods. Since Russia miscalculated their offensive their propaganda is forced to likewise backpedal.
If Russia's aim was indeed to harm civilians, then yes, I suppose that using conventional weapons could offer plausible deniability.Quote:
Originally Posted by Manatroid92
DC Comics > Marvel.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
I’ve been away from the news. What the heck is happening to the Russians? are they really turning on Putin
@Poptart, what is happening to Russia is what happens to an eighteenth-century autocracy when it meets 21st century capitalism. The US gave 0.5% of its GNP to Ukraine in the form of modern weapons, along with some modern professional military training and strict military discipline, and Russia is folding like a piece of wet cardboard.Quote:
Originally Posted by Poptart
The Russian bloggers inside Russia are complaining. However, they have no wealth and therefore no power, and Putin has wisely avoided a general mobilization which would put guns into the hands of Moscow and St. Petersburg eighteen and twenty-somethings who are expected to (and would) die fighting the Ukrainians, so there will be no armed uprising against him.
What I expect to happen is that Russia will be kicked out of all parts of Ukraine and Putin will declare victory and will kill a few generals and mid-level officers for insufficient wisdom and foresight*, and the Russian elites will complain but the massive state security apparatus will suppress their complaints. The average Russian will do nothing, because he has been very intentionally conditioned to be powerless.
In the meantime, Moscow will grow poorer as oil and gas revenues decline, and there will be less money available to suppress dissent in the outlying districts of the Russian Federation. The guys running these districts will start acting independently and will be making their own economic deals with the West, and Russia won't have the troops to do anything about it.
With luck, the Russian Federation will dissolve from lack of interest and Moscow will descend into North Korea status until every empire-lover there is dead and gone.
*The people that Putin will kill will be his best generals, because they are the ones who are the biggest threat to him, personally. And this is how Russia got to be the way it is.
I sometimes wonder if all states which rely on massively extractive industries are doomed to also having massive inequality.
I mean, there's no law of nature that says if your country is sitting on huge reserves of the most valuable thing on earth, and I'm not talking about human minds here, that your country will necessarily become hugely unequal in income and therefore hugely unequal in terms of political power.
But that's the way it seems to turn out.
Ukraine's Kharkiv offensive did capture a lot of territory, but we don't know whether or not Ukraine can sustain this momentum. After the initial collapse of Russia's thinly-spread front line, the Russian army retreated to defensible positions along the eastern bank of the Oskil river. There is footage of captured Russian small arms but no footage of captured heavy weapons, which must have been moved to safety, and which suggests a Russian tactical retreat as opposed to a disorganized rout. (1) According to (1), Russia may have stationed poorly-trained convicts in Kharkiv, as opposed to professionals, due to manpower shortages.
A Russian blogger is reporting a Ukrainian build-up in preparation for an assault on the eastern bank of the Oskil, and we'll see how that goes (2). Russia is also counterattacking, and we'll see how that goes.
In Kherson, Ukraine's offensive hasn't made very much progress so far, and its momentum may have run out — only a handful of towns and villages have been liberated. But it has only been over two weeks, whereas it may take up to five weeks or so, as suggested by think tanks and the Ukrainian government, before the operation's success is known.
I couldn't find an independent figure for the total number of Ukrainian casualties since late August (the start of the Kherson counteroffensive). Russian bloggers and the Russian MoD report high Ukrainian casualties, but I'd rather not rely solely on them.
Yes, plausible deniability was the word I was looking for. :thumbsup:Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
...How can you have comic books that don't have comic book supervillains?Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
The best stories I’ve read were about ordinary people who did extraordinary (but possible) things. Like falling in like and in love.Quote:
Originally Posted by Coeruleum Blue
I used to read these old science fiction comics about heroes who fought the evil, galaxy-spanning Voom who fed on people’s emotional horror, back in the Golden Age.
But the Golden Age of stories like this is twelve.
A female LIE, I believe. RIP.
https://www.reddit.com/r/ukraine/com...or_soledar_on/
This just popped up. The leader of the Wagner group (Prigozhin) is trying to recruit prisoners. I have no clue about the date that the video was shot.
https://vk.com/milinfolive?w=wall-123538639_2992823
They've been doing that for a long time. Because Russian prisoners make the best Russian soldiers, of course. They are definitely going to be disciplined, restrained, and fighting honorably for a noble cause, and therefore we can expect them to conduct themselves well on the battlefield and off.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
Or are they just there to kill children and women and unarmed civilians, and rape farm animals? Curious minds want to know.
I think there was a '60's war movie about this. The Dirty Dozen? The Devil's Brigade? Maybe I'm mis-remembering.
The Dirty DozenQuote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
When I read books like that, I usually read ones without pictures. I guess the X-Men and Watchmen also have some cultural credit, as well as the funny comics.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
For anyone who wants to hear what my voice sounds like, this guy Hertling sounds EXACTLY like I do, at least, that's from recordings of my voice that I've heard myself.
Same tone, same cadence, everything is the same.
I've always regretted that my voice isn't lower or more imposing and that I sound a bit like a duck, but you work with what you have.
https://nitter.net/BulwarkOnline/sta...299482959872#m
One of the best military analyses of this war comes courtesy of the Austrian army. (1)
* Ukraine's Kherson offensive was repelled, as the flat ground allowed Russia to effectively utilize reconnaissance. Massed Russian artillery inflicted heavy casualties.
* In Kharkiv, the Ukrainians staged their attack in complete secrecy. Fast Ukrainian units cleverly outmanoeuvred under-trained Russian troops. The Russians retreated in a panic, fearing that they were about to be encircled.
According to Al-Jazeera, those under-trained troops may have been convicts, fuelling speculation that Russia is facing a manpower crunch. (2) We do know that the Wagner group is recruiting convicts. (3)
What if they let Daniel Barenboim conduct the Wagner group?Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
We should fight our wars with music instead of guns.Quote:
Originally Posted by Coeruleum Blue
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9-NER8aFJ4
This video is all about military facts and strategy... so much Te... I don't see value judgement.
The guy seems Fe-PoLR to me.
* unintentional double post deleted *
Quote:
Originally Posted by WinnieW
I think the guy is ESI. Surprisingly, a lot of ESIs work hard in the sciences and are pretty good at Te.
He is giving a very detailed explanation of the things right in front of him. What I do not see is the rolling persuasion that is characteristic of LIEs. An LIE would be rolling up towards the course of action that he wants his audience to undertake.
This guy is entirely about "This happened, and then this happened, and this is the situation, and this happened in the past, and this is what we saw." Nothing about "This is the situation, and because of X, we can exploit the enemy's Y to accomplish Z if we do not hesitate to act now."
As for you not seeing "value judgement", he isn't giving his opinion about what should be done in a tactical or a strategic sense, because ESIs can tell you everything there is to know about what happened and what is happening, including what is impossible, but they won't tell you what the best course of action should be, because they don't know.
He actually does express his value judgement subtly in the video when he shows the video of the Ukrainians singing the national anthem in a group, just before they launched the latest offensive. The scene has almost religious overtones, and as we know, the HA of an ESI is "to believe". If that isn't showing which set of values he has, then I don't know what is.
If you want to see Te in a war blogger (no Ni, though), there is Jake Broe, LSE extraordinaire. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEnPUJLNgRk
And here is Ti in a war blogger, in Denys Davydov, LII. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2tGHqq_Dlo
If you want Fe-PoLR*, you could watch the SLI, Operator Starsky, in his regular reports on Ukraine. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9l3bP8xaLPQ, and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYKTZs7_L8E
*An easy way to recognize Fe-PoLR is to watch for a comment from them that says "You are so fucking stupid." (ILIs can do this, too.)
That was a somewhat rushed post I did, I watched only about 4 minutes of the video.
An Estonian politician talks about the Russian travel ban, to a Russian-speaking audience in Estonia.
Some people say that Russians should be banned completely from polite society, and other people say that a travel ban is counter-productive because it doesn't allow the "good Russians" a means to escape Russia.
Most of the countries which border Russia and which have histories of dealing with Russians have imposed travel bans. The US government has not followed their lead, saying that a ban on Russians traveling to the US would be counter-productive.
Personally, I think that the US position is a result of the fact that many Russians work in the US for the government in some capacity, and a surprisingly large number of them are racist, Jew-hating, conservative Russian imperialists who are in the States purely because Russia is a cesspool and they can live a better life here while still hating the US, and not because they disagree with Putin's imperialist ambitions. These Russians have not renounced their Russian citizenship and would be deported under a travel ban. Mostly, they are really smart guys who happen to be authoritarians, and the US military-industrial complex is using them to sharpen the US advantage in the world.
Anyway, here's what the Estonian said about Russians, to Russians:
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
You have to understand the Estonian state, the government is not in the business of sorting out what Russians are good or bad. This has very little interest to us. We are concerned with protecting our security. We are primarily interested in supporting Ukraine at the moment. For the sake of them winning this war.
I'm sorry to say that this may be so, but in my generation, there is no longer any confidence in Estonian Politics that Russia will become a normal country, a normal neighbor for Estonia in the coming decades. And basically, we want you to lose this war.
We want to weaken your military capabilities for the next decades. We don't want to see you rebuild your economy. We want the opposite. The sanctions that the West has imposed, they're already starting to work. We see that they are already affecting the Russian Federations' ability to fight, they will work even more and more.
We will give up Russian energy. We absolutely do no care whether Russian tourists come back or not. What the Estonian foreign minister said: "We are not waiting for them here."
So this is a completely different game. We feel like Israel, which at one point saw itself surrounded by Arab countries, which wanted to destroy Israel. Because we look at what your government is doing, and we listen carefully, we read not only Putin, but Patrushev, Gerasimov, your Medvedev, all these representatives of Russia and in whose name they are now fighting, killing people of Ukraine say. That's our position right there.
To tell you the truth, we don't really care which Russians living in Russia are good or bad. This is not our business.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
https://www.reddit.com/r/ukraine/com...ated_estonian/
.
Adam, if we're indicting the Russian people on the basis of their chauvinism, we'd have to apply the same logic to the Ukrainians. Ukraine wasn't an inclusive, liberal society before the war, and it was even moving in the opposite direction.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
There were state-imposed attempts to reduce the use of the Russian language, for one thing. Civil servants were mandated to use Ukrainian instead of Russian (1); laws were passed that restricted teachers from teaching Russian (and other minority languages, like Hungarian and Romanian) in schools (2). Even if we grant that Russians are a non-indigenous, late addition to a preceding Ukrainian entity — a country that they invaded and colonized during the eighteenth century — and were a fifth column that was more loyal to Russia than to Ukraine, it's still wrong to suppress their culture.
I don't like the Kremlin and don't like this invasion, which, unless an international court says otherwise, seems to me to be a crime against peace (3) and the root cause of multiple war crimes. I believe that international law should be upheld and that countries which violate it should be punished. And even if we believe (as I do) that Russia was provoked by NATO's overreach into Eastern Europe, nothing justifies retaliation by war.
But by being in Ukraine, by propping up one form of chauvinism against another, we have to at least acknowledge that the West is taking sides in a civil war between different ethnic nationalisms (and now, with the continuing rise of far-right groups like the AZOV battalion, there is even less hope for a Ukraine that tolerates ethnic heterogeneity).
As for those people who believe that Ukraine has the right to choose its foreign policy, the right to full autonomy, and the right to self-determination, in the most absolute terms and irrespective of any tectonic geopolitical fallout: Why not extend the same sympathy to the Russian-speaking separatist republics in the Donbass?
But none of this is guaranteed.Quote:
We want to weaken your military capabilities for the next decades. We don't want to see you rebuild your economy. We want the opposite. The sanctions that the West has imposed, they're already starting to work. We see that they are already affecting the Russian Federations' ability to fight, they will work even more and more.
Sanctions haven't destroyed Russia's economy so far, which seems to be reindustrializing via import substitution. Economic sanctions haven't stopped Russian trade with other emerging countries (many of which have their own skepticism towards the United States). And Russia has so far succeeded in trading in local currencies.
The Russian army, which hasn't performed as well as the Russian MoD had hoped, and which apparently isn't strong enough to offer an existential threat to NATO, has shown that it can still capture 20% of a NATO-backed country (an area the size of England). And, once this war is over, whether or not it loses, its army will have gained massive experience and a direction for reform.
Unless we're prepared to occupy or destroy it, Russia still has the potential to threaten Ukraine again. Russia recovered and reformed after its defeat during the Crimean war. Under Joseph Stalin, it had fully recovered (within a generation) from an even worse military defeat and a civil war.
Countries recover from defeat. They don't recover from humiliation. Only diplomacy offers a permanent solution.
@xerx, I disagree with you on almost every point, but it's late and I'm not up to presenting a point-by-point rebuttal at the moment. Maybe later.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
I do admire your optimism, though. Very refreshing, especially since I tend to go very dark sometimes.
I’m sorry but Putin is such an desperate loser.
He really tried to invade Ukraine with like half a tank of gas and blames NATO for all of his problems like a jealous abusive boyfriend who holds everyone but himself accountable. “I’m mad that Ukraine likes the West more than me. Now I must mobilize for war. It’s your fault for making me mad!!@ You deserve to be hurt for hurting my feelings. Make another move and I swear I’ll fuckin crack your head open dude—I have a nuclear arsenal and I’m not afraid to use it! Laugh at me one more time, I dare you..”
Quote:
Originally Posted by Poptart
Authoritarian regimes are composed of people who want a strong ruler who will brutally punish their enemies, who are ubiquitous. This means that the more cruel and punitive the leader is, the more the authoritarian followers love them. You can see this behavior in Trump’s followers, too. It’s a cycle of abuse, but it seems to be widespread in populations.
This means that Putin, or any guy who rules people like this, have almost no restraints placed on their behavior by their supporters. Their end has to come from outside their support group, from people who either are not authoritarian or are stronger than the ruler.
If you have spent a lifetime being rewarded for behaving as if you are above the law, you are probably not going to be able to moderate your behavior just because things seem to be going badly right now.
Witness both Trump and Putin doubling down on their bets.
Both of them are also making vague threats that there will be terrible consequences if they are opposed in the slightest.
Well, they are right about that.
There will be terrible consequences. For them.
Let’s talk about nuclear weapons. First, they will not end civilization. There haven’t been just two bombs exploded in history; there have been thousands, all exploded in tests, and the world keeps chugging along. Burning carbon is a much bigger threat.
Second, a nuclear bomb is one of the most complex devices ever made by humans, and the trigger mechanisms sit right next to a source of very hard radiation. Radiation tends to weaken metals and wiring and destroys electronics, which means that the triggers have to be replaced every four years or so, or else the bomb just won’t go off.
Putin has been in charge of Russia for twenty years. That’s twenty years of stealing everything that can be resold. Russia has the most advanced jet fighter in the world, and has been able to build and maintain about five of them.
Russia has one of the most advanced tanks in the world, and they have been able to build and maintain just a very few of them.
Russia has very advanced delivery rockets, and about one third of them fail to get anywhere near their target. As for numbers, they are taking the rockets from the ring defenses around St. Petersburg to use to bomb Ukrainians.
What are the chances that Russia’s nuclear arsenal is any different? Do they have five working devices? Do they have rockets that will get these devices anywhere near their target?
Most knowledgeable experts say no.
Russia is currently leveling cities and killing everyone in and around them. Does it make any difference to the dead that they died by conventional or by nuclear weapons? At least, a nuclear bomb doesn’t torture you for weeks before killing you.
Putin and Trump really are like serial abuser husbands. They threaten ultimate violence in order to perpetuate continuous violence.
They both need to be course-corrected.
Thanks. I'm definitely an optimistic person, but I'm not advocating for diplomacy from a sense of naive idealism.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
My opinion comes from listening to policymakers like Kissinger, Brzezinski, and George Kennan (for the record, and to put a very fine point on it: I do not share these men's politics or world-view, only their opinions about the current conflict). They believed, with some variation between them, that peace with Russia was possible, that NATO shouldn't be expanded, and that security could be achieved by rapprochement with Russia.
These aren't people who formed their opinions randomly. They probably met with hundreds of world leaders, read thousands of foreign policy documents, and developed a sense for what was possible and impossible in foreign policy. If they believed that peace was possible, they surely had well-thought-out reasons for believing as they did.
It's always amusing watching left-wing authoritarians wax poetic about the psychology of right wing authoritarians.
While people point to Putins behavior as erratic, and it is... this is a shallow way of thinking. NATO has been working to undermine / overthrow communism and Russia since WW2 ended. We funded the war in Syria to take out Russias allies & strategic position in the middle east... that war was actually alot bloodier than this one, but it wasn't very covered by the news because we were driving it.
It is naive to pretend that NATO has not been in a state of undeclared war with Russia and is not indirectly responsible for this war. Which does not mean Russia isn't primarily responsible.
It's funny because I was listening to some Russian soldiers who defected, and it was only after defection that they could see outside of the Russian controlled media bubble. They were shocked that their military would commit the sort of crimes against civilians we are seeing. But people in the West aren't really that different... we have committed far worse crimes in just the last 10 years.
As for Trump - you can say what you want about his social policies, his scapegoating of immigrants, the fact he was an arrogant narcissist... these things are true, but one thing he did right is he ended the war in Syria. Meanwhile your precious Biden / Obama administration are the ones who started that war. This high-browed philosophical soap boxing about the psychology of authoritarian strong men... it is just left-wingers with their own noses very far up their asses. The US may have a nice cushy set of domestic policies but globally they're the most hated nation... even after this crisis in Ukraine the US is still far more hated than Russia.
@Adam Strange- Making vague threats of violence is a move used by cowards to maintain plausible deniability. Also they know that the mere threat of violence is usually enough to get people to comply. It’s manipulative and abusive and there should be consequences. It’ll be interesting to see what happens if Putin is “re-elected” in 2024.Quote:
Both of them are also making vague threats that there will be terrible consequences if they are opposed in the slightest.
Well, they are right about that.
There will be terrible consequences. For them.
How do you know that the US is globally "the most hated nation... even after this crisis in Ukraine the US is still far more hated than Russia."?Quote:
Originally Posted by DogOfDanger
Can you cite sources, or did you just decide that this is true? Because the number of people actively trying to move into or out of these two respective countries doesn't support your assertion.
My ILI shrink told me yesterday that there are four ways to get what you want, and they involve increasing amounts of coercion. They are:Quote:
Originally Posted by Poptart
1.) Make a request. In other words, just ask for what you want. No coercion involved. The person being asked can fulfill your request or not, as they see fit.
2.) Do deals. Trade something that you have, or can do, for something that that they have, or can do. Again, no coercion involved.
3.) Manipulation. Try to manipulate the other person into complying, usually by lies or by deception. This method doesn't involve direct coersion, but it does involve deception, and therefore it disrespects the other person.
4.) Force. Taking physical action against the other person, and this does involve coercion, and it disrespects the other person, too.
Trump says that he's at Level 2, but long experience indicates that he's steadily been at level 3.
Putin is all Level 4, all the time.
Level 1: Asking for what you want - https://www.reddit.com/r/ukraine/com...n_you_do_that/
Level 4: Forcing them to do what you want - https://www.reddit.com/r/ukraine/com..._volunteering/
An incredibly attractive and intelligent Russian female.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96TsPKhAc0M
Most of the time, she looks like an ESI, but in her photographs from the rally, she looks SEI.
More proof that your Dual can look like your Conflictor.
Russian mobilization is going well. All according to plan.
https://nitter.net/bigSAC10/status/1...918586888192#m
Very easilyQuote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...ies-poll-shows
https://news.gallup.com/poll/116350/position-world.aspx
Attachment 18175
Notice the spikes / dips in the worlds approval centering around our invasion of Iraq / funding of the war in Syria. Also notice the increase (gasp) in approval from 2016-2020 - same reason, war in Syria.
Not that it matters, but there's a big difference between arbitrarily deciding something is true and observing trends that suggest a thing is true.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
Actually, your statement here wouldn't support or discredit the assertion since we're talking about global approval, whereas this is a matter of the countries domestics.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
Carry onward!
Russia has committed war crimes, apparently, according to UN investigators. https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...-investigators By using cluster munitions that don't distinguish between combatants and civilians, performing executions, torture, etc.
I find it weird people assume there's always a good guy and a bad guy in every conflict. The bad guys tend to fight each other. Hasn't everything from Disney cartoons to fantasy novels taught us that? But people don't to apply that to real life. No, all the good guys are friends so all the bad guys must be, too.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
Russia is still defying sanctions by trading with China.
Bloomberg
Japan Times
And that apparently includes machinery and electronics. Early in the war, lots of articles reported that Russian imports of technological goods like machinery, cars, and electronics had plummeted. But China is apparently filling that gap, and Chinese businesses are getting better at skirting sanctions. Trade in Yuan, which is outside the purview of the United States, has surged. Al Jazeera
I couldn't find anything concerning trade in microchips, though. Chinese chips aren't as good as Western ones, although they're getting there. They've developed a ~5nm transistor design but still lack in the ability to miniaturize transistors to that level (Al Jazeera) and have to rely on Taiwan. I'd love to find out more about Chinese CPU architectures (how good is their simultaneous multithreading, SIMD, etc.).
I'm completely out of my depth when it comes to Euromaidan (I haven't read a single book about it), don't fully understand the events that surrounded Euromaidan or their legality/illegality, and cautious about believing anything that turns out to be a wild conspiracy theory.
But we do have evidence (a leaked telephone call involving Victoria Nuland, a neoconservative member of the Obama administration) that American officials did conspire to hand-pick Ukraine's new government in the aftermath. Considering the scrutiny directed at alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 American election (is there even any conclusive evidence that Russian meddling affected the final result?), attempted American meddling in Ukraine should have raised the same questions and concerns. (Other source).
This CATO article on Euromadian can be opinionated, and I don't know enough to decide whether or not its accusatory tone is justified, but I enjoyed reading it anyway. (In case anyone asks, I'm not a libertarian or fan of CATO in any way.)
The Ukraine that eventually resulted chose to move closer to NATO and the United States. And to the extent that American meddling existed and was successful, that choice didn't arise entirely organically from the suggested fear of Russian imperialism. It came about by the artificial amplification of select political interests within Ukrainian society.Quote:
Originally Posted by CATO article
A former US army field artillery officer wrote a short article about the effectiveness of Iranian drones, based on his experience in Iraq.
They aren't a laughing stock, apparently, and Iran is emerging as a major player in the production of asymmetric weapons.Quote:
With such capabilities and functions in mind, it is also important to recognize the unique challenges these drones pose in the area of force protection. First, they are exceptionally hard to track on radar, as they do not share the characteristics of the manned aircraft most modern air defense systems were designed for. Due to their small radar cross-section, relatively slow speed, and low altitude, drones present a unique challenge. They require the use of specific technologies that allow air defenders to identify the drones based on the above characteristics. Second, even if Ukrainian forces can manage to identify and track Iranian UAS systems, they are hard to shoot down for the same reasons they are hard to find on radar: They are not manned aircraft, and most air defense systems weren’t designed to shoot them down.
...
An Asymmetric Threat
While American forces in the Middle East have had more recent success defending against Iranian drones, it was a long learning curve to develop competent C-UAS strategies and adapt existing weapons and technologies to meet the threat. The situations of American forces in the Middle East and the Ukrainian army are not comparable whatsoever. American forces in Iraq and Syria have the luxury of being in fixed, static defensive positions where they are almost entirely focused on force protection. This allows them to emplace necessary air defenses and to have assets and personnel fully dedicated to C-UAS operations at all times. The Ukrainians do not have that luxury. They are engaged in a completely different style of warfare, one where UAS is only one threat on a long list of Russian artillery, rockets, missiles, aircraft, ships, and maneuver forces.
Here's the brochure, straight from the Iranian press: (1, 2)
Also: (3)
I want the US to stay out of this mess. Why are we sticking our nose in all of this? Lesson learned don’t be so willing to share highly destructive weapons of mass destruction should they fall into the hands of maniacs not to bring everyone into equal stance but rather to hold the world to hostage
@xerx Idk what happened (I wasn’t there) but apparently there’s more to the cookie/phone call story - https://www.thebulwark.com/what-real...nd-since-then/Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
. The body bag manufacturers are having a field day.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
What do Russia, Tucker Carlson, Scott Ritter, Douglas Macgregor, and Trump all have in common?
Julia Davis
@JuliaDavisNews
Some things never change: translated clips of Tucker Carlson are still an ever-present feature on Russian state TV, rivaled only by those of Scott Ritter, Douglas Macgregor and Trump.
https://nitter.net/JuliaDavisNews/st...483935248384#m
.
@Beautiful sky, humans are maniacs by default. We're easily the most dangerous creature on the planet, both to ourselves and to every other creature alive. Politics is what we use to KEEP from killing everyone else.Quote:
Originally Posted by Beautiful sky
Graffiti in St. Petersburg: "You were indifferent to politics and now you're cannon fodder."
https://nitter.net/andersostlund/sta...698502029312#m
A response from police prohibiting access to a lawyer seeking his detained client : “After September 21st, laws no longer apply”
Lol. In Russia, laws never applied. Only the Tsar's wishes apply.
The thing is, 40% of every population likes it this way. I'm talking to you, Tucker.
https://nitter.net/ABarbashin/status...991060520962#m
You can't stay out by because your government is the one who orchestrated all this mess.Quote:
Originally Posted by Beautiful sky
The US has a large debt that needs to be serviced by constantly refinancing. When debt rates are high, investors are willing to buy bonds because they know that when new bond rates start to fall, old bonds will rise in price. When the rate is low and everyone expects it to rise, no one wants to buy US bonds, because it is obvious that during a recession rates on new debt will rise and old bonds will become cheaper. The only way to get Europeans to invest in America during a recession is to create a crisis in Europe. Therefore, at the end of each credit cycle, the US government provokes some kind of crisis in Eurasia, so that the crisis is there and not here.
Obviously you are not responsible for politicians, and I say this not to blame you, but in order for you to look at things soberly.
It's amazing that people in this thread perceive global crisis as some kind of sports match (Adam, I'm looking at you). Well, amazing discoveries await them next year.
@Kurt Gabin, I definitely don't look at the Russian invasion of Ukraine as a sports match.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kurt Gabin
"Well, amazing discoveries await them next year." Is this what you have been told? Because I just read "A Roadside Picnic", a philosophical science fiction novel by Soviet-Russian authors Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, written in 1971. It is quite good, and a theme running through the novel is that, amidst the dystopia and senseless death and misery and pettiness of every day life, "amazing discoveries next year" are promised. Lol.
That was fifty years ago. Evidently, the Russian government's story hasn't changed since then.
Incidentally, you don't understand the US bond market. The US is a sovereign country; it prints money, so it has no need to borrow. US government bonds are merely a gift to some rich investors to give them a guaranteed return.
Company bonds are a different matter. Companies can't print their own currency.
Furthermore, the value of a nation's currency, compared to other nations' currencies, is a measure of how much confidence that the holder of the currency has in the country's ability to provide something of value in the future in exchange for that piece of paper.
The US dollar is currently rising compared to every other major currency. That tells me that people are betting that the US will be able to provide them in the future with something more valuable than any other country can provide, and that the US does not really have any problems with getting people to accept the dollars that it prints.
The bottom line is, the US doesn't need to get Europeans to invest in the US. If anything, the US would like to see happy and contented consumers in every country, who can afford to buy US products. Every capitalist country wants that.
Except Russia, and a few other imperialist countries with empires. The US crushed the British empire because empires are not as good for everyone (except the king or the Tsar) as capitalist countries, and I would think that more people would realize this.
Incidentally, Kurt, have you mobilized yet?
https://nitter.net/francis_scarr/sta...060989390849#m
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1...049665538.html
https://nitter.net/officejjsmart/sta...676424495105#m
.
>>it prints money
And this is exactly what led to inflation and higher rates when printed money was distributed in the form of benefits during covid
>>so it has no need to borrow
At all?) How convenient, perhaps you even patented a perpetual motion machine?
>>The US dollar is currently rising compared to every other major currency. That tells me that people are betting that the US will be able to provide them in the future with something more valuable than any other country can provide, and that the US does not really have any problems with getting people to accept the dollars that it prints.
Of course, when Europe is in crisis, dollar is rising.. Because capital is fleeing from the collapsed euro
>>If anything, the US would like to see happy and contented consumers in every country, who can afford to buy US products.
It would be great, but instead, the United States has a trade deficit and, as a result, growing external debt.
>>Incidentally, Kurt, have you mobilized yet?
Nope. Now they are mobilizing those who have experience in combat operations or have concluded a special contract with the Ministry of Defense. This is called a reserve, according to official information, there are two million people in it – 10 times more than number of contractors currently used in Ukraine. In addition to the reserve, there is also a standby (IDK how to translate this correctly, but you get the point) – all other physically and mentally healthy men, about thirty million people. These thirty millions are divided into three stages, I am in the second and it is unlikely that my participation will be required. And, in general, I expect that now that Russia has a multiple advantage on the side, Kyiv will finally agree to start negotiations.
On one hand... we say that global warming is a bigger threat than nuclear war (global warming isn't even the most important environmental problem, pollution / habitat destruction is), at the same time... we say that capitalism is the greatest benefit to all, despite the fact it primarily drives the market & the resulting pollution, and this seems to justify toppling various communist governments throughout the years.
Every major country in the world is experiencing higher inflation. Even the ones which didn't print money for benefits during covid.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kurt Gabin
Capitalism is a man-made system, not a natural law, so the first and second laws of thermodynamics do not apply. Yes, it is possible to print money forever.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kurt Gabin
Why would a country that can print money need to borrow it from its citizens? It can just print more.
Technically, a sovereign country doesn't need to tax, either, for the same reason, but they do tax, not because they need their paper back, but because taxing gives the paper value. You need to have it on April 15, or they put you in jail.
Capital must also be fleeing from the collapsed British pound, the collapsed Japanese yen, the collapsed Indian Rupee, the collapsed Chinese Yuan, and a few other currencies. Perhaps there is a US-induced crisis in all of these countries.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kurt Gabin
Or could it be that people just think that US prospects for the future are good?
Well, this is complicated, but the US is not harmed by this. Or you could simply say that the rest of the world is willing to stack up dollars in exchange for the right to export goods to the States.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kurt Gabin
Well, I genuinely hope that you don't have to go fight in Ukraine. I've seen a lot of pictures recently of Russian soldiers lying in pools of blood and mud in Ukraine. No one wants to die that way.Quote:
Originally Posted by Kurt Gabin
What do you think Ukraine should negotiate for, seeing as how Ukraine was invaded by Russia?Quote:
Originally Posted by Kurt Gabin
What would you negotiate for, if some country invaded Russia? Do Ukrainians have the same rights as Russians to be free of invasions from other countries?
Looks like Putin has succeeded in mobilizing over a quarter million young men in Russia. They mobilized themselves right out of Russia.
https://nitter.net/carlbildt/status/...974317219845#m
nato abuses sad bald bully man into attacking innocent blond-haired, blue-eyed wheat farmers
America gets to look like hero again and the mic gets to fuck your bitch renewed for the next 50 years
And then people complain about technocracy as if it's inferior to republicanism and dictatorship
"President Vladimir Putin grants Russian citizenship to former US security contractor Edward Snowden."
Lucky guy. He can now be conscripted into Russia's mobilization.
https://nitter.net/seungminkim/statu...krJQISAAA%3D#r
Maybe Trump can get the same deal. Please?
>> What do you think Ukraine should negotiate for, seeing as how Ukraine was invaded by Russia?
Apparently, you still have not familiarized yourself with the history of this conflict and do not understand what is going on, so here is the whole story
In the early 1990s, the Soviet Union collapsed and its republics became separate states. Among other things, they had to decide whether they were going to maintain their previous economic ties or develop relations with other countries. Until 2014, Russia remained the main trading partner of Ukraine. By the way, even now, right during the war, they manage to trade with us and Russia remains the third largest market for their exports.
In the 2000s, they began to discuss whether they should join the European Union. Russia, of course, did not like this, but no one forbade them to do this, and they even agreed on a plan to join the EU until 2018.
Now back to economics. The main products of Ukraine are steel, coal and grain. In the 2000s, the Chinese Party set a goal to increase steel production, and the Chinese exceeded the target so much that steel and coal prices collapsed. Because of this, by 2013, the Ukrainian economy was in a difficult state and they even had a deflation.
In the same year, their government was conducting regular negotiations on joining the EU, but officials from the EU were not very interested in accepting more beggars for maintenance and put forward additional requirements for the government of Ukraine.
Against the backdrop of a difficult economic situation, this became an opportunity for opposition nationalist parties to make a revolution and overthrow the old government. Since then, the government of Ukraine has been a mixture of nationalists and populists. They began to give out promises about how great it will be to live when Ukraine joins the EU and NATO. But at the same time, they remembered what they did to the previous government and understood that in the future they would have to explain why the EU did not want to accept them. They found a very simple explanation: the white master does not want to accept us, because the evil Russians do not let us go.
The latter was rather stupid, especially in terms of the promises to join NATO, since Russia and Ukraine had a lease agreement for a military base in Crimea, which allows to control the entire Black Sea.
The military does not understand such jokes, they thought "What if these idiots are really taken to NATO?" And in 2014, the Russian army just came and took this base along with the entire Crimea.
In addition, as Ukraine, previously viewed as an ally by Russia, has become unpredictable and hostile neighbor, Russia has supported several separatist movements in Ukraine's border areas with it. It was assumed that when they achieved the status of republics, they would have a veto in the Ukrainian parliament and thus be able to block the most dangerous ideas of the new government.
After a short military conflict, the situation with these republics was frozen and agreed to be resolved through diplomacy. This is how the Minsk Agreements appeared.
Everything remained in this state for almost eight years. Until 2019, the president of Ukraine was the oligarch Poroshenko, who had something to lose. But you haven't forgotten about the populists yet, right? In May 2019, Ukrainians voted for comedian and actor Zelensky. It was the most foolish election campaign in history: politicians and oligarchs found this poor artist and made a series about how he becomes president and punishes politicians and oligarchs. Ukrainians watched this series and... believed!
In 2021, when inflation problems began in the United States and ratings began to fall, Americans showed up to this circus. The Ukrainian government was promised support in the confrontation against Russia, so they happily tore up the Minsk Agreements and rallied to clean up the separatist republics through military action. From October 2021, they began to demand that Russia refuse to support these republics. At the same time, the United States imposed more and more sanctions, so that in the end Putin just went crazy with the number of them and said, “WTF! If the US has already imposed sanctions, and Ukraine is going to take these republics by force, then what do I have to lose?"
I am not defending our Darkest Lord, but we need to assess the situation objectively and understand that there is no way that Ukraine will win anything in this war. In fact, there is no longer such a country as Ukraine, its politicians have destroyed it. Every third citizen left the country, the rest survive and pray that it all ends, GDP has fallen DOUBLE, their politicians have sold their grain to the West, so in winter the country will face hunger (obviously, this year Ukrainian farmers did not sow anything)... And how will they fight with Russia? Do you really think that a poor country whose name translates as "Outskirts" and which was the outskirts of the Soviet Union, after which it was plundered by constantly changing groups for two decades, has anything other than Soviet weapons of the 70s? And who will fight? I have already mentioned the numbers, you can estimate the alignment of forces. 200,000 men against a militarized country that has 10 times as many soldiers in reserve alone and 150 times as many if it goes all out? Against the world's second largest arms manufacturer? Who you want they fight for? For a comedian? For the oligarchs?
Therefore, it is obvious that the negotiations will be about anything Putin wants.
>>What would you negotiate for, if some country invaded Russia? Do Ukrainians have the same rights as Russians to be free of invasions from other countries?
Unfortunately, politicians have no morals, and in such a situation it makes no sense to talk in such categories. The only good thing they did in this war was to reduce the number of injured civilians to a minimum. Although, wait, there is still a moral here: don't vote for actors, they are not better presidents than artists.
A'ight, I'll need to read more about the subject. It's pointless to have an opinion about stuff like this without doing (lots of) research.Quote:
Originally Posted by Poptart
It's entirely possible that Nuland's telephone conversation was completely taken out of context. I also know for a fact that Yanukovich was indeed voted out of office by the Ukrainian parliament following Euromaidan, not somehow removed at gunpoint, and that his removal wasn't necessarily illegal (although, again, I'm out of my depth when discussing the legality and legitimacy of this move).
But I'm going to look for a more objective source. This author seems biased, and she glosses over some things when dismissing Donetsk and Luhansk's case for independence:
She describes the Donbass republics as "gangster states", citing their criminality and corruption (I can believe this, and I somewhat doubt that these problems will be quickly solved by joining Russia). But it isn't immediately obvious that their criminality and corruption were far outside the norm compared to other parts of Ukraine, in case that's her implication. And even if they were criminal and corrupt, I don't see why a region's internal problems would affect its legal case for independence under international law.
She says that the rest of Ukraine, including its Russian-speaking regions (which also disapproved of the post-Euromaidan government), were opposed to the secession of the Luhansk and Donetsk republics. But she doesn't provide legal reasons for why one region's disapproval would negate another region's case for independence. In a recent instance, the International Court of Justice ruled that Kosovo (which was also in conflict with the Serbian central government and barred from independence under Serbian law) was legally allowed, under international law, to unilaterally declare independence from Serbia (1). I don't know for sure if these (and other) cases for independence are similar, but it seems like an important question to tackle.
When discussing the war in Donbass, she condemns but glosses over Ukraine's rocket attacks in populated areas (2). She says that these crimes "cannot compare" to the "criminality and lawlessness" of the Donbass republics, but she never justifies this. The killing of civilians, however intentional or unintentional, doesn't seem trivial, and it certainly can compare unfavourably to criminality and lawlessness. It's possible to invoke her logic for justifying Russia's invasion of Ukraine, citing the fact that Ukraine is a corrupt country that's controlled by oligarchs.
Russian air supremacy isn't a thing for some reason. This article gives an interesting viewpoint (defence news) as to why. Among other things, Russian reconnaissance is god-awful (not enough reconnaissance drones; Russian satellite imagery is slow and blurry), meaning that the Russian air force can only attack known targets. Russian pilots stay away from Ukrainian airspace for that reason.
Russian milbloggers (the few that I read, anyway) periodically freak out about the lack of good reconnaissance.
Ukraine, on the other hand, has great reconnaissance (NATO-tier). :thumbsup:
Once the Russian-occupied regions finish their referendums (is there any doubt that they'll vote to become part of Russia? lol), I don't suppose that Russia will agree to cede them back to Ukraine. Ukraine's public stance is that it intends to liberate all captured territories. Is there still any hope for a negotiated peace at this point, or is one side just going to have to win decisively?
Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
I really don't understand why people think that a negotiated peace is in Ukraine's favor. Look at the history of treaties and promises between Russia and Ukraine. The only treaty that Russia ever kept was the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact.
@xerx, you're in Canada, correct? What if the US military just rolled into Ontario, flattened the cities, killed men, women, and children indiscriminately, then held a "referendum" which said that Ontario is now part of the US, and the men there have to join the army to fight the other provinces?
Plus, you Canadians don't speak American.
What would you want to negotiate?
Some people say that Russians should be allowed to travel to other countries, because denying an escape route from Russia would harm the "good" Russians.
Other people say that closing the borders and keeping the "good" Russians in their own country just might force them to take action against their present government, assuming that they don't actually like it, and aren't just fleeing to avoid getting killed in Putin's war of imperialism.
Let's hear what the Russians themselves say: https://nitter.net/Fella_Tuga/status...772367704067#m
@xerx, I'm constantly amazed at how legal and proper you are. Your instincts are very different from mine, and I admire them.Quote:
Originally Posted by xerx
I'd rather have you than me as a judge.
i believe most ppl in eastern europe are degenerates, this also has to do with the good ones fleeing leaving the nationalists to reproduce there and keep ruining their own countries and forcing even more of the good ones to flee . it makes sense the case would be the worst in russia. this does not mean all of them are like that, and u may not care too mcuh about minor casualties if u see it as necessary evil. it should be also obvious that russians who didnt express hatred towards ukranians were not included in the video. its unclear to me if u think russians should be allowed to flee. as a minority they cant overthrow the government and everyone whom supports itQuote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
I’m looking for arguments for why I should be more reasonable. You’ve provided a few, thanks.Quote:
Originally Posted by VewyScawwyNawcissist
I’ve also thought about why some countries seem to have a “Sociotype”. I believe that every society on earth has a natural and identical “normal” distribution of sociotypes. I also believe that the ratios between every type can be changed, by, say, shooting all the IEIs, or only allowing ESEs into the country. So, in this Darwinian way, a given type can become over-represented for a generation or two after the policy is applied.
I think that the US is LIE because, in the 1880’s, a lot of LIEs moved to the states from Europe, and the place has been a bastion of cold-hearted efficient self-interest ever since.
Similarly, a country can lose sociotypes if those types move away or cannot prosper or reproduce in adequate numbers to offset the selection process.
That may have occurred in Russia, but I have no proof of that.
My real question is why are countries the way they are? Socionics with Darwinian filters offers one explanation, but there are many other possibilities.
i swear u can see tribes in nature where u see all the people share exactly 1 perceiving function in the ego block, those tribes are defined by lifestyle and u can VI them all. from facial features to body features. it took me years to learn to VI and ofc i am not always accurate, and along those years i was skeptical of that idea, both of typology and of ppl in those tribes having particular types, but i kept looking and i started seeing it, and now not only with personality types but also mental illnesses and even god damn astrology.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
lifestyle, personality, relationships and sociotype are related to human evolution in nature
@Adam Strange put yourself in the shoes of a 70 year old Russian man who was born when Stalin was in power. @VewyScawwyNawcissist put yourself in the shoes of a Russian teenager about to get drafted to fight in Ukraine.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=03ovWDvGWEM
It's a provocatively obvious false flag Operation.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5rRZdiu1UE
"I can't stand it, I know you planned it
I'm gonna set it straight, this Watergate
I can't stand rocking when I'm in here
'Cause your crystal ball ain't so crystal clear
So while you sit back and wonder why
I got this fucking thorn in my side
Oh my God, it's a mirage
I'm tellin' y'all, it's a sabotage"
@Poptart, I can try to do this, but what I come up with is a person whose information about the world is restricted.Quote:
Originally Posted by Poptart
I believe that all other differences would be due to intrinsic attitude.
So, I can almost do this. What should I conclude from this?
I actually know a 71 year old Russian LIE who is extremely smart and also really reactionary. His view of the world is severely dysfunctional.
I also know 40 year old Russians, also graduates of Moscow University, who are not complete political idiots.
I think that willful ignorance and prejudice are choices.
Is ignorance a choice when access to information is heavily restricted?Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
Maybe I misunderstand what you mean by intrinsic attitude.
I wonder if Sol will be drafted
@Adam Strange education tends to have that effect. It’s why in 2016, your level of education was the strongest indicator of whether you voted for Trump or Hillary lol.Quote:
I also know 40 year old Russians, graduates of Moscow University, who are not complete political idiots.
i will find a way to escape or if i fail i will ruin as many of the lives of the men around me (as in russians drafted with me who are complcent) as i can before i die. i guess that could be not so good bc some of them may be trying ways to refuse to participate bc they have a brain and a moral compass, i should try to get that information without being suspected but assuming whoever is leading us thats my primary target, if i cant figure out a way to disable the unitQuote:
Originally Posted by Poptart
Ignorance in many cases can be corrected by life learning.Quote:
Originally Posted by Poptart
My grandparents were casual racists and I absorbed that attitude as a kid, but quickly discovered that prejudice is largely a measure of insecurity. To say nothing of it being disrespectful and (because I’m LIE) inefficient. If you discard a set of people for non-performance reasons, you are only hurting yourself.
Just surrender. You can Google the process. Hopefully, you don’t get killed accidentally.Quote:
Originally Posted by VewyScawwyNawcissist
Adam, I'm beginning to think your cynicism towards Russian people who are mostly victims of disinformation and a shitty dictator is pretty low.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
It is so hard to please everyone, @Wavebury.Quote:
Originally Posted by Wavebury
Your assumptions about my opinion are wrong. I don’t disrespect Russian people. My comment about not getting killed while surrendering is merely practical advice. I’ve seen videos of Russians surrendering, and there are bullets flying everywhere. It is a situation where anyone could get killed.
I’m sorry that your first impulse is to assume the worst about people.
Their names contain the letter R?Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
More seriously, it's probably "white Christian nationalism."
There are tons of books on why nations succeed and fail if you want look at this through lenses other than Socionics and Darwinism.Quote:
Originally Posted by Adam Strange
https://a.co/d/22OOJIw