If European leaders don't watch this and realise they need to take control of their own destiny they're idiots. Several European leaders visited this week bending the knee to try and stave off tariffs. Time to stand up, realise the US is no longer a reliable ally, and start building (on all fronts - military, manufacturing, tech, etc). Given the American people voted for this guy twice - the second time in spite of Jan 6th and multiple indictments against him - there's no reason to believe the next person they vote in won't be worse.
We just had the leader of a Swedish party saying that non-US nuclear armament plans are needed, this is very significant since it's been basically unthinkable to say as far back as the 1960s or so when our own nuclear program was dismantled (The program was discontinued partly due to internal pressures but also rumored longstanding US guarantees for being under a nuclear shield).
I'd openly appreciate Sweden doing a nuclear test, preferably with almost plausible deniability (like Israel).
I'd also count support for this from any of our politicians as a plus for any party in our election this fall.
We have lots of money, the Swedes has nuclear power, know how, industrial expertise and probably a few guys left that still remember last time (they could have done it a number of times) they covertly almost built a nuke.
Hey look, a NATO founding member with a backbone, congratulations!
> After yesterday's events in the White House, Haltbakk Bunkers, one of Norway's largest marine fuel companies, appears to have announced that it will no longer refuel American Navy vessels
France and the UK are the obvious candidates, as both are nuclear powers.
Ideally there would be some coordination at the EU level, but really hard to see that short term.
It is not a new idea, but France would love to have others pay for their nuclear weapons, without giving up control. So yes, it will be a while to sort this out, but the box is open now. It is clear that own nukes are the only thing, the big powers respect. So many countries will pursue them now.
And building a simple nuke is not that complicated - when you have the nuclear material. Europe does.
It's not all "very likely" the next president of France would be far right.
The 2024 French legislative (not Presidential) snap election was Macron calling the electorate's bluff that even though they disliked low growth, carbon taxes, inflation, unemployment, immigration, they still wouldn't vote for a FN govt (in the second round; view the first round as a protest vote where some voters for FN are tactically expressing discontent with the govt).
The 2027 French presidential election is a long way away yet and Polymarket doesn't even have a prediction market open for it yet, but Oddschecker puts Le Pen as frontrunner but not "very likely"; and that's before Bayrou emerges as Macron's successor [0]. Macron stands to gain a lot of influence in Europe if he can forge a good relationship with Germany's Merz.
Anyway, obviously a European nuclear deterrent would have to firewall against any of the large member-states or their leaders going rogue. Rutte and NATO haven't commented publicly yet on Trump's recent stance. See what happens at the next G7 summit in Canada, 6/2025. And of course the Ukraine settlement and who provides security guarantees for it.
Evangelical American Zionism hates Jewish people with a thin facade of support. A disturbingly large amount of Americans believe that it's prophecy and God's will that the Middle East be "cleansed in fire" and that Israel's role as the Jewish state is an essential part of the plan. It is the same support a farmer offers to pigs when they fill their trough with slop. They want Israel so they can see its destruction through nuclear war.
It is a disgusting viewpoint and essential to understanding American Zionist support of Israel. My (lifelong far-right conservative jack-Mormon) father shared this with me 25 years ago.
Trident, the United Kingdom’s nuclear weapons program is dependent on Washington for the maintenance, design, and testing of UK submarines. The nuclear missiles aboard them are on lease from Uncle Sam.
If France can keep Sweden from resuming their own nuclear weapons program, they don't have to worry about getting into a nuclear war with Sweden 40 years from now. (Unthinkable? So was Sweden joining a mutual defense alliance like NATO.)
Drones make nukes obsolete anyway. After you nuke a country its generals no longer have any incentive to surrender; they have nothing to go home to when they leave their bunkers.
There's a significant difference between Fat Man (21 kilotonnes TNT yield) and Little Boy (15 kT) and 400 Minuteman IIIs each carrying a W87 (300 kilotonnes each, 120 000 kilotonnes total). And that's one third of the US's current nuclear triad. The second leg is 14 submarines, each carrying 20 Trident II missiles, each armed with an average of four warheads in MIRVs, for a total of some 1100 deployed independently retargetable warheads, which can be 475-kilotonne W88 warheads or something smaller. I'd look up the gravity-bomb numbers, but I think I've had enough already.
The effects on a country of 1000 or 2000 radioactive mushroom clouds seem like they'd be quite a bit larger than the one or two we've seen previously. You could see a billion people dead within an hour.
But they're very unselective weapons. The reason for the trend toward these sub-megatonne warheads is that it makes them more selective so they have more strategic value. But they really can't compete with simple precision weapons there. The US's force of 2800-some warheads costs about US$60 billion per year to maintain, about 20 million dollars per year per warhead. US$200 million will buy you 200 000 commercial drones with which you can kill almost 200 000 individually selected people with grenades. That's enormously more strategically valuable than the million random people you can kill with the warhead.
You need people to arm and deploy 200k drones. With nukes you just press a button. They're also a lot cheaper if you skimp on maintenance and make up for it in quantity.
What? Nobody has been nuked since the first atomic bombs in Japan, and those were devastating, convincing them to fully surrender. A lot more powerful and effective ones have been developed during the cold war. A couple megatons dropped on a major city could cause a massive firestorm. EMPs could be generated high up in the atmosphere knocking out the grid and unshielded electronics.
Also, Thomas Nilsson, head of Sweden’s military intelligence service (MUST), said that Sweden must be ready for any eventuality [with Russia from the Finnish border to the Arctic] after a Ukraine settlement.
> If European leaders don't watch this and realise they need to take control of their own destiny they're idiots
They should take control. That's why it puzzled me why they are okay to get deindustrialized, are okay to destroy their nuclear plants, and are okay to rely on imports of natural gas from Russia
Europe still produces more than 20% of its electric power from nuclear plants. In hindsight, it was premature by Germany to shut down theirs so early, but looking at the rise of renewables it’s just a matter of time until nuclear will just be irrelevant (1). In addition, this will allow true energy independence while for example the German nuclear plants relied partially on fuel rods produced in Russia …
(1) Yes, there is the challenge of dark days with little wind, but there are many, many avenues to solve this one (better grid interconnections across Europe, green hydrogen backup plants, overbuilding cheap capacity, …)
> In hindsight, it was premature by Germany to shut down theirs so early
What hindsight? Everyone knew at the time that it was premature. It was a deliberate choice to bear the burden of increased pollution and to make the country more dependent on the whims of a foreign dictator, because nuclear bad.
Yes, some of the consequences could have been seen at that time, but I cannot remember that they were really part of the wider discussion. It was mostly nuclear safety vs nuclear‘s low CO2 emissions and alleged low costs. My memory might fail me, but I cannot remember that energy dependence was a big topic. Rather the opposite, nuclear was seen as „bridge technology“ that would eventually pave the way towards full renewable energy. Even the utility companies did not argue for a permanent place for nuclear in the power mix, but a slower switchover to lower the costs of the transition. I think most were already picturing the future 20 years down the road when decentralized renewables would create a green, independent, … future
There was no discussion. It was a knee-jerk decision by then-chancellor Merkel in the wake of the Fukushima nuclear incident, and constituted pretty much a 180 (relative to the maybe-phase-out-not-clear-when-definitely-not-now that was pretty much the bipartisan consensus at the time). It was clear to observers at the time that it would make Germany more reliant on coal and gas and, by extension, Putin, that it would threaten the energy-intensive German industry and it was criticized for that at the time. Calling this a hindsight debate is just silly.
The phase out of nuclear had already started. Merkel reversed that, than in the wake of Fukushima reversed that once again, paying the nuclear companies hundreds of millions of damages in the process.
First, nuclear power has been discussed intensively in Germany since the 1970s. While political moods shifted somewhat over the decades, in practical terms there was less and less willingness to maintain or even expand nuclear power: maintenance issues, rising costs, lack of consensus on permanent waste storage, lack of political direction, … would have resulted in a transition away from nuclear power in any case. Yes, the decision by Merkel was sudden but it didn’t emerge from nowhere. Nuclear power was already doomed in Germany and it was just a question of when it would die. And despite all the discussions, I still cannot remember (or find) that dependence from Russia was even in the top-5 of arguments from either side
> And despite all the discussions, I still cannot remember (or find) that dependence from Russia was even in the top-5 of arguments from either side
The Nord Stream pipeline was completed in 2011, the same year Merkel decided to accelerate the phase out of nuclear. The US had repeatedly warned against constructing the pipeline because of energy dependence on Russia.
Everyone knew that apart from coal Germany has no energy resources. Given that it wouldn't be possible to meet climate goals with coal the energy would need to come from either the newly constructed pipeline or renewables.
That the newly created energy dependence would give power to dictatorships may not have been at the forefront of the public's mind. But treating it as something unknowable without hindsight lets the politicians who caused this travesty off too easy. If Merkel had been honest to the public about the potential consequences of her decision, perhaps it would've been a part of the debate.
> more dependent on the whims of a foreign dictator
You do realize that Germany is not allowed to do any uranium enrichment or waste processing? All of this was outsourced, partially to France, but primarily to Russia.
How is that not "dependent on the whims of a foreign dictator"
Actually, I'm pretty sure it was a lot of fearmongering due to the Fukushima incident which started that wave of anti-nuclear in Germany. A bad decision, for sure.
> Europe still produces more than 20% of its electric power from nuclear plants.
That's technically true, but France's representation is completely outsized in that, as the one country which went hard on nuclear it's got more than half the nuclear production of the continent: https://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/statistics-explained/index.php...
And that's being down 25% from its historical peaks because a significant fraction of the park was offline for unscheduled maintenance due to corrosion issues (I believe the park's been ramping back up and should be back to full).
IIRC France is the number 3 nuclear electricity producer on the planet behind the US and China.
With time being relative, nuclear might become irrelevant, though that's very far off into the future. It's very important to have stable baseline power generation that you can depend on, and not the whims of the weather. Wind turbines don't do constant production even off-shore, as there are periods where it's either too windy or not windy enough so they can't work, even though it's more rare than on-shore wind.
We don't need stable baseline power generation, we need a stable power line frequency. I know there are grid engineers here that could explain it better than me, but FWIW, nuclear power plants are sloooow, and thus terrible at reacting to fluctuations in the line frequency. Even if there are nuclear power plants, you use hydro-, gas-, or (hypothetically) battery-power in so called dispatch power plants to maintain the frequency.
Add on top the insane costs of building, maintaining, and waste disposal, nuclear power plants are, without subventions, just not economically viable. But keep on researching, there is interesting stuff happening in this space, and -- who knows -- maybe something moves the equation around.
> there are many, many avenues to solve this one (better grid interconnections across Europe, green hydrogen backup plants, overbuilding cheap capacity, …)
All those options are currently non-viable because they are too expensive.
The problem is that the few dark days with little wind cost as much to produce as all remaining days of the year (and may even surpass it). Interconnections added to the problem, with worse long term allocation of hydro storage and increased volatile in the energy market. Market forces has been a direct hindrance, with citizens in practically every EU country demanding government subsidizes to solve the issue of energy shortage, rather then reducing demand.
Looking at a typical energy bill from northern Europe, you almost don't pay anything for hours when wind production is optimal. The cost of those hours are basically a rounding error and all you pay are grid fees. The issue is the average price are more than 20x of that, and the peak price are well over 100x.
> In hindsight, it was premature by Germany to shut down theirs so early
This is a widespread talking point that is more wrong than correct:
Germany did not shut down its nuclear reactors early. In fact, those reactors should have been shut down decades ago. They had been well past their intended shelf lives.
The decision to finally shut them down also dates back to Merkel during the Fukushima incident (2011). So the timeline to shutting them down wasn't exactly short either. The last nuclear reactors were shut down well more than ten years after the original decision was made.
What you can blame Germany for is not building new nuclear reactors. Germany hadn't built new nuclear reactors since Chernobyl - the last reactor to come online was in 1988. The influence of the anti-nuclear protests was strong enough to prevent the construction of new reactors but not enough to phase out the ones that existed. Instead Germany continued extending their runtimes over and over again because this was easier to justify politically (or rather because it was less obvious than building new ones).
So in other words: it took Germany from 1986 (Chernobyl) to 2023 to shut down its reactors. But it did so in an extremely irresponsible way. And it still didn't have proper plans in place like investing in grid infrastructure and storage necessary to expand renewables.
That said, nuclear power is overrated as the one thing it does well is constant stable energy production. But the problem in the modern grid is not not having enough energy, the problem is not having enough energy on demand. Renewables can provide enough energy but they are unstable. You need something to cover those dips and nuclear doesn't work for that because you can't really scale it up and down much. Storage would be ideal but for the majority of time since the reunion Germany has been under a conservative government which doesn't want to spend money on infrastructure maintenance let alone investments (let's see if this conservative government will do things differently as Black Rock Merz has been promising in between his anti-woke populism). But for the time being the only option Germany has is fossil.
Germany spent 1 trillion euros on renewable energy, has the most expensive electricity in the EU and emits much more than nuclear France. Can we just move on and accept that renewables do not work at larger scales?
First they aren't, which is why Germany and other countries need to provide massive subsidies to producers. Also a source of energy that produces only when wind blows is quite useless, even if it's free. Your source of energy should produce when you have the need for it.
And storage is typically something thay doesn't scale, which is why Germany needs coal or gas to complement renewables. Polluting the rest of Europe while doing so.
Even the term of "renewables" is untrue, given the relatively short lifespan of most windfarms and solar panels. After 25 years you have to trash them, with no real way to recycle it.
Germany spent a lot on renewables but next to nothing on actual grid infrastructure and storage. Energy prices depend on the most expensive option in the mix at any given time. In Germany that means energy prices are dictated by the gas price. No amount of renewables helps with that unless you can eliminate gas entirely.
Because storage and grid infrastructure are immensely expensive and don't scale. Storage alone has negative returns above a certain capacity. You ask a country to rebuild its whole electrical infrastructure. It's a massive waste of capital.
Grid infrastructure requirements alone likely negates any ecological benefits given the amount of copper needed and the abysmal ecological conditions of copper mining.
You're misattributing the issues entirely. The issues right now are caused by the markets not reflecting reality.
If Germany were to split its electrical grid into two (north and south), as economists and the EU demand, things would be clearer.
The northern grid would produce more renewable energy than is required in total (hovering between 120-300% production vs usage). It'd have electricity prices around 10-15ct/kWh
The southern grid would have more pollution than even poland, as it's primarily fed with lignite, and would end up with an electricity price above 90ct/kWh.
The issues in Germany are not caused by technical or economical challenges, but by political ones. The southern states have passed laws to restrict renewables and limit construction of new power lines to gain favors with conservative NIMBYs and newage NIMBYs.
Look into the German Chancellor that shut down the nuclear power plants and brought in natural gas from Russia is up to these days. It wasn't "Europe" being ok with it, just classic grift.
Merkel might have followed his idea but she made the final decision. It was Merkel (after Fukushima) who declared an end to nuclear power in Germany - pandering to Green voters.
The idea might well have come from the Schroeder Government but he did not make the final decision. In fact, the idea of nuclear exit is an idea of the Greens, Schroeder was pandering to the Greens in his coalition government back in the day. (Schroeder being SPD ("socialist"), Merkel being CDU ("conservative") and the Greens being the king makers back in the day - 2002 elections).
One has to remember that it was different times: the Greens were a serious alternative to SPD and CDU, one of their main ideals (since their foundation) has been an exit from nuclear (generally). So once they came into power with the SPD and Schroeder, they were naturally keen on asserting their influence.
Schroeder needed an alternative power source so he started looking to Russia. Russia was a serious partner in Europe, not only for Germany but all of Europe. After the fall of the wall, the policy of Europe was Russian integration into Europe. Why? Because this policy of interdependence of nations within Europe brought peace to Europe. Interdependence is - within capitalism - best achieved via trade amongst nations. Hence Germanys (not only Schroeder but german industry too) decision to accept (more) cheap gas and oil from Russia. The Russians were keen to bypass Ukraine and deliver gas directly to Germany, hence the idea of building the Nordstream 2 pipeline - an idea supported by the Schroeder Government and most probably german industry.
The Nordstream 2 pipeline was completed in Merkels times but it was never brought online. Olaf Scholz (SPD) made the final decision not to take the pipeline online because of Russias official recognition of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions as Russian. It was bombed - destroyed? - by unknown persons during the current war in 2022.
The result of these events has been raising energy costs in Germany. Which has lead to disenchantment in the political system, which in turn has lead to a shift to the right in Germany and a raise in the AFD. Ironically, it has now come full circle with a CDU suggesting an easing (if not removal) of the "Schuldenbremse"[1] ("brake on debt") - meaning that Germany is not allowed to borrow money above a certain limit. A policy that has destroyed investment in the country and lead to an evasion to risk-taking. A policy introduced by the CDU back in 2009.
In the end, it is all rather academic since we're now here and pointing fingers at the past is pointless. We're now facing a populist president in the USA, a populist Kanzler (prime minister) in German and chaos in Europe and the World.
For me, it seems that good ideas are always the success of those that commit to those ideas, never those that actually had the ideas. Bad ideas, on the other hand, are always the fault of those that had the ideas, never those that committed to those ideas. Unfortunately hindsight decides between good and bad ideas.
I was thinking about this recently, and wondering the EU will start moving away from the USD, further weakening the global strength of USD and America. They are already dealing with BRIC, and the potential of crypto (likely Bitcoin) to remove any single currency as providing power to any country.
The US has benefitted hugely by being the reserve currency, but that strength is also a weakness that can be used against them, but only if the other countries collaborate, which the EU is most capable of.
The benefit of the reserve currency is our ability to run huge deficits and the result is a loss of our industrial base. It's a double-edged sword but one that ends up leaving us vulnerable. If we had a major non-nuclear conflict with China, for example, they would out build us the way we out built the Germans in WWII.
I see it the precise other way around, essentially the position parodied by Yes Prime Minister with Hacker's Grand Design.
Basically, there's never a sensible reason to use the nukes. Let's suppose the EU invades Russia. We seize Pskov, should Russia use its nukes? Of course not, we will nuke them in turn. If we take Novgorod, should they use them? Of course not, it'll be nuclear annihilation. St Petersburg, Pskov, Novgorod? No. Moscow? No.
There's never any reason to fire the missiles, and if they respond with a limited nuclear strike, we just match it with one causing, let's say, 10% more damage and keep pushing.
As long as you have nukes yourself nukes are irrelevant and won't be used other than in a limited way even as your conventional forces march through your enemy's capital.
If it was a non-nuclear conflict Russian would have been mowed down long time ago. The only reason why Russia is still in the game is defensive plans involving tactical nuclear weapons.
Both sides do have nuclear weapons. Europe has France.
While there are no European armies in Ukraine, we are not neutral and thus in principle in some way at war with Russia. Presumably this is why our PM here in Sweden has said that we are neither at war nor not at war-- i.e. we're legally at war with Russia, but it's a sort of phony-war á la 1938.
As a US citizen horrified by the people that voted for Trump, this is my big fear too.
We have never had a weaker president that caused so many self-inflicted wounds.
This administration is shaping up to be self-immolation covered by the veneer of strength, for people that don't understand what strength is.
The small fraction of Silicon Valley that bent the knee to this narcissist wanna-be-king have shown themselves to be unbelievably weak too. It's surprising. I have lost so much respect for so many people over the past 6 months, but I fear much more for the future prosperity that we have needlessly destroyed.
"As a US citizen horrified by the people that voted for Trump"
Congratulations, you've been successfully propagandized to a point where you view people who don't vote the way you do as morally inferior. I'm sure that will help you persuade them in the future.
"This administration is shaping up to be self-immolation covered by the veneer of strength, for people that don't understand what strength is." Oh, so you know what strength is huh? Did you ever serve in the military? Do you even have friends who did?
Interesting that you ignore the fact that the previous president was mentally incapable of the job for increasingly long intervals as his term progressed, and was so incompetent on the Afghanistan withdrawal that he projected tremendous weakness that acted as an invite for Putin to launch a full scale assault less than a year later.
Biden did nothing for Silicon Valley, other than try to regulate AI to a point where only a small handful of massive companies had foundation models. Marc Andreesen didn't support Trump until AFTER the Biden administration bureaucrats met with him and told him they would ensure that they would only allow a small handful of foundation AI companies that they tightly regulated to exist. He was so horrified that he switched over.
The moral inversion it takes to claim that the people willing to stand agains the Valley's intense social conformity "weak" is also revealing about how brainwashed you truly are. You're just part of the mob, and if you lived in a super conservative place, you'd be part of that mob too. Freethinking requires courage, and I see none of it in the typical SV limousine liberal. Just a bunch of millionaires who hate the billionaires they envy.
You elected a mad king who is intent on tearing down the alliances that have made the US prosper over the last 80 years. I don't think your parent is the one who is brainwashed. Embracing tyranny is only "courageous free thinking" in a fever dream.
You don’t think there has been mad kings in the last 80 years? You think the Iraq/Afghanistan dalliances were not inherently domination oriented? JFK was killed for specific reasons that you can look up if you at all curious.
Nixon's administration is sill within 60 years old, so of course this isn't the only attempt in 80 years. Sad part was we were actually good at shaming corruption back then. Not sure what happened to make us complacent to daily Watergate+ level scaandals.
JP, the tone of your answer actually jumps to all the conclusions, and name calling. Epi just said "he was horrified", he did not in any way suggest that the people who voted for Trump were inferior.
Having said that, Biden was a pretty crap and useless leader. That doesn't mean the opposite of Biden is doing better. At least Biden did fairly minimal damage with his inaction.
Do I disagree with Biden's take on AI? Sure, but did they actually have any teeth to stop progress? China's progress in AI proves not.
You were very quick to blame others for being successfully propagandized. I suggest you point the same magnifying glass on yourself.
I have no clue why people keep saying Biden was useless. He had to handle the COVID pandemic at its worst (after Trump 45's early actions made things worse) and managed to ease the economy to avoid (or at elast, delay) a recession compared to most other countries. He had to handle the decisions with the Ukrainan war which let the stand strong for 3 years, and unlike Trumps false promises he was starting to bring in local American production in light of realizing we were losing to China. He may not take full credit, but he also had an incredibly effective FTC/FCC that was harkening back to the days of attacking Robber Barons.
He was a good (not great) president in unprecedented bad times. He's no FDR but "inaction" would have had America in a truly awful situation. So where did all his "useless leader" narrative come from? Did people really get that brainwashed from one bad night as the proceeding precedent is spouting nonsense on the daily?
Where Biden really failed was messaging, and the failure was at least in part related to his age.
Trump does an amazing job messaging. Sure, 99% of what he says is either a lie senile ramblings, but he’s out there all the time. A social media POTUS indeed.
It is depressing to think that future presidents will probably follow Trump’s lead. I liked having a boring president for four years who didn’t feel the need to be the center of attention all the time. I get that disciplined restraint must be balanced with communicating to Americans, like maybe the best kid was with Obama or Clinton, who communicated often but never did with so much bluster or arrogance.
I’m hoping the American people don’t require that level of bluster. I think a younger Biden who could have effectively communicated his empathy, accomplishments, challenges with inflation and etc… could have won again. The election really was very close.
Another data point is when many other politicians have tried to be like Trump, they have lost. We’ll just have to see what happens in 2 and 4 years.
Wow, politics really doesn't belong here. I have no idea why your comment would be downvoted. I disagree that Biden was effective, but should you really be downvoted because people disagree with you?
You kinda make a good point regarding Covid, but at the same time, I think the action he took there was basically what any non-lunatic would do. It wasn't like he had some massive amazing plan and he actioned it. He just stopped the ignorance of previous administration.
WRT Ukraine, "letting them stand strong" wasn't strong enough. The delays and lack of significant support is, I believe, what has caused the war to drag on. It's like there being a person with cancer, and rather than giving them enough chemo to kill the cancer, you give them just enough that the cancer has difficulty spreading.
What was necessary was a conclusive coordinated action among allies, so that isn't entirely Biden's fault, but everything did seem haphazard.
Also, being in Australia, I think from an economic standpoint, you are overstating the easing of the economy. Everyone has faced some level of inflation, but when I go to the US, it seems to me that "real" inflation has hit you more than other countries I've visited.
Can you explain either of your points? What do you mean? Do you have evidence?
For example, whatever one thinks about US immigration policy (I think it’s utterly broken to the point of absurdity), a cursory attempt to figure out the approximate net number of illegal immigrants added during Biden’s tenure comes suggests that the net change was pretty small. It seems that there
has been a trend toward net addition of illegal immigrants in the last few years that (a) is small compared to the total number in the US and (b) started well before the end of the last Trump administration.
I did find plenty of partisan sources trying to shock me with numbers of border encounters that contain many digits, but there doesn’t seem to be much explanation of why this is a useful statistic or to what extent Biden’s administration had much to do with it. (There was a program derisively referred to as “catch and release” that seems likely to have resulted in a temporary increase in “border encounters,” but I don’t see evidence that it had much effect on net illegal immigration.)
As for graft, I genuinely have no idea what you’re referring to.
The illegal immigrant numbers aren't really meaningful anymore since we moved to a policy where anyone who crosses the border and says "asylum" gets to stay for years as a legal immigrant awaiting a court date.
You are correct finding numbers can be a bit hard. Here is what I have found.
Since President Biden took office in January 2021, the U.S. has experienced a significant increase in illegal border crossings. Reports indicate that there have been approximately 8 million "encounters" at the U.S.-Mexico border during his tenure, a substantial rise compared to previous administrations.
This surge is notably higher than the figures recorded during the Trump administration, which saw approximately 2.4 million encounters over four years.
For graft I was referring to the continual mismanagement of funds by Federal Departments.
- An estimated $236 billion in improper payments were made, encompassing over-payments, underpayments, and payments lacking proper documentation.
- The DOD hasn't passed an audit in in 7 years! We can not account for our spending or our military assets.
- The whole US Aid thing is also part of that graft. US dollars going to questionable endeavors to enrich a few.
There are many more examples from FEMA and other organizations. The examples illustrate a systemic issue with the federal governments financial management.
Can we recognise how bad of a look it is to be calling people "illegals" while your leaders are giving Nazi salutes, opening concentration camps and referring to people on welfare as parasites? I don't think any of us should be engaging with such violently charged language anymore. By all means have the discussion respectfully but it's distressing to see people continue with this dehumanising language while the rest of us look on in horror.
I don't agree that it is a bad look. People on welfare are taking from the system and people who cross our borders and enter and stay in our country without visas are illegal. People who look at such things with "horror" dehumanize the conversation by refusing to admit the harsh truths of the world. It is like they bathe themselves in weakness and virtue signaling. They hide from how cruel the world is and try to bring everything down to some tame level that doesn't exist solely so they can control the discourse.
> People on welfare are taking from the system and people who cross our borders and enter and stay in our country without visas are illegal.
They are taking from the system, yes. They are people who receive welfare, not parasites. People who emigrate illegally have committed a crime, they are not themselves a crime , they are not themselves illegal. The most we could stretch to would be "illegally present people." But going further and calling a group of people "illegals" removes the human aspect from the conversation and is therefore quite literally dehumanising.
> People who look at such things with "horror" dehumanize the conversation
A conversation is not a human so this point comes across as absurd. Could you rephrase it?
> It is like they bathe themselves in weakness and virtue signaling.
This point comes across as a vaccuous ad hominem, could you rephrase it?
> They hide from how cruel the world is
I can speak for myself and say that I am very much not doing that. I couldn't be more conscious of the fact that the last time language like this was normalised it lead to the deaths of millions of innocent people. This cannot happen again. It is purely the incredible cruelty of this world that drives me to say what I am saying.
When the completely descriptive term "illegal immigrant" becomes somehow an immoral thing to call people who immigrate illegally, it was a bit absurd. Literally every illegal immigrant has committed a crime, by definition, and that crime is immigrating illegally - "illegal" describes the mode of immigration. The previous administration used "undocumented immigrant" (and often shortened it to "undocumented") as a sort of "softening" language game.
You're talking about the term "illegal immigrants" but I was responding to the use of the term "illegals." The term you're using includes the word migrant and is therefore not dehumanising in the same way. The difference is between using illegal as an alternative or a noun. Sorry if that wasn't clear from what I said
I'm sorry but these are the word games that drive the right. In essence, no one gives a shit. You are only signaling to other liberals and accomplishing nothing. Why not focus on a fight that matters.
You've made a good example of the danger of using words like this to group people. You've made an incorrect assumption that I am a "liberal" and you've made no argument beyond that I am serving a boogeyman in the nebulous concept of "the right," perpetuating a black and white idea of us-and-them politics and shoe-horning every possible opinion into one of two camps.
If you genuinely want to change my behaviour then please substantiate your claims, give arguments for the points you're making and speak to me like an individual rather than a hologram of whatever group you're projecting onto me.
I don't care about political labels. These niche arguments are useless - they don't change anyone's mind. Both sides use these debates as examples to portray the other as extreme. I'm tired of discourse that claims to enlighten but only pushes people further apart, regardless of intent.
You don't care about political labels but your entire argument was that my position "drives the right" -- no reasoning was offered, only the claim that your boogeyman of choice was somehow being strengthened. You don't care about labels but you made sure to accompany your claim by pointing out that I was "only signaling to other liberals" making again a point with no content other than the boogeyman and now with the addition of now placing me within that group on the basis of my position.
I've read back on this exchange several times. I see that I am positing something about language and explaining my reasoning, then you're responding with cries about "word games" without saying anything of substance. Do you see the same thing? What are you trying to say and why?
The word games I was referring to were your overly technical analysis of the term "illegal." In everyday conversation, people don't care about logical breakdowns of words. They find such arguments absurd and view those making these claims as out of touch. While you might see it as a justified position, most people perceive it as someone being pedantic/elitist with too much time on their hands.
I'm sorry that I assumed you belonged to a group on a political thread where everyone was trashing Trump. It was a dumb mistake to assume you are worried about the rise of the far right.
If we should call things what they are, we should definitely start by calling Americans who emigrate to other countries what they are: immigrants in the other country. Of course most choose to cutely refer to themselves as "expats".
Sure, I agree you should call them that. "Expat" is short for "expatriate" which is about where they come from. They are both expatriates of America and immigrants to wherever they go.
I'm just pointing out that the most plausible reason your fellow countrymen choose to call themselves "expats" wherever they go, is because the rhetoric in your country has dehumanized or made the word immigrants/illegal "dirty".
Not hard to imagine such rhetoric can lead to nastiness all around, ending even in violence against said group. If you don't mind that and see no problem with that, then of course there's absolutely no common ground for us to have any discussion on :)
I don't agree with you that the words "illegal immigrant" create violence. Also, "immigrant" does not carry a negative connotation in most uses as far as I can tell. The negative connotation comes from the word "illegal," which marks someone who commits a crime (illegal immigration) as a criminal. Of course, aside from arrest and deportation, they do not deserve to be subject to violence or maltreatment. That is how every country in the world treats people who immigrate illegally.
I am a second-generation American and actually have been told "go back to your country" and been given the "you don't belong here" before, too. The people who say that shit are assholes and are worth ignoring (it's very easy). But thank you for informing me that disliking the people who jump the line invalidates my perspective.
When the completely descriptive term "illegal immigrant" becomes somehow an immoral thing to call people who immigrate illegally, it was a bit absurd
I think you're missing GP's point. It's "illegals" that's arguably dehumanizing. Similar to "blacks" or "the blacks" versus "black people".
I'm not saying that I necessarily agree with GP, but I've definitely picked up on racism from people who talk about "blacks" instead of black people, and the homophobia from people who talk about "the gays" instead of gay people.
Who says it isn't? If you want my opinion, it's the same habit creeping into the new language. Whether or not that's dehumanizing, I don't know, and I don't care. I'm fine with the term "illegals". I was just explaining what I understood GP's point to be.
I really don't want to get into de-railing the conversation away from the very real concern of the rise of facism in the US, but "undocumented" here is a factual adjective whereas using the term "illegals" as a noun is a clear scare-word. The more neutral equivalent would be "illegal immigrants" and the more charged version of "the undocumented" would be "undocumenteds."
The real problem is the totality of it. We've gone far past calling them "illegal" to saying "they're poisoning the blood of our country", which incidentally is also language used by Nazis.
The things they say consistently ratchet toward justifications for genocide rather than away from it, and that's how it works - one small step at a time, where people explain each one away as not that bad.
But each step is toward the day when you can say "... and therefore we must implement a final solution for the problem of illegals. I wish it didn't have to be this way, but they forced us to by poisoning and invading our country."
It's a long way to go from the word "illegal(s)" and large-scale deportations to Nazism and genocide. Deportation of illegal immigrants is a good thing. Illegal immigration is a violation of the law, and it is routine for people who overstay a visa to be deported (and usually banned from entry to a country for 10-20 years).
There are people who wait decades to legally get a visa, and all of the people who saunter over the border thinking they are above the law make a mockery of the people who do it the right way. While you keep imagining an unavoidable slippery slope to genocide, I will celebrate the return of the rule of law to immigration while making sure that it goes no further.
We're far past "illegals" tho. Like I said, we are at "vermin poisoning the blood of the country". We are past "detention facilities", and we are on to "military controlled black site known for torturing terrorists where media can't see". And the political climate has moved from "we need to build a wall" to "we need to deport 11 million people and challenge the constitutionality of citizenship".
We are closer than you think. All they need at this point is to start defying court orders and there are no more guardrails. None. They have the authority. They have the social permission structure. They have immunity from laws. They control the police and military. What's left?
If you disagree, please point to what would prevent this administration from carrying out a "final solution" against immigrants?
As I said in my initial comment those are all points that can be made respectfully. I have no issue with someone arguing in favour of deporting those who have illegally emigrated. That argument is indeed a far way away from Nazism.
Where it becomes concerning is when this dehumanising language begins to creep in. When the administration begins talking about people as "vermin" it becomes very concerning.
Where the fear of Nazism comes in is when we see Nazi salutes and plans to move "the illegals" to purpose built camps outside of normal American jurisdiction in Guantanamo Bay.
Yes, but making the world a less cruel place requires strength—strength of purpose, strength of character, and intellectual strength to have hard conversations about hard realities. We don’t reduce cruelty by ignoring the harm done by those who break the law. The people you defend are not victims—they are the ones making life harder for others, whether it’s overwhelming social services, committing crimes, or undercutting legal immigrants who followed the rules.
We don’t fight cruelty by sanitizing language or pretending reality isn’t what it is. We fight it by acknowledging hard truths and having the courage to address them honestly, not emotionally.
You realize that tons of industries directly support illegal immigration by hiring said illegals right? All of agribusiness, nearly all restaurants, warehouses, meat packing etc. etc. Have you ever stopped to wonder why we don't throw the business owners in jail for this? We would stop illegal immigration overnight if we jailed the actors driving the demand but we never do, and this is bipartisan.
Capitalism is addicted to cheap labor, and it benefits from the demonization and criminalization of the immigrants as it makes them even cheaper and easier to exploit. So sure, demonize illegals all you want, you're playing the exact role the oligarchs want you to to deflect attention from them.
> Marc Andreesen didn't support Trump until AFTER the Biden administration bureaucrats met with him and told him they would ensure that they would only allow a small handful of foundation AI companies that they tightly regulated to exist. He was so horrified that he switched over.
a16z investments are mostly Cryptos and some AIs.
Andreesen loves Crypto and he hates that it's being regulated like mad (cause tons of scamming going on).
>>> Marc Andreesen didn't support Trump until AFTER the Biden administration bureaucrats met with him and told him they would ensure that they would only allow a small handful of foundation AI companies that they tightly regulated to exist. He was so horrified that he switched over.
That is the claim from Andreessen, and the way he told it sounded rather far-fetched. Has anyone else confirmed it?
Andreessen also claims (see Joe Rogan interview) that the US nuclear weapons testing program was some elaborate fake complete with fake movies of nuclear bomb tests. When someone makes such ludicrous claims, I tend to doubt anything else they say.
The Biden admin tried to shut them down by suing them for being an unlicensed security exchange. And they did this even though the only time the issue has been ruled on by a judge it was determined that crypto is not a security.
I thought Andreesen on the surface publicly "heel turned" because the Biden administration and SEC made some really weak motions at regulating cryptocurrencies. I believe Andreesen's words were "CRYPTO REGULATION TERROR REGIME", or something like that. Every day there is a bigger and bigger crypto token scam becoming public, not always but sometimes involving the most powerful person in the United States.
Thanks for giving a different perspective here. Unfortunately, I have to respectively disagree.
> was so incompetent on the Afghanistan withdrawal
That was based on a deal Trump made with the Taliban. I don't know if Trump would have botched it too. I would put that on Bush who f*ed up that war completely.
But ultimately it boils down to the moral inability of Americans to fight an uneven war. The problem here is the appeasement policy that unfortunately both sides suffer from.
> projected tremendous weakness
I think that's overblown. There are cases where it was true and others (such as Ukraine) where Biden showed how he can hold back Russia without risking a single US soldier. That was pretty good.
> Biden did nothing for Silicon Valley
The CHIPS act? Intel etc. got a ton of money. Battery manufacturing moved back to the states with multiple factories opening up.
He brought back manufacturing to the USA and gave a lot in that sense. The fact that he kept policies going (no tariffs etc.) was a huge benefit to tech which relies on stability and globalization.
> Freethinking requires courage, and I see none of it in the typical SV limousine liberal.
I think using language like that goes counter to free thinking. I despise Trump as a person, but I accept that some of the policies and stances aren't wrong. Unfortunately, discourse is at a level where we can't even have adult conversations on the issues without name-calling.
If you wish to discuss the topic, I'll happily explain every reason I hate the current administration. Of which there is many, and of which is bound in ojective stories I can point to with sources.
If you wish to instead accuse me of propaganda with no basis, thanks for justiying one of the reasons I hate the administration and their supporters. Mud slinging doesn't interest me in this day and age and your entire rant is not only baseless but has so many holes and inaccuracies that I'd recommend reading your history before trying to re-write such statements. .
It's wild seeing life imitating art, but the recent Civil War movie had the sitting president serving his 3rd term as to what probably caused 19 states to secede, and Trump has talked about somehow finding a way to serve a third term. One could argue that's just typical Trump bluster, like him telling people they won't have to vote again, or blue states might disappear in year. But I'm becoming more convinced he actual intends to do these things.
Biden 2020 was supposed to be civility prez, I don't think anybody thinks Trump is civil? Zelenskyy personality cult did need a dressing down but I also think it was a piece of a performance art, in all likelihood.
Ukraine could have been trivially avoided by Russia, as Ukraine did nothing to provoke the war except perhaps by the mere fact of its existence as a an independent country. But I assume you mean “avoidable by Biden.” How would Biden have avoided it?
What’s the second? Gaza? I give Biden approximately zero credit for competent handling of the situation, but that war was started by a surprise attack by one non-US party against another non-US party. Nobody asked the US’s opinion. I very much doubt that the US could have prevented that war by announcing a desire to annex Gaza.
Those are Russian bot talking points. Best to just ignore. Just like saying Ukraine started the current conflict and not so subtly removing all responsibility from Russia.
Good of you to get the correct talking points back on track! Curious how well this strategy will work? Is there a single Pro Russian perspectives allowed in a critique of a war we pay for? Almost seems like a problematic monoculture. Alas this is primarily a tech site but I would expect SOME debate.
“whataboutism” is a weak and recent phrase that means literally nothing. Please engage with specifics.
Most Americans would not agree with a 1939 “ascendant dictator in America” narrative and yet you do. I wonder how the “you people” strategy works in your brain? I do not think of HN audience as separate to “my” people. Silly that you do the inverse.
>Most Americans would not agree with a 1939 “ascendant dictator in America” narrative and yet you do.
Yes, I'm sure of that. Just as Germans in 1939 would also not agree with an "Ascendent dictator of Germany". `People are pretty good a rejecting inconvinent realities when they're moral compass is on the line.
>I do not think of HN audience as separate to “my” people.
And this is just a dishonest argument. Let's not play coy, thank you.
Fascist prez didn't really ring well with USA voters during Kamala loss so I expect "you" people to just kind of burn out on the whole strategy. Simply the most likely scenario. The majority of the US voted for a fascist? Just reeks of midwit thinking to most people.
People are waking up now to the reality Trump is an aspiring autocrat. His core base might be so blinded by the cult of personality that they will follow a dictator, but the rest of us won't.
some of us are woke :) we looked at all his living years, he’s been a public figure his entire life so easy to review his entire life&legacy. upon this review one can only conclude that he was sent down by God from heavens - a living messiah :) all ends up well as long as it is in his hands
> Congratulations, you've been successfully propagandized to a point where you view people who don't vote the way you do as morally inferior.
Where did they say anything about moral inferiority?
> I'm sure that will help you persuade them in the future.
Why does this argument only work in one direction? Why can the conservatives mock liberals, "coastal elites", blue cities and states, and more than half of America endlessly and still win? Why
> Interesting that you ignore the fact that the previous president was mentally incapable of the job for increasingly long intervals as his term progressed, and was so incompetent on the Afghanistan withdrawal that he projected tremendous weakness that acted as an invite for Putin to launch a full scale assault less than a year later.
Ironic you talk about "successfully propagandized" earlier and are regurgitating right wing talking points.
> The moral inversion it takes to claim that the people willing to stand agains the Valley's intense social conformity "weak" is also revealing about how brainwashed you truly are. You're just part of the mob, and if you lived in a super conservative place, you'd be part of that mob too. Freethinking requires courage, and I see none of it in the typical SV limousine liberal. Just a bunch of millionaires who hate the billionaires they envy.
It takes special kind of mental gymnastics to end up supporting murderous dictators while talking about "free thinkers", "moral inversion", and "brainwashing". What did they teach you next, whatabouttism?
It's been US policy for years to beg NATO members to increase military spending, it took the war in Ukraine for them to finally do it.
Part of NATO's charter is literally "spend minimum 2% GDP on military" and it was just ignored for much of the time.
But honestly I don't know why this entire comment section has turned to NATO NATO NATO. Ukraine isn't in NATO. And if the Budapest Memorandum is what you're referencing, France and UK signed too. It's not as if the US hasn't contributed to the war already.
> Part of NATO's charter is literally "spend minimum 2% GDP on military" and it was just ignored for much of the time.
No, it is literally not. The charter is here[1], read it yourself.
To my knowledge it was first mentioned in 2006, the press briefing [2] states
Finally, I should add that Allies through the comprehensive political guidance have committed to endeavour, to meet the 2% target of GDP devoted to defence spending. Let me be clear, this is not a hard commitment that they will do it. But it is a commitment to work towards it. And that will be a first within the Alliance.
It comes back again in 2014 [3], where they agree to:
aim to move towards the 2% guideline within a decade
A decade after 2014 is 2024, and most, but not all, countries managed.
That's just more transactional thinking. NATO is not a deal but an alliance, a mutual pledge of support by people in the same boat. A pledge, I might remind you, the NATO members upheld when the USA invoked article 5 in 2001 and provided troops, material, and logistics in supporting the US invasion of Afghanistan and the resulting occupation.
This narrative that all NATO members are just freeloading of the USA is a fiction.
An alliance is a deal. The fact that the balance of NATO members are all rapidly and publicly stating “wow we need to increase our defense spending” is an admission that they cannot currently shoulder the security burden without the United States. I didn’t use the word “freeloading” but I suppose you could call it that. “The United States manages security for all of continental Europe” is not a mutual defense pact. It’s a contract.
If you frame any kind of agreement as a "deal" you are obviously right. However, a treaty is not a contract in the sense of civil law, it is not an agreement about you doing X is compensation for me doing Y. It's not tit-for-tat. It is a promise to keep and hold up a certain pledge, ie. you get in trouble, I help you. I get in trouble, you help me. If it weren't, some nations would be preparing charges against the USA for breach of contract right now and I think we can agree that's not what is happening.
Furthermore, your argument that one partner in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, ie. the USA, is shouldering all of the work falls flat, because the only member of the NATO ever invoking the pact defense clause, ie. article 5, was the USA and ALL OTHER members responded by honoring the treaty, ie. supporting the USA to the best of their abilities in invading Afghanistan and maintaining an occupation force for 21 years. Even if you think not much of the abilities of US' NATO allies, most of the time the effort of the other NATO members at least matched the US effort. The USA couldn't have done it all by itself, just consider the range of transport vehicles. I can't change if you think that's nothing, but that's on you.
Speaking from experience here ... some, certainly not all, NATO partners in AFG were additional security burdens with arcane stipulations and ROE (no night ops, can't go outside the wire). I certainly acknowledge that many nations sent troops for that war, but we should not forget the political context in which that happened. European opinion was decidedly against participating. Bush and then Obama had to beg NATO members to increase their levels of support post-invasion (only the Aussies, the British, and I think Canada participated in the invasion, could be wrong), and then again during the occupation. This is part of why we ended up with the famous "caveats" that would make one ask ... why are you even here? The Europeans insisted on putting large safety constraints on their forces, and honestly I understand why. They weren't attacked, it was the Untied States' (bad) idea to pretend it was possible to build AFG into some kind of democracy, and their body politic had good reason to question their country's involvement.
>The USA couldn't have done it all by itself, just consider the range of transport vehicles
Not sure how to parse this. No one has the transport capabilities even close to ours.
Frankly, this issue has been percolating for a while now and it's better that we rip the band aid off and get it over with. We should've done this 25 years ago, but 9/11 happened and we got distracted. The AFG Campaign was extremely telling, both in terms of what a post-Soviet Union NATO could bring itself to do and the actual capabilities of the non-US partners. For what it's worth, Robert Gates (SECDEF at the time) was making some similar points back in 2011[1]:
>Today, I would like to share some parting thoughts about the state of the now 60-plus year old transatlantic security project, to include:
>Where the alliance mission stands in Afghanistan as we enter a critical transition phase; NATO’s serious capability gaps and other institutional shortcomings laid bare by the Libya operation; The military – and political – necessity of fixing these shortcomings if the transatlantic security alliance is going to be viable going forward; And more broadly, the growing difficulty for the U.S. to sustain current support for NATO if the American taxpayer continues to carry most of the burden in the Alliance.
>The blunt reality is that there will be dwindling appetite and patience in the U.S. Congress – and in the American body politic writ large – to expend increasingly precious funds on behalf of nations that are apparently unwilling to devote the necessary resources or make the necessary changes to be serious and capable partners in their own defense. Nations apparently willing and eager for American taxpayers to assume the growing security burden left by reductions in European defense budgets.
>Indeed, if current trends in the decline of European defense capabilities are not halted and reversed, future U.S. political leaders—those for whom the Cold War was not the formative experience that it was for me—may not consider the return on America’s investment in NATO worth the cost.
Emphasis added. This was 14 years ago. Pity that it took the reality of a land war in Eastern Europe and the possibility of no American security presence for the Europeans to take this point seriously.
What word do you want me to use here, rule? Regulation? I honestly don't care, I thought you could describe this as an update to the charter. I'm sorry if that offended you.
You came out pretty strong, stating that something was "literally part of the charter", and thats just wrong. And sometimes I think it is worth pointing out glaring errors.
Instead of "2%" beeing in the charter, it was a goal to have it done by 2024, and most countries managed. Which is very different from even the most charitable interpretation of your post.
> Europe’s dependence on the United States for its security means that the United States possesses a de facto veto on the direction of European defense. Since the 1990s, the United States has typically used its effective veto power to block the defense ambitions of the European Union. This has frequently resulted in an absurd situation where Washington loudly insists that Europe do more on defense but then strongly objects when Europe’s political union—the European Union—tries to answer the call. This policy approach has been a grand strategic error—one that has weakened NATO militarily, strained the trans-Atlantic alliance, and contributed to the relative decline in Europe’s global clout. As a result, one of America’s closest partners and allies of first resort is not nearly as powerful as it could be.
The US wants increased spending because many small European countries spend that money in the US.
Honestly, the interesting thing question here is:
(A) Does the EU have to political will to bankroll Ukraine.
(B) Will the US keep selling weapons the Ukraine, if funded by the EU.
I suspect (B) is a hard YES. Anything would end US military industry.
On (A) I'm less certain, the EU has had a hard time finding consensus. The EU can do big things, even when it's hard, the EU did so under covid.
I didn’t mention NATO, Ukraine, or the Budapest memorandum… Defence is only a part of this. The economy is a big part. Europe is far too reliant on US tech for example. Given US citizens can’t be trusted not to elect a lunatic the US should no longer be relied upon in any capacity.
Tell me about ways your life in the US was ever seriously negatively impacted by who got elected to the EU commission? Complaining about cookie popups or the GDPR doesn't count.
France enstated a very unpopular ruling of raising the minimum retirement age to 68 IIRC. This sets precedent and started having the US discuss the same thing. So potentially that decision will affect me long term via precedent.
The flip side of this is that the NATO countries have traditionally toed the U.S. stance on diplomatic matters, even on issues that are quite unpopular at home. The understanding abroad is that the U.S. can dictate what it wants, but then the Allies will simply drag their feet.
Ukraine’s potential NATO membership is one of Russia’s main demands for ending the war. Additionally, Ukraine participated in the coalition that invaded Iraq in 2003.
Arguably the US isn’t either anymore . It is pretty clear that Trump won’t enforce Article 5 when Russia is the aggressive party. Which, by itself, might be a preparation to take Greenland. Both US and Russia are already interfering in the upcoming elections there.
It doesn’t sound crazy anymore, considering the shitshow we’ve seen the last four weeks sounded crazy before the inauguration.
Similarly to the U.S., European countries are also democracies and it is a fact of life for us that administrations and leadership change. Today it’s the U.S. that’s not a reliable partner, yesterday it was Poland or someone else. Authoritarian regimes like to criticize this as unstable, but it’s worth noting that this surface level lack of stability also means frequent recalibration and stress testing. In consequence there is a deeper stability and fitness.
The point of a democracy is to also have guardrails by splitting up executive, legislative and judicial powers - the U.S. is still not a dictatorship. European leaders know this, and professional politicians know that you can go hot and cold very fast. Today there is drama - tomorrow might rapidly turn over and flip.
And to get even more practical, “stability” is a comfort word rather than proof of a local optimum. We are not surprised when a dictatorship subdues an uprising because we are not surprised there was an uprising.
It seems that this was a very cold and unexpected shower for all of us in Europe (maybe except Hungary) and now there is a big focus on working together against our common enemy and finding other more reliable partners.
It's a pity we were relying this much on Americans for so long... Now we have motivation to change approach. And do it fast!
They could've understood this in 2014 when Nuland said "Fuck the EU"[0], and the US pressed on with the coup in the Ukraine setting off the chain of events that has led us all to where we are now.
>Given the American people voted for this guy twice
American people voted twice for George W. Bush, the second time after the illegal invasion of Iraq in 2003. This might have given a hint.
I know this is pedantic, but the system selected Bush in his first election. Vietnam veteran and Southern Senator Al Gore won the popular vote. Only in his second election, as a wartime President, did Bush win the popular vote.
This is important -- as in, history books important. Two things: whomever won was going to inherit a balanced budget, and (in hindsight) be able to claim wartime priorities due to a pair of terrorist attacks. Those are highly influential for Gen-X and later generations, and not honestly impactful at all for Boomers and prior generations. Bush did not carry younger voters in either election.
In 2001, the Supreme Court ruled that Florida, counting too slowly yet not carefully-enough, could not fully count their ballots. Every other state had successfully counted, but the Court sat through Florida's legal arguments, even though the state was a poster child for inadequate election planning. So, the popular vote would not matter. Statistically, if you don't count Florida, Gore's districts accounted for 60% of American GDP, and Bush's only 40%. This statistic becomes only more lopsided: in 2024, Biden would lose and election even though Trump represents only 30% of American productivity.
Anyway, in 2004, today's median American was still a minor. Giuliani would give the convention address for Republicans in New York; he re-used then-Senate candidate Barack Obama's catchphrases. It was the highpoint of his career. He would only be noteworthy among the unusually-named group "white ethnics" of the Republican Party from then on.
I hope that changes soon. America is marching towards becoming kings of the world or completely isolated until this admin goes out to pasture. I hope nobody wants to go back to kings.
We can do both: prepare for a future without the US, while at the same time trying to make the best of the relationship with the current madcap US government. I don't think there's a conflict between those two. Completely burning bridges at this point seems unwise.
It's not a matter of taking control. For many reasons, starting from ww2 and later the U.s. summarized the west population common values and ethics, in a very simple and sharable way. In Europe this is not possible because there is too much cultural distance between the countries, but we are all equidistant from the U.s. That's why we are all NATO allies and why fundamentally for the u.s. eveything is possible. It's something that we all agree upon because otherwise we would be arguing with each other.
They weren't bending the knee. They were treating Trump like a toddler because that's the best strategy to get concessions from him.
Look at the theatre of the UK giving him the "unprecedented" letter from the King.
Talk of "bending knees" just makes macho idiots think they're winning. It's more like distracting your really drunk friend with something shiny to stop him starting a bar fight or walking into traffic while hoping when he sobers up he'll change for the better, not continue his slide into becoming an permanent asshole.
The historic strategic opportunity is for all of what remains of the free world to join the EU and become the 'rules based order' hegemon. Doesn't need to be literally the EU, a similar kind of organization would work.
As I said personal freedoms. Freedom of speech, right to bear arms off the top of my head. These may not be important to other countries so they may not feel their lose of them as anything important. Hence my statement we may in fact view freedom differently one from one another.
To be fair, the US is also talking about annexing territory from non-allies, too. Maybe we need to annex territory comprising widely varying climates and degrees of strategic value?
I said allies because, although I don't personally agree, I can see all argument for why the "leader of the free world" would be taking on tyrants and dictators, whereas no such argument can hold water when they're threatening countries that rate higher than themselves on the democracy index
I don't equate personal freedoms with conquests. If you are a threat to our country I give no cares for what we do to you. If your nation has to be thrown on the pyre of Americas freedom..so be it.
Alec I can't respond to your response. But no it wasn't a parody. I don't actually think we are cozying up to Putin. Europe keeps throwing money at him, we are just trying to end a stupid war. The "purge" is more of a fact finding to see who is wasting our money and how. No one is being killed, jailed, or tortured. I would however not mind if many politicians end up in jail. People forget previous presidents have fired over 350,000 federal employees, the sky didn't fall. But the national debt did for a time...just saying...
That’s not even remotely comparable. The United States and Ukraine are vastly different in terms of military capability, geographic positioning, and strategic importance. Putin annexing a couple of U.S. states is a laughably unrealistic scenario—he can barely hold the territory he's taken from a country bordering his own.
The war in Ukraine is tragic, but it’s not our war. The idea that we must commit endless resources to it just because it’s happening is not a rational foreign policy stance. A stronger America means prioritizing where we spend our strength, not blindly throwing resources at conflicts that don’t directly threaten us.
Personally most Trump supporters I know can only hope for a more Trumpian successor to Trump. Basically if JD Vance continues on his path he is looking like a sure thing for the Republican nomination obviously, but if any of Trump's tactics work he has a decent chance overall to ride that wave.
It’s clever to pick the word “prosper” rather than grow, or stabilize, or build, or strengthen. It’s also clever to slip Vance into it, which assumes either he wins the ongoing succession, or loses it and moots your bet.
JD Vance, and Elon Musk for that matter, and really everyone else lacks the one thing even Trump haters admit Trump has: charisma. Even my feminist ex-wife loved him on the apprentice. Even to this day she think's he's a funny guy and is entertained by him. Fact of the matter is his charisma has formed a cult of personality around him.
JD Vance, Elon Musk, Ron DeSantis, all of these guys who think they'll be able to take over the cult lack the key ingredient - the personality. Musk has a sort of cult among specifically the HN crowd, but we are small and generally people clock him as a weirdo creep.
There is no successor to Trump, his movement dies with him. His age is our saving grace.
I have a feeling your dislike of Trump and possibly even conservatives is clouding your judgement. Vance is well liked by basically all Trump supporters.
If Joe Biden has proven anything, it's that voters will vote for someone they barely like if they think it's helping their cause.
The only issue in play here is how many voters think lower crime, less wasteful spending, less racist hiring practices, and less illegal immigration is something they like. If they decide those things matter to them, JD is more than likable and capable enough for them to get behind.
I'm actually more conservative in my politics than conservatives these days. What's happening in government now is not conservative in the least, it's incredibly radical. US supporting Putin over Ukraine is not a conservative position, for instance.
JD Vance has nowhere near the charisma of Trump. Being "well liked" within the context of Trump isn't sufficient to maintain the personality cult of Trump. Ron DeSantis had more solid conservative support than JD Vance and he also was unable to get control of the MAGA cult.
> If European leaders don't watch this and realise they need to take control of their own destiny they're idiots. Several European leaders visited this week bending the knee to try and stave off tariffs.
European leader are desperate because they realize obvious truth - US will soon implement regime changes all across Europe... European elites are simply not up to task of dealing with this new revolutionary era.
The elephant in the room though is Europe. Trump wants Europe to step up and act more independently. Pay their fair share for NATO. Increase their active militaries.
Here's another fact to remember: Trump told Europe to kill Nord stream pipeline during his first term. He didn't want them tied economically to Putin. He didn't want Europe to depend upon Putin! Why? Because he's Putin's ally? Or maybe he is trying to make strong, independent countries that act as a deterrent.
That would be a hell of a deterrent, instead of old people with no kids droning on endlessly about NATO.
It is not that people do not realize it is just not something you can do overnight.
But once independent security system gets put in... I am sure there will be much less oral appeasement.
Merz (CDU) is the new chancellor-elect, Scholz (SPD) was the previous chancellor (although really hed of a weak, unstable three-party "traffic-light" coalition). Weidel (AfD) also doubled voteshare to 20.8%. The SPD and also the Greens lost at last week's election, Habeck (Greens) quit, and they will both have less influence, and the Greens might not even be in the next coalition. Merz/CDU will be a main factor in the next coalition govt's position on Russia-Ukraine.
Clearly each of the above parties have differing views on Russia-Ukraine, just like Obama/Biden/Trump. That's how coalitions work. It's very different to the US two-party presidential system, where you can directly measure a leader's power by their majority in seats or voteshare.
I'm confused at what you're trying to say or how it relates to GP, but the very first statement is wrong, Merz isn't "chancellor-elect", that's not even a term anybody uses in Germany. He's merely the leader of the party that got the highest share of votes during the recent elections.
It is of course extremely likely that he'll become the next chancellor in a coalition with the SPD, but technically it could all still fail and lead to new elections. Unlikely, but not impossible.
Out of the parties you mentioned, mainly only CDU and SPD are relevant because it's the only realistic coalition (apart from decisions that require a 2/3 majority like reforming the debt brake). They're both pro-Ukraine although to different degrees (Scholz was dragging his feet quite a bit). Merz in particular has been rather vocal about this and as the chancellor he's probably going to be setting the tone. I don't like or trust the guy particularly, but I believe him in that respect. So I think the video got it essentially right.
He has veto power as Hungary is part of the EU. It might sound strange from the point of view of the big guy that doesn't even recognize the International Criminal Court, but in the EU small countries have a voice too, although in this case it sadly works against the common good.
We (Germany) don’t need Hungary to order a thousand Taurus and a hundred thousand Drones and hand them to Ukraine. We don’t need Hungary to negotiate a nuclear umbrella with France. We don’t need Hungary to cancel F35, which will probably never be delivered anyways.
Hungary, on the other Hand, needs Germany to pay most of their bills. It’s time to give Orban a taste of his own style.
You, Germany, need Hungary selling you Russian LNG, as you, Germany put your head up into your ass with sanctions against Russia.
You either change your position or your economy will continue to degrade and more of your factories will get closed and you will lose more positions on the market of automobiles and will get higher unemployment rate and higher unrest levels. And given your multicultural policy of welcoming Muslim immigrants - the unrest may get accelerated with just a few more "incidents" where someone rides into a crowd again or decides to start a jihad on some street in one of your cities.
Depends on whether Germany wants to participate in a war or prefers peace and good relations with countries important to their economy (either as one that sells them something or as one whose territory could be used as a market for the goods you produce and sell).
It's no more "strange" than US Senators from Wyoming or N Dakota or Vermont or Alaska having a veto. To pick one example, the US Senate veto is why the US consistently refused to recognize the Armenian genocide for many decades.
Hungary by no means has a veto on everything. The 27 EU member states vote on most issues by qualified majority (55% of member states = 15 countries, and >= 65% of total population). Only on a narrow set of issues (foreign, defense, finance, treaties, EU enlargement) they have a veto.
Who absorbed 5 million Ukrainian refugees? Europe, not the US. (Even Canada took more). And there could be millions more yet depending on the ceasefire/settlement arrangement.
Who paid € billions more in energy costs since 2022? Europe, not the US. [0][1] Germany in particular got crucified, and its manufacturing base fled to China (also in part due to the German Greens' historic Cold-War opposition to nuclear, nut that's a long story).
Funding Ukraine is not the "heavy lifting". The heavy lifting is when Putin invades Finland after taking Ukraine, and Germany and France are forced to respond militarily against a Russia aligned with the US.
He can but it’s not a huge issue because the countries that want to act can do so outside of EU structures, which would be necessary given the UK isn’t in the EU.
Yeah, good luck with establishing that. The 27 EU member states are still separate sovereign nations, and nationalism has been on the rise in recent years.
You’re referring to the nationalism I presume. That’s true, but it doesn’t help the overall situation, unless you believe that we should just let Putin do what he wants with Ukraine.
We need a constitutional convention to fix the legislative branch. People in Wyoming should not have 10x the representation as people in California. Without the complicity of the legislative branch Trump's power would be limited much more.
We need mixed-member districts and eliminate the senate<->state connection and/or repeal the 17th amendment. Bicameral is no longer suited for the world we live in.
Unfortunately short of a revolution, there is no realistic way to pass any kind of meaningful constitutional amendment in the US. And it's hard to imagine that fact changing, which makes me pessimistic for the long term future of the country.
You must have missed the visit from the French president. Macron whooped Trump harder than Stormy. That's probably why his fragile little ego needed someone to tell at.
A lot of Americans missed that cue. I think that old-fashioned Americans avoid applying psychoanalysis to politics because they’re afraid to fit in with cynics.
More like the europeans acted like adult gentleman. Not like a frustrated and insecure imbecile, as the trend seems to be for representatives of the people in some places. Do not mix up handling a dangerous child with loaded weapon in the hand nicely with relying on him. They go home and organize the way the situation deserves. Trump is a dumb loser anyway, riding the waves of mass frustration without comprehending much beyond whistles and bells and shiny shiny things, a child would find center of the life.
That's why I voted for Harris. I hate her guts, but she would have at least tried to not sink her ship. Trump seems to think that a fire in the engine room will make it go faster...
You are aware that Trump has _not_ stopped this war right? He has floated certain some possible agreements with Ukraine, but his terms have not been agreeable to the Ukrainians. If Trump actually wants Ukraine to come to an agreement with the US, he'll have to come up with a deal that is acceptable to them.
So yeah up until now Trump has done _nothing_ to stop this war. He's really only proved to all the US' supposed allies, that the US is not trustworthy. At this point, Trump should just shut up and stop pretending like he's trying to reach some peace agreement. He should just stop sending funds to Ukraine as he obviously wants to do and just leave the discussion because he's really no longer relevant.
I don't think Trump will bring peace to Ukraine and he seems to be operating on an "America-First, forget about Europe" policy.
However, if by "genociding Ukrainian people" you mean eradicating the population of Ukraine that considers itself distinct from Russia, Trump could conceivably stop the war by letting Russia hold onto territories it owns, while having the rest of Ukraine as a protectorate of various European powers that may eventually bring it into the EU.
This might result in a populatin exchange as Russian speakers get sent to the Russian-held parts of Ukraine and vice-versa. This would not be good but it would not be a genocide either. You can also look at the Indian partition for an example of how this could go horribly wrong.
Russia does not care the slightest about the territory, it is purely a war about ideology and influence.
The only acceptable outcome from a Russian perspective is a Russia aligned government in Kiev, or a peace deal where they will rebuild their army and end up stronger than Ukraine followed by restarting the war.
Problem is I don't think Russia is ever going to agree to to the point of Ukraine becoming a protectorate of the EU without having legal authority to veto EU military intervention in Ukraine. And I severely doubt Ukraine's is going to agree to give up to give up those lands without a security guarantee that Russia can't veto.
Sides, Russia's got nukes. It's nuke's are the whole reason why the US and Europe has been reluctant to intervene. If, in this scenario, Russia invades Ukraine again and then simple say that it will launch it's warheads at any nation that attempts to intervene, what then?
> Zelensky isn't just a dumb clown, he got tricked into starting a war
How do you have a political discussion with someone whose reality is completely upside-down to your own? With someone whose grasp of reality is also factually wrong?
> Facts are usually universal and rarely disputed.
The parent poster claimed that Zelensky started the war.
How do you even begin having a conversation with someone who disputes the main fact on how this war started: Vladimir Putin, the dictator of Russia, invaded the neighbouring sovereign nation of Ukraine.
Crimea was a disputed region. Russia had claims for it right after the Soviet Union got dissolved, as Crimea was always a Russian territory, not Ukrainian. But secretary general of Soviet Union acting as an individual, without any referendums or something alike decided to just give Crimea as a present to Ukraine. That even happened in the times when it didn't mean much: Russia and Ukraine were the save country - Soviet Union, that's why no one bothered to correct him then and there. It was more of just a gesture. And how can it not be? There was a Russian military base on that peninsula! Who lives on that peninsula? like >90% are Russian nationals. It was Russian de-facto, but just not de-jure.
Granted by United Nations - every nation has a right for self-determination, so Russia did some not-so-legal actions by holding a referendum there, just so that the people of Crimea could exercise their right for self-determination. Which they then successfully did and overwhelming majority voted for being with Russia, rather than with Ukraine.
These were just the facts, not opinions.
Now there is the place for some opinions: you think (as far as I understand) that this is when Russia started a war.
And I say I don't see these events as Russia starting war, since the annexation of Crimea was voluntary and happened without a single shot.
I don't know of any examples of wars happening without a single shot.
I think the consequential actions of Ukraine (that got mad by the fact that it just lost some part of their country due to separatism) is when the war started.
That's when a few other regions claimed they'd like to join Russia as well and that's when Ukraine attacked them.
A referendum carried out by an occupying force means nothing. That's a fact.
If Russia were serious about self-determination of the Dombas and Crimea regions, they'd have first proposed a referendum audited by international observers, and pressured Ukraine diplomatically to accept.
Instead, Russia chose to invade. They started the war, and they can stop it and withdraw at any time they choose. Every death from the Ukraine war is entirely on Russia's head.
That's not a fact, that's an opinion. Because the sentence isn't detailed enough: means nothing to whom? If the vote results are this definitive, where the majority is so overwhelming that it simply can't be forged - what is even the point of having a referendum? It was merely a formality: no one disputes the results, after all. The international independent observers were invited to said referendum, but they decided not to come. And it is obvious why: because they aren't really that independent after all.
Personally I realized that if you dig deep enough you realize that all those documents, formalities, treaties and agreements - they don't mean much, as we aren't some tenant entities with an overlord above us who could judge us in case of disputes. International (I don't even know what's the right word here) situation happens mostly as a consequence of who's more powerful and who controls what.
U.S. invades other countries whenever it likes.
Why can't Russia do just the same?
> They started the war, and they can stop it and withdraw at any time they choose.
The comic part of the situation is that Ukraine can stop it any time they choose as well.
But neither side wants to stop it THAT way. Each side wants to win in this situation.
If Ukraine feels so lucky as to fight a Goliath - let Zelensky be that David and send as many soldiers to death as he please until the unrest inside his country ends his presidency or the other side's forceful actions lead to the same result. Harsh, but kinda fair. Know your fights. Don't fight with a Goliath alone, if you are a tiny David, and if you are - group up with others and bow to them if the success of your very existence becomes dependent on their help.
Zelensky didn't bow low enough and now gets what he deserves.
It's a fact. A free and fair referendum cannot be held by an occupying force, because their very presence biases the results.
This is true even if the occupiers are honorable. It goes double for a leader like Putin, who imprisons and assassinates his political opponents.
> U.S. invades other countries whenever it likes.
>
> Why can't Russia do just the same?
In both cases it's wrong. But if you want the realpolitik answer, it's because the US has a competent military.
> If Ukraine feels so lucky as to fight a Goliath - let Zelensky be that David and send as many soldiers to death as he please until the unrest inside his country ends his presidency or the other side's forceful actions lead to the same result. Harsh, but kinda fair. Know your fights. Don't fight with a Goliath alone, if you are a tiny David, and if you are - group up with others and bow to them if the success of your very existence becomes dependent on their help.
David won against Goliath, remember? That's the whole point of the parable. At least find a metaphor that supports your argument.
Besides, isn't finding support exactly what Zelensky's been doing all this time? The US may be withdrawing its support, but European support is increasing. And in terms of population, economy, and military spending, Europe is a lot bigger than Russia.
You say Ukraine should know their fights, but doesn't that apply more to Russia? They expected the war to be over in 3 days, and it's been 3 years. Putin vastly overestimated the strength of his own army, and underestimated the resistance Ukraine would put up.
How much longer can Russia's reserves actually last? Those steadily rising Russian interest rates indicate an economy that's edging ever closer to collapse.
No, facts can't contain undefined properties like "free and fair".
Who should decide whether a referendum is free and fair?
No one.
It's basically the question of whether people of that region agree or disagree with the referendum enough as to defend their position with force.
As you can see - Crimeans are quite content they are part of Russia and not in ruins under a nazi regime.
(That's also an opinion, the fact is that there's just no unrest.)
> But if you want the realpolitik answer, it's because the US has a competent military.
If Russia's military is so incompetent - Zelensky is going to win ~ soon, let's wait.
> David won against Goliath, remember? That's the whole point of the parable. At least find a metaphor that supports your argument.
You missed the point: Zelensky sees himself as a David from the metaphor, but reality is that he is a clown, not a leader, not even a politician, but rather a parody to one.
> And in terms of population, economy, and military spending, Europe is a lot bigger than Russia.
Yep. But Russia is at war and Europe is only cuckoldily fighting right now. Let Europe get into full blown war if they want to participate so much.
> You say Ukraine should know their fights, but doesn't that apply more to Russia? They expected the war to be over in 3 days, and it's been 3 years. Putin vastly overestimated the strength of his own army, and underestimated the resistance Ukraine would put up.
They got Ukraine military in the chokehold at the start of the operation, then Zelensky agreed to proceed with diplomacy and Russia pulled its forces back.
But then Ukraine got some spoken assurances from US and EU of receiving money and military help from them. And then Russia had to start liberation from the border again. It goes quite slow for a few reasons: first of all, Russia isn't in a hurry: it gets really valuable first hand experience in modern warfare, the kind that almost none gets (even US hasn't fought a real war (without bombarding the area to the smithereens first) for quite a long time). Another reason is that Russia successfully mobilized its economy for war time. Just in case it has to go into a bigger war now/later, but it needs time to produce more new weaponry. Another reason for going slow is that Russia isn't really fighting a genocidal war, where everyone on the other side is seen as an enemy, they just demilitarize Ukraine, fighting just its soldiers, trying not to harm civilians, and that's not so simple, actually.
> No, facts can't contain undefined properties like "free and fair".
Free and fair are very much defined. It's why in democratic countries we have election observers and secret ballots, to remove or at least reduce possibilities of voter coercion.
> If Russia's military is so incompetent - Zelensky is going to win ~ soon, let's wait.
It remains to be seen whether Russia is incompetent enough to fail completely. They still have 4 times the population as Ukraine.
> You missed the point: Zelensky sees himself as a David from the metaphor, but reality is that he is a clown, not a leader, not even a politician, but rather a parody to one.
He's done remarkably well defending his country for a clown, don't you think?
> Yep. But Russia is at war and Europe is only cuckoldily fighting right now. Let Europe get into full blown war if they want to participate so much.
In that, we agree. Russia's barely making progress in a war with an opponent that, on paper, shouldn't have lasted a week. I'd be very interested to see how they do against a military with 4 times their funding.
> They got Ukraine military in the chokehold at the start of the operation, then Zelensky agreed to proceed with diplomacy and Russia pulled its forces back.
Oh, is that the Kremlin's reason for all those humiliating retreats in the initial months of the war?
> It goes quite slow for a few reasons: first of all, Russia isn't in a hurry: it gets really valuable first hand experience in modern warfare, the kind that almost none gets (even US hasn't fought a real war (without bombarding the area to the smithereens first) for quite a long time).
Ah, I see. So the 700,000 casualties Russia has incurred so far was worth it to get valuable, first-hand experience. Presumably the first lesson is: don't incur 700,000 casualties when fighting against a country a quarter your size.
> Another reason is that Russia successfully mobilized its economy for war time.
A "war time economy" comes at the cost of the civilian economy. Every man sent to Ukraine is one who can't work at home. Every piece of ordinance, every destroyed tank and plane, represents wasted investment that could be used to create civilian goods and services.
You need only look at the steadily rising interest rates to see the signs of an economy that's spending more than it's earning. Russia has poured billions into the Ukraine war; so has Europe, of course, but Europe's economy is 14 times larger. Europe can afford to outspend Russia.
> Another reason for going slow is that Russia isn't really fighting a genocidal war, where everyone on the other side is seen as an enemy, they just demilitarize Ukraine, fighting just its soldiers, trying not to harm civilians, and that's not so simple, actually.
Given the devastation to cities in Ukraine, they're very bad at avoiding civilian infrastructure. I know the Russian army's weapons are outdated and inaccurate, but are they really that inept?
But there's no genocide in Ukraine towards Ukrainians even now when "cannons speak": liberated civilians aren't killed or imprisoned, instead, criminal Russia dares to give them homes, pensions and employment (and not a forced one)!
Weird how the Ukrainians don't seem to want to be "liberated". They're acting almost as if they're being invaded by a warmongering dictator who wants to conquer and plunder their country.
Funny how you finally regurgitate the Kremlin's talking points...
Ukraine had 0 chances from the start? But how come Russia couldn't get Kiev in 3 days as announced in Feb 22? How come Russia needs to ask North Korea for soldiers to supplement its own troops?
Chances of what? Of winning in a war against a far bigger country with bigger military complex? It could just avoid the war (if followed Moscow's demands (and Moscow didn't demand much)), but I think it had no chances in winning a war.
As for the 3 days - you seem to be uninformed, just google how fast Russian forces captured Gostomel airport near Kyiv.
Then Zelensky threw white flag and peace talks started, but then Zelensky changed his position and now it's a war to the last militant Ukrainian.
As for NK - they were just on an excursion to learn from Russian battle front, since NK is now Russia's ally and this was done just for the case if/when this war changes into a WW3.
Oh, no. Don't do that. Europe footing its own bill for its own defense and increasing their industrial output is the last thing Donald Trump wants. Really.
Donald Trump just turned the USA into a liability. I don't know how anyone can think this is a good idea.
Like people thinking killing USAID was a good idea. Guess who is going to pick up to collect the good will USAID gave? China, or possibly some other country that thinks the US hegemony was a bad thing.
How can people not see that Trump is weakening USA?
If China wants to start paying for queer theater in Lesotho, I say they are more than welcome to! But I wouldn't hold my breath for this to happen... Have a Nice Day :)
Don't be silly. Have a look at all the waste that is being claimed and you will notice that the things that are questionable (apart from the irrigation in Afghanistan, which had some unfortunate effects) all sin up to less than a half percent of the USAID budget.
Plus that the people doing the cutting have no clue what they are doing. First the 50 millions dollars for hamas condoms and then not even knowing how government contracts work. It is like watching the evening of amateurs, but where the stakes are people's lives and the world order.
If there's any mineral, water, or food supply advantage to doing so they'll be there with Pink Yuen before the undrunk US coffees cool on the table.
China is nothing if not pragmatic and there's central party policy vs. China's regulated but somewhat free market here.
It was the US after all that forced the sale of Grindr by the Chinese Beijing Kunlun Tech to San Vicente Acquisition for ~ $600 million. I dare say fear of communists having a direct line to toe tapping Republicans drove that.
If X is encroaching on Y and you're all the way over in Z, you're not defending yourself; you're deliberately getting getting involved in someone else's problem. Maybe the numbers are in your favor, or it's "the right thing to do," but Europeans have been using similar rationale to destroy their continent over and over again for centuries. I'm not judging at this point—it's probably just in your blood. The rest of the world just wants you to pay for it from here on out.
This sounds a lot like being pro-bully. Also, it sounds like you dont unserstand what saber-rattling is. Putin is the one who is saber rattling. We are helping him pay for it by helping him steal land from Ukraine.
They could soon realize China and Russia may actually make better allies. Might not be what the consensus on HN prefers, but maybe it’s time to look east.
We need more cooperation for collective benefit instead of cooperation for the sake of profit
Ukraine was Russia's ally. Russian businesses operated in Ukraine. Russian entertainment was made in Ukraine. There was effectively no borders between Russia and Ukraine. Ukraine was one of the most pro-Russian countries among the post-Soviet countries.
That’s not really accurate. Ukraine was not a member of either defence or economic blocs, like CSTO, or Customs Union, headed by Russia. Also some of the Ukrainian governments were effectively against relying on Russia, Yuschenko 2005-2010.
Yet, there were extensive economic ties up to 2014, and some cultural ties up to 2022. Its not black and white.
Syria rolled over because HTS improved the quality of life in Idlib. Ukraine resisted because russia turned donbas into a corrupt mafia state. People overlook the importance of the little things. Most people are fence sitters but are very aware of the facts on the ground.
Wait who would ally with China/Russia, Europe or US? I mean either of those are a deathknell for Europe. China will not defend them against Russia. Heck I am not sure China can keep its hands off of Russia's oil fields as they lack their own resources. It would be fun to watch though.
What collective benefit are you referring to exactly that isn't going to be profit? You think Russia and China care about your ideologies? China will exploit you and Russia will do what Russia always does. They all want to gang up and invade America?? They would have better things to do then that if Europe became their pet.
I got this weird dissonance - like this was a science from a TV show about the White House, because no-one, I mean no-one would ever do that inpublic. Apart from common courtesy, even basic management training says praise in public, criticise in private.
Just doing this in front of the world’s media … it’s hard to understand
I'm less convinced this was planned because I've met people like this in real life. Criticizing someone for showing disrespect while being incredibly disrespectful yourself seems like abusive parent 101.
Also, the fact they talk down to him about the war in Ukraine of all things is pretty shocking, like he wouldn't be there if he didn't understand the situation in Ukraine (it's not like he was there being extorted for minerals because he thinks things are going amazingly). It seems weird from a global policy perspective but on brand if you're just an asshole. Either way, truly an embarrassing day to be an American.
Yes I hope this wakes people up and inspires the country to elect sober thoughtful people again. I'm pretty cynical though so I've learned not to expect much from modern politics.
One thing that gives me hope is that politics has always been a mess (there are some times of stability but they never last forever). Though I think a big thing we need to do is strengthen democracy in the US, get rid of first past the post elections, gerrymandering, the necessity of large donors required for campaigns, unequal representation in Congress, etc. I think if we break the two-party system politics in the US would look better.
The only way that can happen is if several red state legislatures agree to the Compact. This Compact is useless to replacing the Electoral College if only blue states sign up; these states would have voted blue in an election, anyway. It tips over to 270 if several red states sign up and allocate their electoral votes against the wishes of their own red state constituencies. Would that be democratic? It is obvious why the growth of the compact has stalled at 209 votes; it is irrational for a red state to join it. It is also true in the mirror image if it were a "red state 270 vote compact," no blue state would join it.
Restructuring the elections, congressional seat allocation, etc. would require Constitutional amendments. Unlikely to happen. It is baked in the cake that individual votes are weighed unequally between the 50 states of the Republic. The only other way to do it would be an organic mass migration of voters that equalizes the population in all 50 states. The Census would eventually reflect this and the seats and electoral votes would be equal in all states, as I understand it.
We already have a "third party" now in the sense the GOP is unrecognizable from 20 years ago; the old GOP died out, like the Whig Party.
> Restructuring the elections, congressional seat allocation, etc. would require Constitutional amendments. Unlikely to happen.
As a Brazilian, I think it's unfortunately more likely than you think. Here in Brazil, we got a completely rewritten constitution (the 1988 constitution) after our USA-backed military dictatorship ended. So if the current USA government becomes a dictatorship (which unfortunately does not seem unlikely enough right now), there's a good chance the USA will also get a brand new constitution after all that mess ends, hopefully one with better electoral mechanics.
> Restructuring the elections, congressional seat allocation, etc. would require Constitutional amendments.
That's not always true. Proportional representation in the House would help a lot, and that could be done by passing a regular law. (The current "one member per district" law is only from 1967: [0])
I agree, but we're essentially asking for a unicorn for each of those favors. Just getting one of those done with the current societal setup could easily be a decade+ of very heavy campaigning. I'm not convinced I'll see all 5 in my lifetime, and I'm not super old as is.
It is more possible now than ever though with unprecedented communication. But to paraphrase Warren Buffet a bit: "We (the rich) are a lot better at this and we're kicking your ass right now". Imagine if we could have even a fraction of the youth anger from Tiktok aimed at such issues above.
You underestimate how important it is for people who perceive themselves as alpha males not to admit they were wrong about someone for eight years. Ain’t going to happen, they are already falling in line.
I have seen some people start to realize that Trump isn't this infallible hero over this, so it is working. But Some fans will diehard, very very hard over trump. Just gotta keep chinking at the armor, almost everyone will have a breaking point.
You must recognize some irony in how disproportionately democratic party supporters are being punished by the current republican government, whereas before, the chance of you losing your job for supporting Trump was nearly zero (as it should be). Yet here is your government, explicitly seeking to weed out politically non-compliant people for 'efficiency'. Public service is supposed to be apolitical; this witch hunt is patently unconstitutional.
I don't understand how you can write that comment in good faith. It is demonstrably illogical.
The only Trump supporters I know of who lost their jobs due to politically motivated incidences were January sixers, to which... I'd say it's unsurprising to see people let go from their jobs for breaking into the capitol building.
Your talk about power structures is also ironic. Power structures are being built right now. Some are torn down, but don't be fooled; something is taking its place. You may not notice because you think it serves you, but consider for a moment at least that this could be exactly what the structure builders want.
Can you clarify this assertion? If a lot of public servants are left leaning, make no mistake about them: they’re working for their incomes, regardless of political affiliation.
As other commenters have pointed out, a staggering amount of federal funds are paid to red states who are not working for these payments.
If this doesn’t debunk what you’re saying, then what exactly are you saying?
They're going to Liz Truss the budget. Economic chaos will be bad for everyone with a 401k. Probably that's the route to getting rid of them, just as people used the price of eggs against Biden.
I'm definitely glad that Trumpism has brought the dark underbelly of America so out in the open. At least I'll be able to avoid horrible people like you IRL.
I'm an American and what's actually embarrassing to me is the hundreds of millions of dollars we have spent keeping a meat grinder running that has claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands to a million good men and women. Likewise the Biden family's involvement in corruption in Ukraine stinks to High Hell and I cannot be moved to regard these two phenomena as coincidental.
I actually do not care one bit where the line on the map is drawn between Ukraine and Russia and I find it very weird that so many of us claim to. Think what could have been done instead, with all the wasted lives, time, and money. THAT, is embarrassing!
They literally said: “This makes great TV” - and both right-wing Fox and the Russian media are cheering.
It worries me that no-one in the Republican Party looks at it and says: Russia is our enemy right, why are we doing exactly what they want and benefits them?
> It worries me that no-one in the Republican Party looks at it and says: Russia is our enemy right, why are we doing exactly what they want and benefits them?
Why would they? GOP senators literally spent independence day in russia a few years back. Multiple GOP congressmembers voted against various resolutions to support the people of ukraine[0], condemn russia for its kidnapping of ukrainian children[1], or direct the administration to collect evidence of russian war crimes[2].
The GOP has had a strongly pro-putin wing for a decade, and Trump has been in russia's pocket for longer than that: ignoring claims that he's a hard KGB asset, the trump family has been reliant on russian money (investments and loans) for at least two decades. With trump being the uncontested leader of the GOP, the party is very much pro russia.
> I believe this is exactly what sebazzz finds worrying.
But none of these are anything new. This is all years old stuff. It does not make sense that it "worries", either you've never cared before and things have not changed, or you should be several steps beyond "worry".
But the votes you cited have 3, 9 and 7 republicans? How do you arrive at "the party is very much pro russia" if for all this time republicans have always voted for Ukraine military aid? What about the other almost 200 people? The pro-Putin freakshow has the White House sure, but can he really turn the entire republican party to side with our enemy? Against all the interests of the military industrial complex that pays for all their campaigns no less.
Russia is an enemy of the Left and "wokeness" specifically at this point, for sure. I'd oddly posit that Russia is at least semi-aligned with the "sane & conservative" values that the MAGA movement represents, so it all makes sense.
Personally, I think all Western nations need to be in partnership-with and promoting Democracy in a relatively-sane and ethnically-white country like Russia. Short of a few eastern-European countries and Israel, Russia has until recently been the only such country that hasn't fallen prey to "pretty please invade us we'll even pay you" kind of left-wing socialism that's fallen upon most of the west. A movement that oddly hasn't fallen-upon any non-majority-white country around the world.
I agree. I'd even go further; I suspect this show was about redefining the term "diplomacy" for the conservative base.
I think it's a step in a larger plan to start moving the Republican foreign policy platform into include a greater emphasis on diplomacy. Since diplomacy's been seen as the "weaker and less effective" path for so long it needs a rebrand in order to sell it to a strength-worshipping constituency.
It's Putin's plan to isolate Ukraine, and what a stroke of luck Trump and Vance are completely on board with Putin's rhetoric. Soon he can affect Ukraine elections and retake it. The war angle didn't work as he wanted.
Ukraine’s constitution doesn’t allow for elections during martial law. This is pretty reasonable, and the UK did a similar thing whilst we were under threat of invasion by the Nazis.
Realistically it’s not possible to hold a free and fair election while:
- A foreign power would bomb polling stations
- An invading power would try to interfere in other ways
- Millions of voters are displaced (within and outside the country)
- Millions of voters are in the armed forces at the front line
- Voting districts are occupied by an invading force and can’t really vote
That last point is pretty key, too. How do you ensure only Ukrainian citizens vote and aren’t doing so with a gun to their head? What if you manage to do this and Russia refuses to recognise your election because “you counted votes from legally Russian citizens” (which Russia claims the occupied regions are)? Then if you don’t count those votes, those Russian oblasts suddenly become Ukrainian and Russia claims you disenfranchised legitimate votes to rig an election.
All of this is why Russia (and by extension the USA) position of holding elections in Ukraine is complete nonsense.
Earlier in the same interview he's explicitly asked if he wants to apologize to Trump and says "no." Possibly a real-time softening but also "sorry for this [situation]" not really being the same as an apology.
I wouldn't be very surprised if there was some thaw in relations that comes with an apology, smiling and making nice for the cameras. But I wouldn't be at all surprised at the reverse, particularly considering that Trump tendency to come down in Putin's corner.
Trump should apologize and probably resign while we are at that. But the conservatives want all the good old times without the honor code that existed to some degree back then.
You're witnessing the collapse of American soft power, economic power, and our transition to an authoritarian isolationist state. Some of us accept it while others still have to grasp the situation.
The death of the post cold war neoliberal world order and the death of the American century. to be replaced by... ?
The thing that I find strange about it is that it's being pursued actively, from the inside, as opposed to it being forced on them by an stringer outside force (ie. China). The US has chosen to retract from it's global power and influence.
Mind-blowing, except, kinda-sorta, for the fact that the effort is helmed by a (short-term thinking) businessman rather than a seasoned politician with familiarity with, or even the ability to consider, long term consequences of actions and decisions and the interplay of other countries and their leaders.
Nearly every decision made since the late seventies has been with the intention of making the most money in the shortest amount of time. Not just in government. In everyday people’s lives, in companies.
And it always fails long term. We lose so, so much and then we just ignore it and do it again. We’re getting to a point where we don’t even remember where we started.
This has been a long time coming, IMO. You can only be selfish for so long before you implode. If everyone is selfish, you’re living on borrowed time.
Oh, Russia is still the outside force pulling Trump's puppet strings. They just did such a good propaganda job with "Russia Russia Russia" that people are afraid to say it.
China will benefit the most from this. Europe has zero interest in backing up the US in a fight for Pacific dominance. Good luck trying to form a trading block that excludes China now.
I think this is exactly right, but very discordian. It shouldn't happen, it makes no sense. No country in the world has benefited more from the post cold war, neoliberal world order, than the US. It's the very foundation of all of America's wealth and power. It makes zero sense why the imperialist-core would willingly step down from it's bloody iron throne it has worked for 80 years to create for itself. What was the point of it all then? All the wars, all the coups, all the covert-action, all the forced liberalization, the neocolonialism and the establishment of the liberal world order?
If this is genuinely what is happening, this can only be some sort of hostile takeover enabled by the legitimate grievances in the domestic depoliticized populations. Neoliberalism made itself vulnerable to be destroyed from within, it's greed went too far, the inequities to much to be sustainable, the post-political ideology became so extreme that it forgot the old lessons of empire, bread and circuses.
Or as Merkel and Thatcher said, "There is no alternative". Wanna bet?
Are we giving up our bases? Sending all personnel home, disbanding some brigades or a fleet? No? Then we are not saving any tax dollars. We’ve just made it more expensive to maintain our global empire.
Europe has always been willing to defend itself, but the US had interests in keeping EU dependent on the US for defense; It was a win-win because US could keep their large global sphere of influence and the EU could spend money on other things to benefit its citizens.
The EU will soon announce major defense spending in partnership with the UK, and the US' large sphere of influence, as well as America's superpower status will continue to decline. Whether that's good or bad is yet to be seen, but the world will rebalance itself - China is already throwing money at places where USAID is no longer present to expand their influence.
If by "resolving" a war you mean forcing the victim into a surrender and making the agressor a victor than sure.
You seem to forget the obligations the US has when they signed (and made Ukraine sign) the Budapest memorandum. In which Ukraine gave up the world's third largest nuclear arsenal in exchange for protection of their sovereignty. The US since 2014 (invasion of Crimea) failed to uphold their part of the deal.
> If by "resolving" a war you mean forcing the victim into a surrender and making the agressor a victor than sure.
What other option is there? In all options, Ukraine loses territory in order to stop the fighting. NATO is not going to escalate with Russia, so clearly Ukraine won't be kicking Russia out.
And even if Ukraine did kick Russia out, then what? Russia can just invade again a year later. Is this just an endless war? Is the West going to pay for an endless war?
Seems like the better approach is for Ukraine to get the best deal with Russia they can.
> You seem to forget the obligations the US has when they signed (and made Ukraine sign) the Budapest memorandum. In which Ukraine gave up the world's third largest nuclear arsenal in exchange for protection of their sovereignty. The US since 2014 (invasion of Crimea) failed to uphold their part of the deal.
The US had an obligation not to expand NATO to Ukraine, but hey, here we are.
> The US had an obligation not to expand NATO to Ukraine, but hey, here we are.
Both Gorbachev (the leader of the USSR at the time) and Jasow (higest military leader of the USSR at the time) both say this was never promised to them [1].
And also; Do you really think they would have just let it out the agreement if this was really promised to them? The USSR just forgot to ask to put it on paper?
> And even if Ukraine did kick Russia out, then what? Russia can just invade again a year later. Is this just an endless war?
So what is the difference exactly with a "peace deal" now? Russia did exactly the same thing with Crimea. They invaded, signed a cease fire and then broke it. Whats going to be different this time?
> Seems like the better approach is for Ukraine to get the best deal with Russia they can.
They had a deal in 2014 after Russia invaded Crimea. And Russia chose to break it. That's besides all the deals (such as the Budapest Memorandum) Russia decided to break when they invaded Crimea in the first place.
> Is the West going to pay for an endless war?
Purely from a military perspective, the west is getting a pretty sweet deal with Russia putting it's army in the wood-chipper.
“Foreign Minister Lavrov and
other senior officials have reiterated strong opposition,
stressing that Russia would view further eastward expansion as a potential military threat.”
Despite Russia sharing its redlines with the West in 2008 NATO continued to expand its sphere of influence into Ukraine including backing the coup in 2014.
So yeah, it’s unsurprising that Russia escalated each step of the way as well.
I’m not arguing Russia is right, I’m arguing a war was an obvious outcome.
Russia has already paid a price in the war and clearly it seeks some sort of solution.
You know Ukraine could have sided with Russia and avoided this saga the whole time, right? The real victim are the Ukrainians that had the suffer this war because Zelinski and their deep state sold the country to Biden’s team interests. As a civilian, I’d rather live in an authoritarian and peaceful Russia than a war torn Ukraine where I am forced to be drafted.
They do not have that option. You know who died by the thousands in meat wave attacks on Mariupol, armed with decades-old rifles? Citizens of the "Donetsk People's Republic" and "Luhansk People's Republic" who were forcibly drafted.
You can't cherry pick one example and ignore all the times choosing war was the wrong choice - Vietnam, Cambodia, Iran, Libya, Iraq 2, Somalia, Afghanistan, Panama, Grenada, Syria, Lebanon, Dominican Republic.
It’s lost all respect from its allies and its enemies are excited at the new world order that has been built. Frankly I had admired the US my whole life and I now detest it and want Western civilisation to shun it completely.
Trump called Zelensky a dictator in public, did he not? Zelensky, democratically elected, president of a democratic country, invaded by a tyran, a non-democratic and extreme anti-western attitude, was called a dictator. That is hard to understand, until you realise Trump tries to man-handle an extortion deal out of Ukrain...and now because the man doesn't bend over backwards he's disrespectful? That man showed a lot of courage in my book.
i'm not saying it's anything new... i'm pointing out that if we view Zelenskyy’s role through a Roman lens, where the term dictator originates, his broad wartime powers—granted under martial law, with elections and normal governance suspended—mirror the temporary, crisis-driven authority of a Roman dictator.
Wasn't the word still nonetheless unjustifiably weaponized? Would it not be extremely reasonable to be upset if a sitting US president prior to the US getting involved in WW2 criticized Churchhill and strategically called him a dictator to delegitimize him?
UK’s parliamentary model spread power via coalition; Ukraine’s semi-presidential setup concentrates it in Zelensky, though Parliament retains legislative monopoly.
He's not a dictator at all as his term does have a guaranteed end, once the war is over. I'm sure he would hold an election if he could, just to prove people like you wrong, but it is illegal for him to do so during wartime as per the Ukrainian constitution, which cannot be amended during wartime either.
That's sort of what Trump was subtly trying to get at -- Zelenskyy's political power continues as long as the war continues. If we take the worst interpretation of his character that he is willing to do whatever it takes to hold onto power for as long as possible ... then he has an incentive to sabotage any peace deals.
I personally don't think that's likely, but it is a valid argument depending on how skeptical you are about Zelenskyy's motives.
Can people just think instead of regurgitating what they hear? To your definition Churchill was a dictator too, right? Or somehow he wasn't?
A war is happening, and how can people think they can just hold a nicely done election... Ukrainians don't even care about that, that rhetoric (propaganda) comes from a foreign nation.
Grief is a good way to put it. I know everyone is reinforcing their priors, and mine has been the "Housing Theory of Everything" for the last decade -- and longer than that if you count my mid-2000's (admittedly naive) urban-environmentalism advocacy. It's was a pretty niche area for advocacy until recently... I'm pretty sure I was the first official Strong Towns member in SF.
I'm just blown away that even after the first Trump presidency, and now during the second, that the left still has no serious intention of addressing any of the legitimate grievances that working class has. It's genuinely bananas to see so many people fleeing California for Texas and hearing "good riddance." I'm basically broken at this point, and I feel like fighting for basic, practical and sustainable policies, policies that just make sense, is pointless.
The moderate left (I.e almost all of the left in positions of power) don’t have answers. But, the rest of the left does. The thing is they’re wildly unpopular.
For example, we all know, left and right, that the healthcare system in the US is broken. End of, no debate. It’s broken. But, even the slightest hint of a reasonable single payer system like the rest of the west is met with immediate and severe backlash.
We’re at a place where we’re not even willing to humor, let alone try, any solutions. The conservative approach is “we’ve tried nothing and we’re all out of ideas”, but the left is really not far off from that either.
So many of the further-left’s answers follow the progression of the “step 3: ???” meme. I guess these days we might call it “concepts of a plan”. Even when the goals sound great, the paths to reach them are vague or non-existent (or even worse IMO, depend on questionable or simply outright illegal means).
You mention healthcare…I lived in Colorado in 2016 and we had a ballot measure for a constitutional amendment to establish universal healthcare. Great!
However, in the months leading up to that vote there were so many questions about details that the organizers of the ballot measure just met with some form of, “We’ll let you know after the amendment passes.”
I was a federal employee at the time, with an FEHB plan, and I was concerned that I would wind up paying for both the FEHB plan and the state tax that would come with the state plan. I sent multiple emails and asked at an information session but no one involved in organizing the ballot measure would even entertain the question.
I mean, I simply disagree. The progressive and socialist left's solutions to 'the housing theory of everything' narrative have pretty much failed wherever they have been implemented, especially in the United States.
That doesn't mean I don't think they have any good policies, they certainly do, the issue is that the structure of their policies typically does not have feedback loops that incentivize change when change is needed. There is a reason Stockholm has a 20 year wait list for getting an apartment. With the exception of the Vienna model, which I wholeheartedly support, but that American progressives have all rejected in practice (even if they pretend they don't), every single far-left housing policy system seems to be captured by incumbent electorates, based on seniority, without any willingness to make sacrifices for the next generations.
I hope I made clear from my post that I think these policies come from problems that do not align neatly with political parties, and one of the main reason I see the American political system failing is that incumbent electorates are unwilling to make any sacrifices to help each other.
Couldn’t agree more. Not a peep about land use reform or even any real action on income inequality. DNC offers nothing and is somehow surprised people rejected inaction.
I mean, I think it's worse than that. I grew up in Austin, and still have family there. The fact that a lefty like me is regularly siding with state Republicans against local Democrats on housing policy is legitimately insane.
Austin is basically the only city with dropping housing prices right now and that's happening in large part in spite of city policy, not because of it. Yes, the Republicans are creating tons of new sprawl there, and that's bad, but it's a crisis, not some long term concern we can fiddle with the knobs over. Obviously, the sustainability parts of me don't like sprawl (especially from a Strong Towns perspective), but it's not like the Dems there are upzoning anything more than a token number of corridors.
I've had a perpetual criticism of my fellow Dems since my days of naive urban-enviornmentalism: as long as "the bus is for other people" we won't have good public transit. The same goes for housing. As long as lefties don't actually want to live in a multi-unit European-style townhouses in walkable neighborhoods, we're not going to actually do anything substantial about housing or climate change, but with token projects we can pretend we will... and proceed to keep failing working people.
That’s because the Dems aren’t so different than the GOP when it comes to a lot of that stuff. They’re still the party of the rich, just a different set of rich. The DMC made it clear in 2016 that it rejected the liberal economic policies when it shut down Bernie (who I think could have beat Trump). And radicals like AOC have been a thorn in the side of Pelosi and her ilk. The Dems try to play it safe, but I think if they embraced the radical side they’d find a base to match the MAGA energy and win. That’s what it’s gonna take.
> the left still has no serious intention of addressing any of the legitimate grievances that working class has
Cliché at this point, but worth remembering the Democrats are not a leftist party by any means.
Until America sheds the anti-communist gene and produces an actual, bold left-wing movement rooted in Socialist thought, all you'll have is chauvinism wrapped in politeness optics.
>Just do the opposite of Trump / Musk, it will get you so close to being a saint.
yeah that didn't really work out that well with Kamala.
Problem is, over half the country just doesn't give a shit. Its easy to lose yourself on places like Hacker News and Reddit and think this is the general sentiment, but in reality, on the average 8/10 people around you in US either didn't vote or voted for Trump.
Not all dollars spend translate back to direct dollars earned, but rather political power or influence - which itself is a catalyser for other benefits. But some don’t seem to understand that.
Some understand it fine but are realizing the influence we get isn't worth it. Stop acting like we are idiots for not wanting to engage with geopolitical power games as much as we have been. We know our history, we know our place in the world, we understand all the trade offs, and we may actually not feel they are worth it at this time.
It is the constant refrain of "if they disagree with us they are not informed or are not as intelligent as we are". It is as if they can't believe people could have informed opinions that differ from theirs...wild...
Why can’t it? Stating that America should prioritize itself is a direct and unapologetic stance. Brevity is not a lack of thought—it’s efficient communication. Dismissing a position because it’s concise rather than engaging with its merits is a weak argument. I recognize that some dislike this perspective and will seize any opportunity to undermine it, but that doesn’t make it any less valid.
Stop acting like we are idiots for not wanting to engage with geopolitical power games as much as we have been.
The time for that attitude was the early 2000s, when we started two wars that cost us 30 trillion dollars. We're currently disposing of old military equipment that we would otherwise have to spent money destroying. We're also getting commitments from them to buy our military equipment going forward.
It's ridiculous and disingenuous to claim that supporting Ukraine is playing World Police or even a financially meaningful engagement in foreign affairs. We're giving them "store credit" to get rid of our closeout merchandise and getting a ton of value in return.
The assertion that America's wars cost us $30 trillion is not accurate. As of 2012, the national debt stood at approximately $16 trillion, with a significant portion resulting from domestic spending and the financial crisis, not solely military engagements. Our debt is not that large because of the wars, are they contributors of course, are they the long pole in the tent, not even close.
America is under no obligation to provide endless support to Ukraine. The notion that it's our duty to act as the world's arsenal is misguided. While assistance can be strategic, perpetually fueling a conflict without a clear path to peace is neither noble nor wise. It's time to prioritize diplomatic solutions over an indefinite cycle of military aid.
I mean the US is spending money on US weapons and arms and sending them to a foreign country. We're not sending them cash. The military industrial complex in the US benefits.
Not to mention the huge benefit to us that this equipment is field tested in a way that it can't be done by just testing. That feels a little crass, but the first major comflict of this century has changed somewhat how war is fought.
Sure, the military-industrial complex benefits—but the military-industrial complex always benefits. That’s not a justification for continued involvement; it’s just a fact of how defense spending works. If anything, this strengthens my argument; why not prioritize military production and readiness for the Pacific, where our actual strategic interests lie?
As for "field testing," that’s a pretty thin silver lining to justify indefinite support. Wars evolve regardless, and we don't need to offload billions in weapons to foreign conflicts just to learn how modern combat works. If we’re going to spend, let’s spend where it serves America’s direct security, not someone else’s.
Trump could have just told Ukraine they weren't going to support them anymore. He didn't need to have a public press conference and publicly act like a petulant child demonstrating how truly pathetic and weak his leadership really is.
The fact that you aren't upset by the way Trump and Vance acted is incomprehensible to me. How are you not ashamed that they are leading the US?
My understanding is that a deal was in place. President of Ukraine publicly reneged on that deal and took what was supposed to be more of an announcement as an opportunity to grandstand and renegotiate the deal that had been worked out.
Things got heated. I am not really that upset about this. I have been in far worse meetings with far less at stake. I am glad that our leaders are not letting people we are trying to help push us around. Usually such meetings are not public and basically most people don't get to see the sausage making of diplomacy.
I am more embarrassed that previous Presidents let foreign leaders come to our country and stomp for candidates or make demands of us.
Have you seen the deal? Or are you just speculating? For all we know, Trump actually told Zelensky the US would provide security guarantees to set up this spectacle. Or maybe in fact the deal was never in place and Zelensky was just repeating for the hundredth time what it would take for Ukraine to sign a deal and then Trump and Vance flipped out when hearing something they already knew was a cornerstone to his terms?
Presumably we'll never know what actually went down. But we do know that Trump and Vance act like weak little children and are totally incapable of actually mediating between the parties in this war. In the future, they should have the decency to stay out of this discussion and let adults do the talking.
Everyone has their own take on how they behaved. You say they acted like children, others say Zelensky was disrespectful. Either way, I’d rather have leaders willing to push back than the so-called "adults" who let this war start and then kept it going on autopilot.
Whether a deal was fully locked in or not, what we do know is that previous leadership had years to find an off-ramp and failed. The last group of "adults" spent years writing blank checks and getting nothing in return. If the current approach shakes things up and forces real discussion, maybe that’s exactly what’s needed. Looking out for America’s best interests doesn’t mean playing nice—it means knowing when to say enough.
> I’d rather have leaders willing to push back than the so-called "adults" who let this war start and then kept it going on autopilot.
What are you talking about? Putin started this war and I don't see Trump pushing back against him.
So far Trump has _failed_ to broker a deal to end this war. That fact is incontrovertible. At this point I don't understand why Trump doesn't just walk away. If he's not willing to help Ukraine anymore, he can just say so and explicitly change US policy. Everyone already knows that's the truth anyway. He should stop wasting everyone's time.
Putin started the war, but U.S. policy played a major role in keeping it going. The so-called "adults" spent years writing blank checks, refusing to push for peace, and actively discouraging negotiations.
Trump has been in office for barely a month, and you're already declaring his efforts a "failure"? Wars don’t end in 30 days, especially when the previous administration spent two years fueling it instead of pushing for a resolution.
America operates on its own timeline, not anyone else's. If we want to change our approach to Ukraine, we should do it in a way that aligns with our interests, not because of some artificial urgency. The fact that negotiations are already moving forward with Putin should tell you something: a real process is happening. If the previous administration had done its job, we wouldn’t even be in this mess.
You know I don't actually follow that take to be honest. I find this an interesting and important topic. So I am responding where a statement trips my fancy. I mean I am getting down voted all the time so not like I am doing it for the attention. I have opinions on this and have been thinking about the geo political climate intently for the last few years, as such I see no reason I can't chime in. Is there some policy about not being overly engaged in a topic I was unaware of?
Yeah it's incredible when the mask drops this far.
Trump is a pathetic fuck, but this lines up with how he only ever plays to the domestic audience in advancing protectionist interests. We're feeling that dissonance because this kind of protectionist thinking is extremely rare, basically unheard of these days for world leaders.
Which is why Zelensky mishandled the event. He should have just kept his mouth shut in front of the media. Especially since he's not as articulate in English.
> no-one, I mean no-one would ever do that inpublic
I agree. It seemed to me like Zelensky initiated the public display. Both trump and jd Vance we also commenting on his inappropriate public statements.
On the minerals front, the US doesn't need anything from Ukraine. Most of the minerals mentioned, except titanium, are un-mined deposits. Or things the US has plenty of already, such as oil, natural gas, coal, and iron.
Here's a rundown:
- Rare earths:
I've mentioned the MP Minerals, Mountain Pass, CA mine before.
The US doesn't have enough rare earth refining
capability, and China won't export the technology.
So US ore goes to China for processing.
Or did, until DoD paid for a separation plant
at Mountain Pass. That problem is close to being
solved. That new separation plant is running.
A plant for the final step, making magnet-ready metal,
has been built in Texas, again by MP Minerals,
and it's about ready to open.
What's happened with rare earths is not that
they're rare. It's that China undercut US
prices so much that the Mountain Pass mine
went bankrupt. Twice. In 2015, there was a
rare earths glut. Look at WSJ
rare earths articles back to 2011.
There are large un-mined rare earth deposits in
Colorado and Wyoming, with startups talking
about mining them. Whether this makes
economic sense is unclear. If all those
start up, the price will crash again and they
all go bust.
Three years ago, the US rare earths situation looked bad.
Not today.
- Uranium
The US has plenty of uranium resources. Canada
and the US are historically the biggest producers.
- Titanium
Titanium ore has supposedly been discovered in Tennessee.
See https://iperionx.com/
Are those guys for real? Not clear.
- Lithium
The US produces about 75% of the lithium it uses.
New deposits have been found in Arkansas:
China is the leading producer, but Canada and Norway are ramping up.
There hasn't been US production of natural graphite since the 1950s.
US production of synthetic graphite satisfies most US demand.
(https://pubs.usgs.gov/publication/pp1802J) Several new synthetic graphite
plants are being built in the US.
As we've seen in rare earths, when the cheaper sources raise their prices, domestic production increases.
It seems to take about three to five years to get a big mining operation going.
Quietly, during the previous administration, there was funding for US mineral projects in
rare earths, graphite, and lithium. It's no secret, but most
coverage is from sites that cover mining and minerals.
1. If you wanted minerals because of strategic concerns, you would not source them from a State which has been invaded by Russia. This is not a stable, reliable source.
2. The deal we saw details for was a jointly controlled fund for investment, where 50% of profit of State owned mining and related infrastructure would be deposited. There's no mention there of mineral supply to the US.
I did not understand it, and I still see no sense in it.
What was actually going on?
We saw Donald try to bounce Z into signing : "you have one hour to sign this".
That obviously shattered any trust that might have been there.
I don't think we ever saw the text of that first deal.
Then the second deal was just this jointly controlled investment fund, which looked like a face-saver.
In any event, USA is now out of the game.
A coup is in the process of occurring, and once the judges and courts are subverted, will be complete.
All this with the deal and D and Z is basically water under the bridge; EU has to stand on its own two feet now, and that's the situation here and now, however we got here.
1. It provides a way for Ukraine to become a client of US defense instead of a an aid recipient. That is, it allows Ukraine to pay for the weapons it receives.
2. It puts Americans on the ground in Ukraine in a non-military capacity. This introduces a new diplomatic dimension, as attacking or occupying land with significant American presence is not desirable.
3. It provides money for an investment fund for rebuilding Ukraine.
Whether this is an effective strategy, I don't know.
> 1. It provides a way for Ukraine to become a client of US defense instead of a an aid recipient. That is, it allows Ukraine to pay for the weapons it receives.
The text I saw was for the formation of a jointly (US/UA) owned entity which would decide how to reinvest 50% of the profits from UA State owned minerals/related infrastructure.
Unless "reinvest" means "give to US", I don't see this point happening.
> 2. It puts Americans on the ground in Ukraine in a non-military capacity. This introduces a new diplomatic dimension, as attacking or occupying land with significant American presence is not desirable.
In what way? we're not talking about any US State investment, and any US private investment would be crazy, given the war and possibility of future war. No one would invest there.
> 3. It provides money for an investment fund for rebuilding Ukraine.
It's money that exists anyway, only now it's in a fund jointly controlled by US/UA rather than being controlled only by UA.
> reinvest 50% of the profits from UA State owned minerals/related infrastructure.
Small correction: 50% of Ukraine's government revenue from natural resource extraction (minus some expenses).
> Unless "reinvest" means "give to US", I don't see this point happening.
You're right. There may be some options when the fund is actually formed, but the current deal almost exclusively benefits Ukraine (financially).
> In what way? we're not talking about any US State investment
It's up to the US how much they want to invest. If they put a lot of money into the fund, they get a lot of control over how Ukraine starts rebuilding. But due to how the fund is financed, the US will be bought out in the long run and the fund will turn into a Ukrainian sovereign one.
> It's money that exists anyway, only now it's in a fund jointly controlled by US/UA rather than being controlled only by UA.
The idea probably being to allow US oversight. Ukraine is incredibly corrupt and its government is fighting a loosing battle against this.
If a corrupt construction contracter pockets 80% of the money given to him and Ukraine tries to prosecute him, he'll just move to Portugal and nothing is ever going to happen to him.
On the other hand, if the US files charges, that contractor is going to have a really bad time.
Combined with the much superior talent pool in finance and international business available in the US, a lot more money should find its way to its intended purposes.
> Ukraine is incredibly corrupt and its government is fighting a loosing battle against this.
I hear this of this. I lived there for a year, fairly recently, in Kyiv. I didn't particularly see it, hear of it, or encounter it. I remember one or two stories of people being convicted of taking bribes, that's it. I didn't see it around me, or hear it from locals.
I may be completely wrong, but I think this isn't any more of an issue than any other post-Soviet country, and with the war on, UA doing an awful lot now to sort it out, because it relates to survival.
US gets to decide how at least half the fund gets spent, so it's US businesses who get the investment and eventually reap the profits. Ukraine obviously doesn't have the cash to give back and it will never have any without reconstruction. This is one way US gets anything at all back at a pace it has any control over.
But you are correct that without security guarantees there will be no development, no reconstruction, no investments. The deal just does nothing.
I think there's two (perhaps more) possibilities you've overlooked, that may go some way to explaining this.
First, that Donald is not the master negotiator / business genius he claims, and is not open to taking advice from smarter people.
Second, misdirection. It may be something to draw attention - the whole 'who needs batteries for their car company?' thing - or it might be a decoy offer, never intended to be seriously contemplated, but will serve as an easy-for-the-dumbs-to-understand future-date hand-wavey explanation for why negotiations failed. (This seems more palatable if you already believe the current US administration is compromised.)
The US has legal reasons now. Ukraine is a sovereign country and would be more than happy to accept US military bases. The US hasn't sent soldiers because they don't want to go to war with Russia
Why would US get involved now when they have nothing to gain and possibly escalate the situation to WW3?
If US owned resources in Ukraine, they have very good reason to deploy troops over there. Russia won't escalate the situation by attacking american resources and troop. This should slow down the war to a good extent combined with the cease fire agreements.
Your logic doesn't make sense. Why would Russia be willing to escalate to ww3 in the first scenario but back down in the second scenario?
And if getting involved will escalate to ww3, what difference does those resource deals make? Either american involvement (via NATO or this mineral deal logic) forces Russia to back down or it doesn't.
US signed memorandum of security for Ukraine. Not involving into Ukraine war means:
1. Nuke is the only option to guarantee security. Everyone should get one. Iran, Venezuela etc.
2. If you have nukes you can occupy neighbors with little/no punishment. Taiwan is the next in line.
3. US is not an ally, could not be trusted in any way.
Sad to see how Trump is dismantling USA from it's role as a global superpower.
1. Nuke doesn't guarantee anything in current situation. Russia might blow up the nuke moment it arrives in Ukr.
2. US France UK has made it very clear that they can occupy and establish military bases in non nuclear countries without repercussions, especially in Middle East and Africa.
3. Memorandum was signed by multiple nuclear countries and none of thier troops are deployed in Ukraine. Besides US was the largest supplier of weapons in Ukraine.
US is hardly affected by Ukr situation. For them to get involved, there should be something at stake. If they owned something in Ukr, they would have reason to defend it with US troops. Russia won't escalate by attacking US troops or resources.
> First, that Donald is not the master negotiator / business genius he claims
We're talking about someone who appears to believe a trade deficit means you're somehow being screwed or getting the short end of a deal. That's mercantilistic nonsense. It's economical thinking on par with a child who believes Scrooge McDuck is a good capitalist.
I think it's likely they know Putin will not honor any peace deal. So they have to figure out a way to blow up this deal and blame it on Ukraine or they'll end up with egg on their face.
There is one way in which it could make sense. If the US is able to extract economic benefits from Ukrainian territory, then it is likely to help Ukraine defend that territory in order to get those benefits.
Now whether those benefits are lucrative enough to warrant the US' help, I think not, which is why the deal apparently included no guarantees. The $500 billion is completely bullshit - they're not worth that much.
I would be extremely surprised if the other half of this profit fund was not eventually meant to go into Trump's pockets rather than to the United States itself.
I think they realized this, and the only way Trump and JD Vance & team knew how to backtrack on it, was to behave like bullies and freeze Zelensky out. Since they are well known to be bullies already (but not always), this came sort of naturally.
This is a puppet government of the US that was installed in 2014 after they overthrew a Russian puppet government. Of course the previous US administration gave tons of support - Obama's people installed Zelensky, so Biden continuing the support makes sense. Biden's family has also made a lot of money in Ukraine under the current regime, so it was personal for him. As for Europe, this is existential for them and it's cheaper to spend Ukrainian lives on this than their own. What is missing is any other international support from parties who aren't directly interested in this conflict, like India pressuring China to stop supporting Russia.
Where is it wrong, though? Here are a few pointers:
Ukraine was Victoria Nuland's project. Her CIA had a huge hand in the protests against Yanakovich (who was, in turn, an asset of Putin's GRU), and she personally had a hand in negotiating with Yanakovich on behalf of the protestors. You should read about the events in Ukraine in 2014. That overthrow led to the retaliatory capture of Crimea, where the US and EU apparently did not learn their lesson about how much of a madman Putin is.
As for the Biden Ukraine connection, I'm sure Hunter Biden is just secretly very talented at managing oil companies, which is why he was put on the board of Burisma in 2014, after Nuland's little coup. I believe the "10% for the big guy" quote was in reference to this deal, too.
As for this being an existential threat to Europe, I'm not even sure you need to be given the facts about having a madman like Putin edging closer to your borders, while also depending on him for energy.
Finally, on supporting your puppet governments: it's basic game theory that you should do this. Otherwise all the other ones (see much of Latin America) get overthrown.
>They are doing fine with him there, and he has not done well at gathering support internationally
I really do admire your ability to live in reality that is not at all correlated with base reality. And from an Iranian as well. I noticed that Trump and his team do this a lot as well, along with Putin. What do all of these have in common?
I've seen speculation that rare earth mining is environmentally destructive enough that it faces massive (expensive) regulatory hurdles in the US. Much easier to pay politicians in less developed countries to do it there.
Mountain Pass, one bankruptcy back, beat that problem. It took some new technology. The system is closer to closed-loop, rather than using huge
amounts of water and producing huge amounts of sludge in evaporation ponds.
That's what the mines in China do, and the sludge ponds are visible from orbit.
Here's the Sierra Club report from 2011.[1] They were OK with the mine.
So was the state of California and the US EPA. Problem solved.
Then in 2015, after all this was working, China cut the price of rare earths.[2]
Mountain Pass mine shut down, and Molycorp, the owner, went bankrupt. But
the equipment was stored and maintained. When the price of rare earths from China went
back up the next owner, MP Minerals, bought the assets and restarted operations.
This time, the new buyers made long-term deals with the US DoD and General Motors
to guarantee a market at a price at which they could operate. That seems to be working.
Much news coverage of mineral issues tends to lack background. Better info is available,
but it's on mining industry sites, in USGS reports, and in places most people don't read.
Punditry is cheap. Reporting is expensive.
Titanium is an odd duck here IMO. Titanium is abundant in the Earth’s crust, and titanium ore is fairly inexpensive. We use the ore for all kinds of unglamorous things, e.g. paint. The hard part is turning that ore into nice pieces of metal —- the process is complicated and expensive. While China produces an outsized share of titanium ore, the US has some large-scale operations that turn titanium ore into metal. As far as I know, the only real limit on our domestic production is demand, and demand is limited because the prices are far too high for most applications.
I recall various sources saying that we’re just about to have a revolution in titanium processing, kind of like how aluminum went from being more expensive than gold to being cheap. It hasn’t happened yet, and I wish Iperion luck!
I’ve heard many, many times that one of the biggest problems with nuclear power plants today is simply sourcing fuel. Obviously a large part of that would be due to international scrutiny and security laws, not to mention trustworthy employees to hold up all of this, but I was seriously under the impression that actually GETTING it is the difficult part.
Is that not a supply issue? I admit I only know a bit about the topic, but it’s the only one without a linked source.
The US seems to have only one uranium enrichment facility left - URENCO, in New Mexico.[1] Uranium mining as a US industry is down to 340 people.[2] That used to be a much larger US industry. It's not lack of ore. It's low prices.[3]
The problem is that western nuclear tech isn't very vertically integrated.
If you buy a Russian nuclear power plant, Rosatom takes care of absolutely everything.
If you buy a powerplant from anywhere else, you've got to juggle hundreds of various contractors and companies at various stages.
So if you've built your system, there will be only very few fuel suppliers left, whose fuel product is approved for usage with all the components.
And if one of those suppliers has problems or goes bankrupt (since nuclear fuel is an aweful product to make money with: Very low numbers, extremely strict regulations, very expensive handling and processing, a very unstable and slow growing market, constantly new requirements and all of your customers have huge legal teams and deep pockets), you're going to have a lot of difficulty finding a replacement.
You're right, but for Trump, there doesn't have to be an actual deal, there just has to be the _appearance_ of a deal. He just needs to be able to repeat that $500 billion number -- it doesn't matter whether it's realistic or not or will ever happen or not. It's like Mexico paying for the wall.
If the guy were grateful for anything that was just given to him, he'd be a much different person. Rather it's got to be an explicit "deal" that can feed his ego. "I did such a great job..... Such a great job they just gave me 5 billion dollars and said they'd give me tar and feathers to come back...... yuge..... yuge amount of money..... Just the most"
Thanks for the detailed report, but if you watch the VP debate, it’s clear that Trump’s entire economic campaign platform was based on promising to do stuff that Biden already accomplished, and to lie and claim it hadn’t been done.
Trump also claimed he had no intention of implementing Project 2025, but that’s what he’s doing.
I’m not sure what the correct response is, but anyone that doesn’t think Trump constantly lies is willfully ignorant.
The only explanation I can come up with for this administration’s actions is intentional sabotage of the US economy and democracy. It matches 100% of the actions they have taken so far.
Where can one reliably learn about rare earths in the supply chain, refining abilities, what’s actually important for which tech, etc? I feel like I read very different views on this stuff all the time at different levels of granularity.
>Titanium ore has supposedly been discovered in [...]
Titanium is very common (ninth most common crustal element IIRC). Generally there are always deposits. It's more important to have the infrastructure already in place because it's obtained in such large quantities.
Steel has the nice property of turning into any product with but a stern look, titanium torches your factory down if it doesn't like the air quality during its massage sessions.
I thought I remembered reading that Ukraine was the largest source of neon gas in the world and that it was necessary for lasers that make advanced microchips?
Remember reading that sometime on here when the war started I think.
> On the minerals front, the US doesn't need anything from Ukraine.
Need's got nothing to do with it. Bullies don't take what you have because they need it, they take it because that's what you have, and they want to take it away from you, just to be taking it away from you.
For Trump, it is not enough that (as he perceives the situation) he wins, rather than (as he perceives) everyone else loses. Even people's whose backs are up against the wall. Especially people whose backs are up against the wall. If you don't exploit the weakest player at the table, why are you even playing?
(Not that Trump knows anything about gambling... who the fuck loses money running a casino... on multiple separate occasions...)
Trump isn't making deals based on carefully considered advantages and concessions. He's just grasping his tiny hands at whatever comes in reach, whether or not he needs it, like the half-wit schoolyard thug he is.
I dont understand how anyone is not seeing that trump just want to gobble up parts of Ukraine for his own gain, it's no better than the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, Trump is just angry he's late to the party. There will be no guarantees for Ukraine and no concessions for Russia once this deal is signed.
Worth watching: Neville Chamberlain's famous "Peace for our time" speech.
"I have here a paper signed by the German Chancellor, Herr Hitler."[1]
And the crowd cheers.
Trump signing a comparable agreement with Putin is all too possible.
Perhaps this is really about keeping out potential European car battery manufacturers from sourcing their raw materials from Ukraine in the future. Trump is under the influence of Musk after all.
Despite being sold as the "mineral deal" to the public, it has nearly nothing to do with them and doesn't give the US any significant control over them.
It's all about establishing a semi-sovereign fund for Ukraine (slowly turning fully sovereign, due to how it's financed), focused on reconstructing Ukraine.
Note that there's an actual chance Trump will be so narcisstic to make the US lose its alliance with Canada over some rumor he heard on X which has no basis in any of the statistics, and Canada can now join the EU because of its shared border with Denmark.
The Trump administration doesn't give a single shit about truth, it's always about power grabs for them. If I were you I'd digitize any copy of school books I can find on the internet, because they will be gone very soon.
As a Canadian that EU join comment is laughable. We've had a border with France way longer... We aren't getting into the EU on some silly Island no one cares about border... Don't undermine yourself with such silly nonsense
That's not the point. The point is making Ukraine pay off the defense contractors rather than the American taxpayers. Trump made a campaign promise to end the war, and was overwhelmingly reelected on those promises, and has so far kept them.
The "minerals deal" isn't one but in name, no idea why it's being sold as such.
It's really just a Ukrainian sovereign reconstruction fund, with the option for the US to buy its way in. Also the fund is financed through Ukraine's natural resource extraction.
The crux being:
No one else can buy into the fund. So if Ukraine is rebuilt and then disappears from the map, the US pretty much owns the fund, together with whoever is recognized as Ukraine's exile government, and with it a huge portion of Ukraine's industries.
So even if Russia were to take over Ukraine, all the money making stuff is still co-managed by the fund.
And since Ukraine is the exclusive financial benefactor of the fund, whoever takes over Ukraine ends up facing an exile government with an utterly ridiculous budget.
And if they wanted to just expropriate the fund, they'd have to expropriate the US gov, too. Good luck with that.
.
The fund is a REALLY good idea, but the way it's sold to the public and Ukraine refusing to agree to it is ... odd at best.
I would like to know what the alternatives are. None that I can think of are palatable:
1. Support Ukraine enough so that Russia doesn't take too much more territory, but not enough for Russia to feel threatened and escalate the war. This was the Biden plan and it sounds like what Europe wants. I just don't see how this ends the war. Is this just buying time for someone to depose Putin?
2. Support Ukraine enough so it can take all its territory (maybe minus Crimea). This may not be possible with weapons alone. This might require a NATO no-fly zone over Ukraine, which effectively makes us a combatant. I actually would support this path, but the downsides are all too obvious.
3. Freeze the conflict at the current lines and guarantee the agreement with US/NATO forces. What does that mean in practice? If Russia violates the agreement we go to option #2? That sounds like a hollow threat because we're clearly not ready to do #2 right now, when it could actually help. All this will do is let Russia rearm.
4. Abandon Ukraine and make a deal with Russia against China. [This is Trump's plan and it's as stupid as it sounds.]
Did I miss anything?
The root of the problem is that this is a hard-power conflict and the only solution is going to be hard-power. But neither the US nor the EU are willing to put in hard-power against Russia. In that situation, I honestly don't know how to stop Putin from getting what he wants.
My frustration is that, as awful as Trump's plan is, it acknowledges that the only way to beat Russia is to send US troops to fight Russians, and there is no universe in which the US public will support that.
But please, correct me if I'm wrong. I would like to be wrong.
In my opinion, Ukraine should be supported as long as they are willing and able to fight, allowing whatever strategies and tactics they consider necessary.
That's because I believe there is a moral and (geo-)political duty to support Ukraine, also in order to make future territorial wars less likely, and Ukraine is a sovereign country with democratically elected leaders and parliament.
Fully agree. Ukraine should be given the means to defend itself on equal footing. No nation, regardless of size or power, should operate under the assumption that it can violate another country's sovereignty without consequences.
NATO must always act as a cohesive unit so any direct confrontation significantly increases the risks.
Western countries including my own have demilitarize heavily since the 1990s + rebuilt armies for counter terrorism, so sending more weapons to a land war isn't straightforward at all (as we've seen).
Western power is mostly centered around air and sea power and you can't easily transfer that to a 3rd party...especially three years late.
If neither Biden or now Trump is going to promise mass Tomahawks and IFVs galore then all we're left with is perpetuating a stalemate, not recovering sovereign land nor sufficiently punishing Russia. A couple more Storm Shadows and Leopard tanks from dwindling supplies aren't going to cut it.
> In order to do that they need to have a defined leader, not twenty some people each one pursuing their own interests
I mean on paper that's not really true. The US or whichever leader can't tell Poland to send troops, warships, or pilots into Ukraine because if Russia then sends a cruise missile into Warsaw it violates the NATO treaty which would require them all to react. There's no minor conflict exception, it moves as a unit. So the only option on the table is full NATO vs Russia, or status quo proxy war where weapons are funneled through it.
For Europe to properly defend Ukraine's sovereignty on their own they would have to break NATO commitments. Because I don't see continued supply of weapons from their small pool as sufficient to make a big difference... only to extend the war for a few more years, after which a very similar DMZ will be established.
To fight this war you need real military power: on the ground logistics, protected supply lines, large troop reserves to support offensive operations, etc. Weapons only get you so far.
I think the heart of the matter that I haven’t seen discussed yet is: Who’s going to pay for it? The current administration is cutting expenses across the board. There’s a lot of talk about the deficit and defense spending. I don’t see much appetite in the US to keep sending blank checks to Ukraine. Hence, the minerals deal: this was to recoup costs.
Of course, it would be great if defending democracy was free. However, with politicians already talking about cutting Medicaid spending, it was only a matter of time until defense spending came under scrutiny
Sending money to Ukraine saves US money. The equipment that Russia is losing means the US does not need to maintain as much military as before and fpr the cost of 90B US can permanently save maybe 30% of its mil budget going forward, especially is Russia clearly looses. One more year of support to Ikrain would destroy most of gerund Russian equipment and set it back for years.
If we apply this reasoning universally, should any sovereign nation engaged in war receive indefinite support as long as they are willing to fight?
Historical cases, such as the U.S. in Vietnam or the Soviet Union in Afghanistan, suggest that prolonged external backing can lead to drawn out conflicts with high costs and unintended consequences.
Is there a point at which the costs/economic, political, or humanitarian of indefinite support outweigh the intended benefits? How do you think such a threshold be determined?
I think one should _at least_ consider alternatives pathways to achieve a resolution.
That is the current path (at least until today's meeting).
Maybe we get lucky and Putin dies or is deposed (and the successor is less hard-line). That's a lot of rolls that have to come down the right way.
More likely, Ukraine continues to bleed men until they can't defend Kyiv, then Russia takes all of Ukraine anyway except you've lost a lot of soldiers and weapons.
No matter what EU leaders say, I think they are beginning to realize that Ukraine will not win this war and time is not on their side. The EU may or may not continue to support Ukraine with weapons, but it will be half-hearted at best.
The EU will pressure Ukraine to freeze the conflict, but without any hard guarantees. In a few years, Russia will then begin the attack again and probably take Kyiv then.
It will be near-impossible to end this conflict with all of Ukrainian territory in Ukrainian hands while Putin is still in power. It would be a massive loss of face and power for Putin and he'll do anything to prevent it.
A successor (even a dictator and/or hard-liner) has a lot more manoeuvring space here, at least initially, because he can just blame it all on Putin.
Remember this all started with "we'll conquer all of Ukraine real quick, back in a jiffy". Putin pivoted to "no, we just wanted the eastern provinces" but everyone knew that was complete bollocks. The entire war is already a massive loss of face for Putin.
It's not warmongering to allow a country that has been invaded to determine how and how long they defend their country and which approaches they take towards peace.
Is it possible that you haven't been raised in a free democratic country? That would explain your patronizing attitude towards elected governments and other countries. Otherwise, I don't know what to say. It's really about sovereignty.
On a side note, it is never a good idea to allow your judgments to get clouded by anecdotal "evidence", let alone videos on social media. Use statistical data instead.
I merely have an intact and uncorrupted sense of justice. I believe that any country illegally attacked by another country should be helped and the people of that country (if it is democratic) should decide on their own how to defend themselves.
1. Is keeping Russia in a forever war. Draining resources and preventing them from projecting any hard power anywhere else in the world. Seems like a good deal for US to me.
No-one is. If that's a hint at Russians, then no: they were on a brink of war throughout the 70s, tensions in the 80s, basically ignored one another since the 90s, however since the start of Ukraine war and both being on the receiving end of sanctions they started to drift closer, which could be described as "the West pushing Russia into Chinese embrace."
Stopping / freezing means russia continues to stock up at the current rate and and takes odessa and kaliningrad once trump term is up. The only option is for to create even more cost efficient+robust+sophisticated+massed drones and slug it out
Russia can’t escalate any more than they already have without directly attacking the US or with nukes, and in both cases, it’s suicide. They are struggling to take on Ukraine, let alone the US, and literally no country of influence would back them if they attacked or escalated to nukes.
I agree with you, but that's not what's being discussed here. If it were to come to kinetic warfare, Russian wouldn't stand a chance against the US as evidenced in Ukraine.
1. Is not about Ukraine. It's about the US and Europe. They benefit massively while Ukraine suffers the losses on their behalf.
Think about it. They support Ukraine by sending them surplus or aged weapon systems while modernising and funnelling money to their military industrial complex (with public support!). In return Ukraine uses those weapons systems to keep Russia tied up in a war, exposing Russia's most modern weapon systems and providing a huge amount of information on how to fight a drone war.
This is a great investment independent of what happens in or to Ukraine, basically they turn weapons they needed to replace or get rid of anyway into intel, new weapons, political brownie points at home and a weakened adversary.
China doesn't mind it that much either, though they enjoy it less because they had invested fairly heavily into Ukrainian infrastructure that is being destroyed. Keeping Russia isolated makes it easy for them to extra cheap oil & gas, push for pipelines that flow to China instead of towards Europe and also offload a bunch of their industrial surplus now that their requirements are winding down and the rest of the world is trying to tariff them for dumping.
So basically the problem is 1. is good for almost everyone except Ukraine and Russia. Trump for whatever reason can't understand that and just wants to throw a tantrum as is befitting for someone of his intelligence.
> It's about the US and Europe. They benefit massively
EU (germany) gets increasingly deindustrialised, to a big part due to energy costs associated with the war, and the related sanctions and sabotages. This war would not have even started if the previous US administration(s) had not pushed to that direction, europe was up to that point signing energy deals with Russia, they had no incentive for a full blown war. EU was following, and now they run around like headless chicken with no purpose, goal and prospects while Trump is basically trying to cash out of the situation. But I agree with you that, whatever this has to do with, the least is about Ukraine itself and democracy. Sadly we are never gonna move on from this false narrative until it is too late.
Right. And also you can never take that threat seriously when Russia is using it while on the offensive, because following that logic you should let them do whatever they want because nukes.
>We are not going to blow up the world to save Ukraine and Russia/Putin knows this. If he decides to use nukes what are we going to do? What can we do?
They are not going to risk their security for Ukraine. They wouldn't risk starting a nuclear war over Ukraine, it's stupid, even for their standards
If anyone use any nuke, the world as we know it is done, Ukraine might not be able to retaliate but others have already promised to. France did for instance.
No one want it, Putin and especially China. Current atomic weapon are no more the little Nagasaki Firecrackers.
I think you're at least a bit wrong in that this is about a lot more thn simply the Ukraine/Russia conflict.
The US has a position as "leader of the free world" which it occupies, at least partly, because it is percieved as committed to supporting democracy and freedom worldwide.
Turning on an ally during wartime doesn't just create problems for Ukraine's ability to defend itself (although it will be interesting to see whether Europe ups spending to compensate) - it removes the US as a percieved ally of liberal democracies worldwide.
So, not that you're wrong on those points, but that they miss the USA's broader commitments. It might make sense to commit to an undesirable outcome, if it fits into a wider strategy.
> The US has a position as "leader of the free world" which it occupies, at least partly, because it is percieved as committed to supporting democracy and freedom worldwide.
Nobody outside of the US has seen the US as that since at least the gulf war. US involvement since the 90s in foreign issues has been primarily for selfish purposes.
I think you need better wording for Option 1: Support Ukraine sufficiently so it can make its own decision if they want to continue fighting.
For Option 2 I actually don't see a lot of downsides except dead European soldiers replacing dead Ukrainian soldiers. Russia would absolutely stop if being stopped in their tracks more ferociously. In fact, Russia is already fighting this war all out. If they could they would do more (or at least I can't phantom why they would not).
Russia had a lot of equipment in storage, equipment that was supposed to be maintained. Strangely enough a lot of that equipment never saw any maintenance despite the maintenance budget being spent. That money 'disappeared' into someone's pockets.
Now these were conventional weapons, guns, tanks, trucks, etcetera. Stuff that you could imagine being used at some point, so there was some risk of being found out.
Now imagine you are a Russian general in charge of maintaining the nuclear stockpile. Weapons that you can reasonably expect never to be actually used. Even better, if you ever get in a situation where they would be used, it's basically the end of the world and no one is going to be alive to care if you pocketed the maintenance money anyway. How much of the allocated maintenance budget do you expect to have been spent on actual maintenance?
US intelligence agencies have said that unlike the other branches, the Russian nuclear forces are well managed and have relatively low levels of corruption. The gist is that more than enough of the rockets will work just fine and deliver bombs that will go boom.
You reveal the core problem for Ukrainian allies on either side of the Atlantic, which is that this war is much more important to Russia than it is to anyone else (not including Ukraine).
Even if so, it's a poor course of action to invite the defending leader to a talk, and ask publicly for his unconditional surrender _under a threat and praising of the invader_
US most certainly has anti ballistic missile tech, however wasting exposing it on Russia is something that is not worth it when there are more capable nations on the line.
Russia is special. They're a sophisticated adversary with a drastically different warfighting doctrine. They still optimize airframes for dogfighting, are laser-focused on hypersonic tech, and we don't officially know how good their missile defense is (probably excellent, or at least good enough to be dangerous, which is a bit of a theme).
They have a much lower defense budget, and have been forced to actually be creative and clever about problems, as opposed to our throw-money-at-problem-ergo-win approach.
tl;dr Russia is not a fun opponent, and they culturally really enjoy statecraft so best to stick with statecraft.
>and we don't officially know how good their missile defense is
we do know. Its mediocre at best.
The thing about Russia that most people don't get is that even before all of this happened, there was no money to be made in terms of talent for stuff that requires engineering. Everyone who was smart was leaving the country so they could make much better salaries elsewhere.
They are a full scale paper tiger, none of their stuff even from cold war era is as good as the propaganda claimed.
The Russian planes true stealth metrics are never going to get published. Russia will exaggerate it, US will never reveal that it can be actually detected. Russia had their latest fighter at the Chinese air show, and it was FAR from stealth.
Sure there is a 0.1% chance it may be able to hold 2 circle or one circle against F22, considering that no F22 has ever flown publicly within its full maneuverability envelope, but it sure as shit would lose to the flying supercomputer that is the F35 because BVR missiles that are smart enough to avoid countermeasures are a thing now. Some even use optical tracking.
As far as ICBM defense goes, we did this back in 2002:
If Russia could bomb kyiv more than they have, they already would have. They literally dont have the strength.
Nukes would likely drag Europeans into the war formally, which Russia cant handle. They dont have resilience, and their oligarchs dont want a nuclear war any more than we do. At the end of the day they are cowards; once their actual livlihood is at stake they will cut and run to save whats left.
Russias only actual card is political division. Biden effectively gambled the US would be more politically resilient than it actually is, and appears to have been wrong. Putin gambled he could manipulate enough in the US to turn the tide.
Now that Trump has exposed it, imo it actually increases the risk because now one warning Nuke can maybe whip his followers into line.
Ultimately today Z played new cards. He saw the writing on the wall, knowing agreeing to Trumps current deal would likely be the (eventual) end of his country. So he appealed to the US voter. This bypasses Trump so it was never going to end well. Now the next phase plays out. Trump tries to discredit z; if he wins its over. If he loses we go back to the Biden plan, rebranded as the Trump plan one way or another.
Strategic victory for Putin in the meantime. JD isnt cut out for the big stage is my main take away.
One nuke and the whole of NATO will back down. To think that we could respond to the limited use of nukes conventionally is extremely naive, and to think that the limited use of nukes can be responded to with a limited use of nukes w/o escalation to global nuclear war is -quite frankly- stupid beyond belief.
My own sense is that Putin waited Biden out to see what might happen in the 2024 elections, and now that Trump is back and conciliatory there is no need for him to escalate to limited nuclear war. And my sense is that Trump understands Putin's limits and that is why Trump is keen to make peace on terms vaguely approaching a complete capitulation to Russia -- for Trump it's not his war anyways, so for him it's not so much capitulation but something that can be sold as another domestic political victory over the Democrats and the Washington establishment.
Russia is basically not a major player anymore. It's a vassal state of PRC. Thinking it would be a useful ally against PRC is a complete misread of the situation. Sacrificing a state and alliance with EU for this is doubly insane. US and West was doing absolutely fine and held ground and the values (freedom etc) against oppressive dictatorships right up until this year. It's distressing.
Russia is expending its soviet cold war materiel. Its trade embargo is seriously undermining its ability to continue to fight. It may be sooner than we think that they'll run out of weapons and equipment so long as Ukraine has support from its allies.
One obvious alternative is to not to behave like a bully but like a real leader. The US could disengage in much more orderly fashion, if it so pleased.
But that doesn't change the underlying problem. How do we stop Putin getting what he wants? If you're saying, there's nothing we can do but the US should be nicer about it, well, I guess that's right, but somewhat useless.
He covered that. NATO troops and security guarantees are only credible if the US/EU is willing to send troops to die in the Donbas. If they're truly willing to do that, why not do it now?
Yes, you did forget a scenario where a EU, US and possibly other countries military presence is on the table as a threat to deter further escalations by Russia, but does not actually occur.
To be more specific, you give Ukraine what it needs to freeze the current lines, a cease fire is signed, Russia gets to stop fighting while saving face, and the unoccupied part of Ukraine gets what would amount to NATO membership without formally joining .
The status of the occupied territories remains ambiguous, with the West and Ukraine banking on a change in leadership in Russia at some point in the future.
As far as I can tell, this is the type of deal that Zelensky thought he came to DC for.
The goal was always to support Ukraine for long enough to pressure Russia into the negotiation table, the concessions could varied, no one knows. Ukraine knows it cannot get it all, but they know they won't settle for nothing either.
We know this given how close even Trump got to having discussions with both parties. His competence was not there to finish any deal and took the worse turn possible.
Ukraine is fighting an existential war. It has far more to lose and therefore can and will commit far more of its population and resources to the fight.
Russia has a greater population, but has been relying largely on conscripts among the poor, the incarcerated, and third world nations likes North Korea. Thats a resource that is far smaller in number than their total population. As soon as it’s tapped out, they either have to give up are start conscripting people in the middle and upper classes, and that will turn the Russian population on the war and their leaders faster than anything.
Right because countries with smaller populations can't beat larger ones when defending their homeland. Oh wait that's exactly what happened in Afghanistan vs USSR and USA, Vietnam etc.
I think Russia would be much more weary to attack a re-armed, well supported and "rested" Ukraine that would be bolstered by defeating goliath, even if at great loss, remember that everyone thought they would capitulate within two weeks.
In this war the only winners are US/EU weapons manufacturers, there is no winning scenario. Something Trump cannot understand and Putin cannot accept.
Let Ukraine attack Russia through European territory. Let them take Kaliningrad and St. Petersburg. Ukraine is boxed in right now but all those other places are lightly defended
Kaliningrad likely has some nukes and offer no benefit for Ukraine to hold or even damage. most of the valuable targets for Ukraine would be reachable by long range missiles. No one wants to supply. Sadly the play seems to be increase Ukrainian lethality and force Russia to conscript more Russians from bigger cities to erode support for the conflict.
The USA used to fight proxy vs proxy against Russia. Now we have a chance for us to fight through a proxy against Russia itself. This is a huge geopolitical opportunity to diminish or even destroy an enemy with low risk to the US itself.
The whole liberal-democratic world should be all-in on Ukraine assistance.
Instead, Trump just made it clear that the optimal time for PRC v ROC round 2 is within the next 3 year 10 months.
I'd look at the minimum viable option as providing enough materiel that the worst case situation is eventually similar to North and South Korea. But I also think it is conceivable that non minimum options are possible.
Put economic pressure upon Russia so it cannot support its war efforts. Meanwhile, Ukraine should be given anything it needs to defend itself effectively. Do you think it is palatable?
Russia had three years, no eleven, to escalate this war but has not done so. You'd think the Kursk invasion would have triggered but it has has not. It is us Europeans who have to escalate this war, show strength because it's the modus that Putin operates on and the only language he understands. I want to see an ultimatum after which we not only create this no-fly-zone over Ukraine but also send men (I'll include my own grey beard here) to Ukraine to help them push the invaders out. If that happens we need to set a second ultimatum after which we simple invade Russia.
It's sad to say: But as with my native Germany, it will take a complete defeat for the Russian people to have even a chance to embrace democracy. I'm somewhat disappointed that the future of Russian people is barely ever mentioned. Take away Putin and his cronies, give them democracy like (West) Germany did and the EU re-gains access to a huge market.
> 4. Abandon Ukraine and make a deal with Russia against China. [This is Trump's plan and it's as stupid as it sounds.]
It would have been in the US best interest to have done this twenty years ago, but some greedy bastards thought there would be untold riches in breaking up Russia, to have "two, three, many Ukraines". They failed.
Russia is a mafia that owns a gas station, not a global power. They’d be irrelevant without nuclear weapons. Their economy is roughly the same size as the state of Texas.
Just because they have nuclear weapons doesn’t make them a reliable partner in global geopolitics. Trusting Russia in any sort of alliance is a foolish move if you’re familiar with history.
russia hasn't been cutoff economically still. 3 years and the economy is going down but not as fast as it should have. The leaders of the west think they are playing a game here with pros and cons. There are no pros and a huge con with number 3 on it. How the fuck can anyone still trade with russia.
This should have been retaliation of the western world years ago.
I'm not sure if Putin/Russia can sustain option 1 for much longer, given the huge economical, military and political drain, especially in combination with effective sanctions.
So keeping it up might destabilize Putin, without further escalating the conflict. Seems like the sanest of bad options to me.
> Support Ukraine enough so it can take all its territory (maybe minus Crimea). This may not be possible with weapons alone. This might require a NATO no-fly zone over Ukraine, which effectively makes us a combatant. I actually would support this path, but the downsides are all too obvious.
It _is_ possible with the combo of weapons and economic sanctions. Ukraine (had) more economic support, so it is both a war of blood and endurance, endurance which Ukraine could have by being a porcupine with next-gen weapons and non-stop bleeding for Russia until things start hitting the oligarch's pocketbooks too far and the people of Russia begin to demand regime change.
Russia is a glorified gas station. You can hurt it dramatically with economic sanctions because its whole GDP is concentrated into one sector.
Imo if Trump really cared about America's long term security, he would be trying to fund research into cheaper / easier to produce next-gen weapons for Ukraine to test for us, instead of complaining how much our HIMARS and tanks currently cost, firing top military brass, cozying up to a dictator, and trying to exploit a ravaged democratic ally.
Maybe. But Biden and Germany didn't push too hard on either because they feared Russian reaction. Now, with so many Ukrainian soldiers dead, it will be much harder.
Economic sanctions won't affect Russia as long as China is behind them. And if the West is against Russia, they will do anything to keep China as an ally.
Sanctions work! But their enforcement requires attention. Russians are draining their fund to the last drop and there is not much left, they cannot easily get a credit either. Unfortunately, these last weeks give some breathing room to Russians and their evasion schemes as people who look after sanctions are being fired.
> Biden and Germany didn't push too hard on either because they feared Russian reaction
And this was a mistake, one that they slowly tried to reverse once they realized Ukraine wasn't going to be a pushover especially with modern weaponry.
I think the "mineral rights" deal might play into this. In the full interview[0], Trump mentions it right off the bat, and talks about how it "means we're going to be inside".
I think it goes in tandem with your number (3). Like you say, why would Russia not violate the agreement? I think maybe the move is "well now we have citizens in there working so don't blow us up". It's one thing for Russia to attack the Ukraine, but another if they have collateral damage that takes out Americans.
I don't even know how valuable the actual underlying resources are, so much as a bit of "kayfabe" between the Ukraine, US, and Russia, that things are different.
Zelenekys issue with that plan is the lack of guarantees, because of what happened the last time. He believes Russia will restrengthen faster than his country and when interest wanes, comes right back.
Trumps issue is he knows the lack of guarantees is a better deal for the US because we gain much and risk nothing. He wants to make a deal and get credit, i dont think he really cares what happens after. Maybe he does, i wish that to be the case. But i dont believe it.
The reality is there can't be guarantees only temporary peace. If the deal fails, Russia won't attack mineral deposits owned by US. US would probably send troops to "protect" US resources.
4. Abandon Ukraine and make a deal with Russia against China. [This is Trump's plan and it's as stupid as it sounds.
that the only way to beat Russia is to send US troops to fight Russians, and there is no universe in which the US public will support that.
This is really Trump's plan? And what makes you think Americans would support sending US troops to defend East Asia if they're not willing to fight for Ukraine? And what makes you think Russia will sit there idling while the US fights China in the pacific?
#1 is the least bad because Putin only has the resources to keep going for so long and will eventually have to quit (while looking for a way to save face). There is a lot of resentment in Russia about their boys dying in Afghanistan and at some point the Russian people will not put up with the loss of life anymore.
The U.S. abandoned Georgia in the 00s because it was indefensible.
The Ukraine is also very difficult to defend, especially since it seems like such a touchy issue for Russia. I doubt that Russia would go to full-scale nuclear war over Ukraine but I wouldn't be surprised if there was a small scale use of nuclear weapons on -say- Brussels. And if Russia makes enough of those Oreshnik missiles they could easily take out most of Europe's air forces in one go without going nuclear, and thus change the balance of power in Ukraine.
The question really is: at what price Ukraine?
Your (1), (2), and (3) are no solutions. Pausing the war now simply means escalating it later.
Depending on Trump's understanding of Russia's limits (I say Trump's because he might have a better understanding that the public), (4) may be the only workable option.
If Ukraine received twice the military aid, they would have already won. Drip feeding aid was worst of all worlds, outside allying with Russia. Both US and Europe got deterred by Putin's nuclear threats. Which means logically next step for Europe is drastically increase their nuclear stockpile.
I don't know what answer you expect. I think you didn't really miss options (broadly speaking), but your interpretation of each option is opinionated, and this is extremely opinionated topic (obviously). So I wouldn't say you are wrong, you are just... opinionated.
1st one isn't really about "buying time". The prolongation of conflict is not a "side-effect" here, it's the whole point. And IMO it's a solid plan, honestly. If I was a citizen of the USA without any morals or inclinations to travel abroad, I would probably support it. This isn't a 100% solid plan, there are actually some questions if it works as it was supposed to work, but the incentive here seems blatantly obvious to me: war weakens Russia, weakens Europe, and nobody cares about Ukraine anyway, so by investing into the war carefully USA ends up winning, same as after WW1 and WW2. To me, the game plan is obvious here. It's just cynical, and that's why Biden (and other public-speaking supporters of the plan) would never say it as it is. No real politician would.
As to Europe wanting that... well, I would say it seems current EU leadership wants that, and I have pretty hard time explaining why, so I'll leave it aside. If you want some random data point: I, as a European citizen definitely don't want that. I don't doubt the majority of my fellow EU citizens would say they "support the support of Ukraine", but I don't find it surprising, given all media outlets chant 24/7 about how horrible Russia/Putin is.
I mean, yes, that's kinda saying "I think I know better than these guys", but I just don't see any benefits for the actual people (not governments) living in EU. This war hurts the economics, it hurts the relationships, and I personally have relatives in Ukraine, so I just want it to stop. I don't care on which terms, and obviously it cannot be the terms on which the war started. It's way too deep into the conflict and too many lives lost to call it a good outcome, but it's the best outcome.
So, not being a citizen of the USA, I am in favor of that alternative which is "as stupid as it sounds", the last one. I mostly have problems not with the option itself, but with the fact that for Trump to want it is not enough for it to happen. Because, as stated, a lot of people don't want this to happen, and it almost seems like Trump is mistaking being POTUS for being God. Meaning, the way he is doing things is stupidly blunt. It might work, it might escalate things more. In any case, having all of HN whining about how ashamed they are of their president is not a good start. And that product he helped BBC to make works awful for him and his plan.
If European leadership does this right, Europe will emerge out of this much stronger than they went into it. It has already strengthened the collaboration across the EU‘s nations, has led to higher defense spending, will lead to even higher defense spending, will drastically increase energy independence, and eventually also increase EU‘s soft power (because they would have the hard power to back it up). If they play it right
Had this on another comment, but decided to respond here more in the root:
If Russia invades a NATO country, then you guys can worry about WW3. Until then, leave it be. We could have avoided a million deaths by now if we weren't adamant to "stick it to Russia". Either Ukraine is a part of NATO, or not.
If the world let it be back in 2022, Russia would have finished invading Ukraine in a week, and then would have been stuck dealing with incredible amounts of terrorism and guerilla warfare coming from a very large Ukrainian population. What exactly would that outcome have helped them in this supposedly-dangerous "invasion of Europe"? More balls and courage to invade another country?
Same outcome if they win tomorrow after 3 bloody years of war. You think they want another European country? What for? You think Putin can continue to convince his populace to keep subsidizing more wars at this point?
Most of the nations were woefully slow to act with Ukraine (hey let's send some token helmets). They've got a totalitarian regime invading democracies in their back yard but don't seem all that united about it ....
This is false. The EU has put up more money than the US but they have not _donated_ more money than the US. A large form of the payment from the EU has been in low interest loans.
Loans which have no security guarantees and will almost certainly be written off, unless you can make Russia pay for them - i.e. they will never be paid back by the Ukraine. It's the standard money giving structure in the EU. Make a loan, write it off later without repayment.
EU is more and more open to the idea of paying for the Ukraine war from the Russian frozen assets ($200 billions or so). The big guns (France and Germany) are still opposed though...
I actually think we should be quite cautious about this. It's essentially seizing dollar assets. It might provide a big boost for China's efforts to get the world off the dollar standard.
(I'm a strong supporter of Ukraine, host refugees in my house, and have donated to Comebackalive.ua, so this is not because I'm neutral in this war.)
About why the dollar has been the world currency for the past few decades (during which EU consolidated into a huge market with a single currency, and China became either the first or second country by economic size): the world's currency needs a country that runs huge trade deficits [0]. China is a nation of savers so their instinct is to not run trade deficits. Europe is in a similar position. US - not so much. I would not expect the dollar to lose this status any time soon.
Yes. But now that the US is the enemy of the free world Europeans are likely going to look to divest from the US and take care of themselves. Meaning Euro first, and likely giving preference to non-US countries in matters of trade.
Huh, how would this seizure take dollars away? These assets are held in Europe, their valuation is stated in Euro terms -- are they actually being held as dollars?
You can open a US dollar account in a non-US bank. Some banks don't offer this service to ordinary private citizens (others do), but I think pretty much all will if you are a (non-sanctioned) business or foreign government or high net worth individual looking to deposit large sums of cash (millions).
The bank needs to somehow hold US dollars to back its US dollar deposits, but there are various ways of doing that – e.g. put the money in its own account(s) in a US bank, hold physical US dollars in a vault somewhere, purchase US treasuries, use the deposit to fund lending denominated in US dollars (huge market for US dollar loans outside the US) – likely it is using some combination of those
So probably some of these Russian assets in Europe are euros, some are US dollars, some are other financial assets such precious metals, stocks and bonds, units in managed funds, etc – and they are just all being converted to euros for reporting purposes
Only about 18% of which is actually owned by Russia. The rest is money that happened to be in transit between private persons at an unfortunate time. Do we really think it's fair that a lady who happened to be selling her house at exactly the time the war started... should have that money donated to Ukraine's war effort?
Re: "Only about 18% of which is actually owned by Russia." - extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Care to show some?
(I do not understand your example with the lady that sold her house when the conflict erupted. Lots of people sold their houses at that time and somehow their money is not being frozen....)
That is complicated. And historically simply not true. Being subject/citizen of one country means that in case of war, your property is legitimate to be anything from damaged to seized by opposing parties in the war. The fact that we hadn't had any kind of real war in since WW2 means that no-one has that experience in recent history.
I'm aware that there have been significant amounts of armed conflict in the mean time, but the last conflict between states that ran similar to historic wars was the Korean war (which technically hasn't ended). Most wars the US was involved in where more similar to colonial expeditions (seizing local resources, defending local bases)
> That is complicated. And historically simply not true. Being subject/citizen of one country means that in case of war, your property is legitimate to be anything from damaged to seized by opposing parties in the war.
There are two sides in this war: Russia and Ukraine. Neither is holding the money.
Those Russians have their own government to blame, which in addition to stealing Ukrainian land has stolen assets of Western companies, including billions in planes. They are legitimized in overthrowing their poor leadership.
Russians are stealing butter and rationing electricity, Russia won’t level anything to rubble far beyond their borders this century. They are almost out of steam.
> Do we really think it's fair that a lady who happened to be selling her house at exactly the time the war started... should have that money donated to Ukraine's war effort?
You know what's not fair? The lady's government invaded a sovereign nation, committed genocide while doing it, and continues to do so. If that lady lost her fortune from it, then she should be vocal about justice for all parties.
America is a functioning democracy so individual Americans are much more responsible than individual Russians for the bullshit their respective countries do.
> America is not a democracy in a strict sense, its a republic
Most republics are democracies. You seem to think "democracy" is equivalent to "direct democracy," but a direct democracy is only one type of democracy. A republic is another form of democracy.
America is certainly a democracy (for now; who knows what will happen in two years)
How deluded do you need to be to detach yourself from all the responsibility in your life that are complicated? If you are an American, the US government is YOUR government and it is YOUR problem. You might not be able to do much, but it does not shield you from your moral responsibility.
Russians are responsible for their government too! They just have way less they're able to do to steer it, but it still their government.
Absolutely, she shouls pay! Also EU should suspend(or tax 100%) pensions and all social benefits to sponsor the war! If that is not enough, confiscate private companies and private properties!
I was saying that for years, since the war started! People thought it is some kind of joke. But that was the only way to win!
So to pay for the war to stop a new Soviet Union, a bloc of countries that all fear their alliance will turn into a new Soviet Union, must become a new Soviet Union?
Macron came out the other day in the interview with Trymp and stated that if the assets were to be seized from Russia that this would be considered payment.
After WW1, in the treaty of Versailles the German Reich, having just lost the war, was made responsible for starting it - it played a part in starting it, but was hardly fully responsible. So its successor state got a huge amount of reparations forced upon. Calling that out was a part of the appeal of the Nazis to the germans.
Now, how that is related to freezing assets from Russia I do not see. Even if interpreted as some kind of reparations, the lesson of that time was not that all reparations lead to a later war. Rather that humiliation will lead to resentment which can lead to war later. Huge and unjust reparations can be a part of that, but that's hardly the scenario we see today.
Macron is (understandably) deeply unpopular in France right now, seems like that seeps into the judgement of his actions here.
Some historians agree, some disagree. It's a typical question for your high school history exams. A good one as one can arrive at both answers when looking at the historic facts. In very short: The German Reich wanted that war and pushed it, but so did the other European nations.
"Germany" as we know it today did not exist before or during or even directly after WW1. You could just as easily say e.g. Poland was responsible for WW1 because most of that region was also part of the German Empire.
What's next, making Italy pay reparations for the roman empire? Making Turkey or other arab countries pay reparations for their empires?
I'm not sure what your point is because nobody is suggesting that modern Germany pay reparation for WW1. The discussion was about reparations that Germany has already paid after WW1, imposed on it by the victorious Entente. There's a long-standing historical myth that those reparations were 1) unjustified because Germany was not actually solely or primarily responsible for the war, and 2) excessive. It further goes to claim that this is a big part of why Germany went Nazi and started WW2 eventually. This was, indeed, the prevailing wisdom in the inter-war era, but Fritz Fischer poked a lot of holes in it after WW2.
At this point, while there's still no consensus as to the degree of German responsibility, most historians would weight it significantly higher than that of the Entente. The notion that reparations (and the Treaty of Versailles in general) was particularly onerous and punitive has also been largely debunked. However, the popular understanding still mostly reflects the inter-war consensus and not the later developments.
Macron wants to set a precedent of stealing assets so he could then steal citizens assets to pay for the abysmal debt he created.
If he cross the line ("freezing" foreign assets was already a big blow at property rights) I'm relocating and bankrunning whatever I have because it means property rights don't exist anymore in the country.
They definitely shouldn't be after this. This is the waking point, I've read article today that we could ramp up some serious defense within 5 years on old continent, skillset and money are there. This would massively boost parts of our economies, just like US did in WWII. Use russian assets, use green deal money that is beyond useless effort at this point and most costs are covered.
At the end this may be good for us, since Germany's stance has been pretty much retarded re defense to keep things polite. 4 superpowers instead of 3, albeit maybe Hungary and Slovakia should be kicked out to not sabotage it from within.
It seems an era is ending. Just like it did with 9/11, even outside US. All due to one orange man being voted by >50% americans to do exactly this. Why I don't get and probably never will but he is a symptom of current times IMHO, not a cause.
Anyway voting is not about recording a talley for every 18+ year old human with a pulse. It’s citizens selecting a leader and policy from their community. Getting your people out to vote is part of the event.
When people choose not to have their vote represented, for whatever reason, when the outcome was so clear in advance, then there is practically, legally, morally and philosophically no distinction between not voting and voting for Trump.
We (Americans) can’t be relied on. Yeah most Americans are still supportive of Europe but our political system produces whipsaw foreign policy. The end result of all this is America is weakened on the global stage as our allies lose faith in us and start working around us. Why should Europeans boycott China, sanction Iran, support Israel, isolate Cuba, intervene in another Iraq? These are American priorities, not European ones.
Because they are a part of NATO and have basically zero military to speak of on their own. There's a reason all of their proposed plans to support Ukraine include an American backstop: because they can't stand on their own and have relied on US military spending for decades to prop themselves up.
Ukraine is not a member of NATO and has no significant mutual defense treaty with America. We intervened nonetheless, to protect Europe. I think we should continue intervening, but I also think it's ludicrous for the EU to threaten to not support America, when they've allowed their military infrastructure to rot away at our expense.
Why do you think the US is going to remain in NATO for the next 4 years? Trump loves to say the quiet part out loud and he’s been repeatedly threatening to pull out.
If the US pulls out of NATO, then it's true that Europe has very little reason to support American interests (unless America "pulls out" of NATO by renegotiating a new mutual defense pact, in which case the countries in that treaty obviously will have plenty of reason to support America — similar to how Trump replaced NAFTA with the USMCA in his first term; which is also what Trump has said he wants to do with NATO).
However, that is an "if" statement that has not come to pass.
Well, threatening to seize an ally's territory kind of put the ally bit in question doesn't it? For all intents and purposes NATO ended existing with Trumps speculation to use military force to seize Greenland. After that statement nobody can consider the US a reliable ally anymore. So.. the US may not have pulled out of NATO^ but there is absolutely no reason to believe in any kind of support being available from the US either.
^which by-the-by is difficult to achieve on a practical level. Notifications of withdrawal have to be handed in to the US government
If you were correct, then European countries wouldn't keep asking that the US sign an agreement to backstop a Ukraine deal — after all, regardless of the paper, the US wouldn't be trusted to do it.
But they are asking for that; I think you should consider why.
The US has successfully created a system that integrates the US economy with Europe, limiting Europe's choices and greatly enriching the US for decades... and then last week JD Vance in Munich yelled at everyone and claimed the EU was somehow stealing money from the US.
The really funny thing is: Vance is ~right that the Europeans "steal money" from the US. What I do not get is why that is a bad thing. A "trade" nowadays basically always involves one side getting something tangible that they want, be that goods or services or commodities. And the other side getting something intangible claims or money.
If I can get something inherently valuable for essentially nothing but an empty promise? That's an extremely comfortable position to be in..
Look we're all grateful for the Americans that do care about The Alliance but we've seen the political trends in America and it looks bad. You can't elect Trump twice and say it doesn't represent America. Trump's politics isn't going away. The Democrats allowed 'radical' social change to dictate the party platform and didn't implement enough reforms to please the average citizen. Until they do or Trump makes massive blunders we don't have a hope that the old America is coming back.
Everything you're saying about the international trust American voters have betrayed and thrown away is pretty reasonable. But this:
> The Democrats allowed 'radical' social change to dictate the party platform and didn't implement enough reforms to please the average citizen.
is false.
Democratic policy has done plenty to benefit average citizens, in a long tradition (at one point bipartisan) going back to WW2.
And it's never been centered around any idea more "radical" than taking seriously the words of the declaration of independence about equality, inalienable rights, and life liberty and the pursuit of happiness, even for people who are doing something others think is weird.
It's even pretty clear that Democratic policies have strong electoral popularity:
But "swing" voters (assuming they really exist in any form as popularly understood) among others are often not really clear on who supports the policies they prefer. My suspicion is that this comes from Democratic underinvestment and poor investments in media and culture while their opposition has been doing this aggressively, which allows others to define them as radical.
That’s some creative mathematic gymnastics you’re doing there. “Anyone who didn’t vote chose the one who gamed the electoral college best.”
But that still does NOT mean anywhere near half of Americans actively chose the current situation. To say so is wholly, maliciously, egregiously disingenuous.
EDIT - Showing my work:
US Census in 2020 - 331,449,281
2024 Trump votes - 77,284,118
Even skipping any possibility for growth since 2020, 77.3mil/331.5mil is not “>50% of Americans” by any possible mathematical definition.
You're right that my numbers were of the voting eligible population, though, and not the total population. Okay, so let's work that out.
244,666,890 total eligible voters
- 156,336,693 total ballots cast
= 88,330,197 passive votes for Trump
88,330,197 passive votes for Trump
+ 77,284,118 active votes for Trump
= 165,613,316 total votes for Trump
/ 331,449,281 total US population
= 49.9% of the total population figure
That is, indeed, just shy of 50%. So I'll concede that Trump did not have >50% of Americans supporting him. Just >50% of American voters.
No. Passive voters effectively for the winner, not the loser even if they don't know in advance who that will be. They're delegating their decision to their fellow actual voters, whatever that may be. Perhaps it's because they trust others to know better or perhaps because they don't care. I've tried to do this explicitly in a small club election submitting my vote as for "whoever gets the most votes" but the administrators didn't like that :P
Nobody gamed the electoral college this election. Trump won the popular vote too.
Many voters are voting for the lesser of two evils; they don't like either candidate. Non-voters are simply taking that to the next level: they can't decide between two evils strongly enough to value casting a vote.
Bikeshedding over the difference between active vs passive votes in a single-winner first-past-the-post election is fruitless.
If they're truly both evils, there's always the option to do a write-in vote for someone else. Futile? Sure. But hopefully headlines like "X won the election with 30% of the vote" would start to raise eyebrows in ways that "X won the election with 49% of the vote" doesn't.
> ll due to one orange man being voted by >50% americans to do exactly this. Why I don't get and probably never will...
Not agreeing is one thing, but it is a remarkably easy decision to understand - people go to WWII because every single war since then has been a disaster for US interests and outcomes (I think every single, certainly most). The last time the US had an unambiguous win by fighting was 70 years ago when they got involved in a fight very late. Since then all the warmongering has made America poorer, they don't achieve anything good and generally make the US worse off.
They made a call that they don't trust the military industrial propaganda and they want to see some peace happening for once. Pretty solid decision too; if we can all have normalised relations with the US after Iraq then we can stomach Russia misbehaving in Ukraine. Escalating a land war in Europe is stupid and its been a mistake every other time the Europeans tried it; even in WWII where they claim to be justified. The blood-lust left everyone closely involved broken and it'd have been better if they found a more peaceful route to ending the violence. The fact that they failed to negotiate something doesn't mean it was impossible.
The last time the US had an unambiguous win by fighting was 70 years ago when they got involved in a fight very late.
No, it was in 1999. A short aerial bombing campaign that lasted less than 3 months and cost less than 600 lives ended a decade of wars in former Yugoslavia that had killed 140 000 people and made millions refugees. What an incredibly small price to pay for peace.
Ukraine needs the same kind of support, but instead, they got misguided "de-escalation" that only boxed Ukraine in and gave the initiative to Russia. By knowing that the US would force Ukraine to throttle back every time the Russians made a large misstep, Russia was encouraged to keep escalating without the fear of triggering an overwhelming response.
That war was a huge win for the US, much more so than for the reasons you mention there. It was the first time they managed to convince other NATO pact countries to execute a unilateral offensive campaign, until then a defensive alliance. The PR campaign had to be extensive and effective to justify violating the UN charter, and it was - for the first time successfully positioning a US-led NATO-run offensive war as altruistically motivated in the public eye, paving the way for the numerous wars that followed.
The campaign was valuable to everyone involved. The US got to assert itself as a global moral authority, also finally getting to build Camp Bondsteel[0] after decades of trying to build a base in the region (the largest US base on foreign soil since Vietnam, and it was built and managed by KBR meaning Dick Cheney and his shareholders also profited considerably; they've since lost interest so nowadays it's just a mini Gitmo). For the allies that backed them and helped justify the war, they received carte blanche permission to do what they like and settle their own scores. Their Dutch friends, for example, got to brazenly violate international law from the start by dumping their out-of-date depleted uranium cluster bombs on my densely populated home town[1], choosing to target the main building of our university, the main building of our city hospital, and the biggest civilian central steam heating plant that kept half the city warm.
The campaign did have some negative effects though. In the east it was interpreted as a deliberate provocation toward Russia at a time of particular weakness (their president getting hammered and falling out of planes etc), and Putin used this extensively as an example of Russian embarrassment at the hands of the US, helping him rise to power as PM in August '99, acting President in December '99, and President in March '00.
I'm not particularly emotional about any of this btw - I just thought you'd appreciate the geopolitical perspective and the ripple effect that war had on Russian politics & subsequent opinion towards the West.
The Russian-leaning world remembers this event differently, they think of it as the US unilaterally bombing Yugoslavia, taking out a Chinese installation full of Chinese nationals, and facing absolutely no consequences or ill effects.
This was one of the factors that guided Putin's thinking when he took Crimea.
At the very least, protecting Ukraine's skies when Russia started targeting its cities with missiles would have been exactly the right move, an appropriate international response to warfare against the civilian population. A huge missed opportunity.
Shooting down incoming missiles is not considered an act of war under international law. It falls under self defense. Japan has shot down a number of North Korean missiles and nobody has accused them of declaring war on North Korea.
Planes stopped flying over Ukrainian-held territory only a few weeks into the invasion. Since then, they've mainly launched glide bombs from far away, due to the high risk of being shot down if they penetrated Ukrainian airspace.
There's nothing preventing Ukraine's allies from setting up air defenses and fighter patrols to shoot down drones and missiles. A number of countries did just that when Iran launched a missile attack on Israel last year.
> Since then, they've mainly launched glide bombs from far away, due to the high risk of being shot down if they penetrated Ukrainian airspace.
And Russia would go back to planes if other countries were shooting down their missiles, because they know that other countries would hesitate to declare war by shooting down one of their planes. Other countries taking over this responsibility neutralizes the air defense against planes.
Ukraine can shoot down planes on its own, that needs no foreign assistance. Feels like you're just looking for excuses to sit idle and give the initiative to the aggressor.
This is simply not the case.
There US has very successfully used it’s military to enjoy the position of absolute top dog in the world, but a major part of why they could do that was that the US has made very strong allies in the whole rest of the western world who have never, until now, seen any reason to try to compete with the US in this regard.
A well placed network of foreign aid has also generated influence in other parts of the world.
The United States has now irrevocably destroyed this position.
There will be enough time for the Trump Family and Elon to make out like the bandits they are, but the US position long term is diminished.
Can any of those things be traced back to a specific positive outcome for anyone outside the US weapons industry? Like, say the US hadn't invaded Afghanistan back in '01 and the trillion dollars in budget had been put towards handing out how dinners for the poor instead - what would the negative part of that trade off have been?
> Can any of those things be traced back to a specific positive outcome for anyone outside the US weapons industry
Yes, you have a ton of money to buy stuff that is much cheaper for you than for anyone else in the world because of the global reserve currency being in dollars, not to mention smooth trade guaranteed by the existence of the US navy.
Every thing you do is positively benefited by America's ability to project its military might across the globe.
American hegemony happened by chance, and the dollar just won the reserve currency lottery?
Granted, not every war was a net win but that war machine is uniquely expensive and it may be sacrifice the public is willing to pay. But it probably wouldn't hurt to see how contemporary books on history differs from propaganda.
Wouldn't have happened. A series of impressive military victories early in WWII looms large in peoples heads, but there's no getting away from the raw numbers of how outclassed Germany was wrt material and manpower against the USSR. Barbarossa was launched on very limited, low quality intelligence, and even when more accurate numbers came in regarding Soviet division numbers in 1942, the top brass refused to believe it.
Who can tell what would have happened? It sure would not have been easy without US support:
"... Lend-Lease, including 1,911 locomotives and 11,225 railcars. Trucks were also vital; by 1945, nearly a third of the trucks used by the Red Army were US-built. Trucks such as the Dodge 3⁄4-ton and Studebaker 2+1⁄2-ton were easily the best trucks available in their class on either side on the Eastern Front. American shipments of telephone cable, aluminum, canned rations and clothing were also critical."
It's "Ukraine," not "the Ukraine." "The Ukraine" is a Russian imperialist term because it's rooted in the idea that Ukraine is a mere territory (akin to "the Great Plains" or "the Midwest") that belongs to a larger political entity.
It’s called Ukraine. It would be particularly prudent to avoid using the Soviet-era nomenclature given the context of the conversation you’re participating in.
> "The Ukraine" is incorrect both grammatically and politically, says Oksana Kyzyma of the Embassy of Ukraine in London.
That doesn't really make any sense. There is no magical deity that arbitrates rules of English. It is merely a tool invented by humans to use as they please. The only semblance of "incorrectness" that might be found is in failing to communicate with the reader, but in this case you clearly had no trouble understanding what "the Ukraine" meant and I suspect nobody else has either.
> and politically
This makes more sense and is a much stronger point, but political correctness is bound to intent. There is no evidence I can see that suggests "the Ukraine" was previously used with intent to offend or marginalize the people of Ukraine. Even if "the Ukraine" can be used as a politically incorrect device, that does not imply that all usage is politically incorrect.
> It’s called Ukraine.
Officially that is true, but there is typically nothing official about a casual comment made on Hacker News. As before, context is significant, and there is nothing in the context that I can see that suggests that the comment was made in some kind of official capacity.
"The Ukraine" is grammatically incorrect for the same reason "the England" is grammatically incorrect. An article doesn't go there.
The politically incorrect usage here is not bound to intent, because unaware readers will subconsciously lower Ukraine's status in their minds regardless of whether the writer intended them to do so.
The official status, or lack thereof, of the comment doesn't matter either. There is no compelling reason to not use the accepted name. If your friend was called James, would you intentionally call him "the James" just because you're not making an official statement? That doesn't make any sense.
> "The Ukraine" is grammatically incorrect for the same reason "the England" is grammatically incorrect.
It is grammatically atypical, perhaps, but not incorrect. It is fundamentally impossible to use English 'incorrectly'. The closest you can get to any semblance of 'incorrectness' is failing to communicate with the reader. But that is certainly not the case here. Everyone is well aware that in the above comment 'the Ukraine' refers to Ukraine.
> The politically incorrect usage here is not bound to intent, because unaware readers will subconsciously lower Ukraine's status in their minds regardless of whether the writer intended them to do so.
A faulty lowering of Ukraine's status may be politically incorrect, but the words are not to blame. That's your fault for thinking about its status improperly. There is no onus on the writer to worry about a failing mind. If there were, communication would be out of the question.
> If your friend was called James, would you intentionally call him "the James" just because you're not making an official statement?
I personally would not be intentional when writing casually. That defeats the purpose of writing casually. If I happened to put "the" down on paper I certainly wouldn't put in the effort to remove it. Who cares? Assuming the context is otherwise clear, nobody is going to be confused about who "the James" is.
there are reasonable policies between "give ukraine everything she possibly wants to protract a war of attrition that risks backing a nuclear power into a corner" and "tell ukraine to pound sand and kiss putin's ring."
for instance, EU states were repeatedly warned about their reliance on russian energy. the EU preferred to empower putin and constrain future actions in exchange for cheap power. perhaps, rather than passing the next massive aid bill, the EU could focus on hurting the aggressor state by literally just not sending her more money on a regular basis. eurocrats continue to, thanks to their reckless energy policy, literal billions of dollars straight to the Kremlin with which she can finance her expansionist war. stopping that would be a great first place to start.
or perhaps EU states could have gotten their act together faster and sent more than busted old helmets (cough Germany cough). trump says a lot of dumb stuff but he's entirely correct that europe has repeatedly failed to adequately invest in her own defense, particular since she has an aggressive, expansionist, would-be-again superpower on her eastern border. then when America doesn't pony up what europe thinks is enough, she goes on a whining tour and asks why the evil Americans won't spend enough money and lives to fight fascism.
I’m not sure it will help if we disclose taxpayers that the loan won’t be paid back. The idea was to sweep it under the rug, not boast about the EU’s lost money.
Noone in Europe knows these are loans. Everyone assumes the money is gone. Politicians don’t talk about loans, they talk about giving money to Ukraine.
Loans are the way to do it because of the way most European budgets work. But you can’t call them regular loans in good faith, and no politician in Europe does so. The language towards the public is that Europe is giving money.
That's just a technicality. There is no "EU" tax so the institutions does not have the billions to give away. They can however secure loans so that is the method being used. But make no mistake what is happening here.
Look at the backing countries and how they are spending on Ukraine. There you will see the direct donations.
No EU member country has yet to make a billion dollar repayment claim post facto. Certainly not five hundred billion.
I don’t see how you’re describing anything other than what I’ve described.
The money may come from the private sector, but the government guarantees for it. This is government spending.
On paper, the government may theoretically not have to pay, but in practice everyone knows that the loans aren’t paid back and then the government must pay for them.
These loans really are just creative accounting for giving money within the budgetary constraints European governments find themselves in.
Of course they are, what did you expect would happen in war? Fighting with pillows? However it's not my responsibility to bear financially. My responsibility is caring for my own.
>We're donating cash
People are dying here as well as politicians are saying the healthcare is underfunded so clearly we need the cash back home.
No one will bother about those loans when a Ukrainian victory will give the EU access to at least the Ukrainian market if not also the market of a new democratic Russia. Please do some long-term thinking on this.
There are reasons why the EU should support the Ukraine, but access to the Ukrainian market isn't one of them.
The Ukrainian GDP is 179 billion USD (https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/gdp?continent=euro...); they're a market smaller than Greece (244 billion USD) or Hungary (212 billion USD). If they succeed in driving the Russians out, they'll have to rebuild their country and will probably be in debt for decades.
Democracy in Russia is a pipe dream; they have nuclear weapons and Putin isn't about to give up power. I guess it's possible that his successor could hold elections, but that's highly unlikely at best.
But people are bothered about affording food and rent now, and when they see their tax euros aboard they're gonna be salty, and speak of potential future winnings (which are all gonna go to some megacorps anyway) are not comforting.
> This is false. The EU has put up more money than the US but they have not _donated_ more money than the US.
That's not quite right, either. A large portion if not a majority of the financial aid from the US is--and tacitly required to be--spent on purchase of weapons and services from US defense contractors. That's in addition to direct military aid where the Pentagon directly purchases and transfers weapons, and transfers old weapons--I think the replacement cost is what's calculated as the US "contribution" for that portion.
This is how military aid packages are structured for Israel and Egypt also. I don't mean to insinuate anything negative, but the reality is that the majority of all this aid is effectively a direct subsidy to US defense contractors.
The EU does the same thing, but the structure and pretense is different--loans tacitly required to be used to buy EU weapons and services, the loans forgiven after the public stops paying attention. Though in the case of Ukraine I think a much larger portion (relative to US) of aid is intended for civilian programs, at least early on, on account of the EU's squeamishness.
The US has mostly donated their obsolete weapons that were going to be decommissioned anyway. While expensive, they would’ve otherwise cost the US money to decommission instead.
Are you referring to ATACMS, Hi-Mars, M777's and M1 Abrams, the backbone of the US military and many of its allies? The materiel currently used all over the world? That 'obsolete' heavy weaponry?[0]
Or is it the thousands of Javelins that annihilated the Russian tank columns so that the Russians are currently mounting assaults in Chinese golf carts?[1]
There were only a few M1s given. MANY more M1s were used against the Iraqi Army!
The stream of weapons has been more of a trickle of weapons. The Javelins have good PR with the nice Saint Javelin but the British-Swedish N-LAWs are wicked and the tens of thousands of the Bofors AT4 did a lot of the initial grunt work.
There is no proper replacement for ATACMS yet. At the projected rate of production for the new replacement missile, a years worth would last about a couple weeks of usage in a serious conflict. ATACMS are still 100% valuable to the US.
> A total of 110 PrSMs are expected to be procured in fiscal 2024 and 190 in fiscal 2025, Inside Defense wrote, citing the Department of Defense documents.
What did we replace "legacy" ATACMS with we could use in a war today? PrSM?
In November 2023, the Army delivered the first four Precision Strike Missiles (PrSM) as an early operational capability (EOC). The Army shot two PrSM EOC missiles at a maritime target in June 2024. Between November 2023 and August 2024, the Army executed three production qualification test (PQT) events. The Army intends to complete a limited user test (LUT) with the fifth PQT test event in 1QFY25 and the remaining four planned PQT test events by 3QFY25.
Not to mention that maintaining M1s must be a nightmare.
The Ukrainians seem to prefer the Bushmasters. This kind of makes sense, given it seems a lot of what Ukraine is doing is guerrilla warfare then equipment that is easily serviceable likely is more useful.
ATACMS... The ones Biden reluctantly donated after Ukraine begged for them because they can strike deeper behind the frontlines and inside Russian territory? They may be an older platform but they appear to be highly desirable and still brought out for juicy targets.
It was 31 M1s donated, last time I looked. And they survived a helluva lot longer against the droneless Iraqi Army, which helps explain the low number. A $500 drone can ignite a $5M tank. Drones have changed the calculus of tank warfare.
Maybe the AT4 and NLAW didn't have the same effectiveness of Javelin? The Javelin has had a pretty good PR campaign with it's point and destroy videos.
>A $500 drone can ignite a $5M tank. Drones have changed the calculus of tank warfare.
No. What you see in Ukraine is the 20th century war with some drones. Active defense system can take out RPG and anti-tank missile. It can easily take out a much slower moving drone. Unfortunately, the Western tanks and IFVs came to Ukraine without ADS (and many even without reactive armor). And for whatever reason Ukraine was pretty slow to put passive drone defenses onto the armor - you can see on the videos of the Ukrainian 2023 counter-offensive that the Western tanks and IVF are mostly "naked", just the bare base armor.
There are stories - videos - from recent decade how tanks correctly "dressed up" with passive defenses and reactive armor would survive direct hits from Javelin, RPG, etc., in some cases it would even survive multiple hits from RPG. And active defense system is a huge step up even from that.
If anything, with the next generation of active defense systems being able to shoot down even incoming artillery/tank gun round, the tanks will continue to rule the battlefield, especially in autonomous version.
If you've been watching the war you'll notice that tanks are largely absent from battle these days. Russia had thousands more tanks than Ukraine 3 years ago, and now is scrounging the last of its inventory leftover from WWII.
The Super Tank™ you've described sounds cool, though. Can Ukraine order 1000 of the upgraded version with lasers for Spring delivery?
watch the videos from the war - the tanks are mostly without ADS, and the ADS that Russia has is really a crappy one. You can also watch videos how soldiers shoot down the drones with shotgun or just using some stick/stone. Drones are much easier to shoot down than RPG, and nobody has been able to shoot down RPG with shotgun (a great baseball player probably would be able with some non-zero probability to bat an RPG out though).
>Can Ukraine order 1000 of the upgraded version with lasers for Spring delivery?
No. Even the existing ADS with shrapnel warheads are not sold to Ukraine.
No navy would deploy a battleship today, no matter how good an anti-missile system it had. Only needs to miss one, and battleships just cost way way more than even a thousand missiles. Plus ballistic artillery just isn’t that useful compared to what a drone or cruise missle can do.
What's the cost of all your whizzbang technology? Does it cost $10M or $20M per tank to make? And how quickly are they produced? Maybe 1-2 per month? And how many years does it take to modify or improve them?
Now compare that to the hundreds of thousands of drones manufactured every month for far less and adapted monthly.
We've already seen mothership drones used in Ukraine.[0] How long do you think it will be until we see fire and forget multiple attack baby drones that overwhelm any whizzbang ADS? 6 months, a year? As the old saying goes: quantity has a quality all it's own.
A man-portable, fire-and-forget anti-tank guided missile system before its expiration date is still a man-portable, fire-and-forget anti-tank guided missile system.
It is however not worth as much to the US than a man-portable, fire-and-forge anti-tank guided missile system that they won't have to replace for much longer.
"How dare you refer to our weapons designed to fight in eastern europe against Russia. We need those weapons in the USA in case we have to.. fight... in eastern europe... against... russia?"
US never wanted to fight Russia directly as it would mean nuclear escalation.
US needs somewhat strong Russia as a scarecrow for Europe and everyone else in the world, so that people would join NATO and pay 4% of GDP to the American military industrial complex: Lockheed Raytheon and friends.
The goal is to scare people and force them to shell out dough for overpriced US weapons.
If Russia becomes too weak, there are two risks:
1. Nuclear/Biowarfare proliferation due to instability inside RU
2. Europe won't spend a dime procuring US weapons because Russia would not be a threat anymore
3. China can increase influence in Russia
so American goal is to keep somewhat stable Russia and force EU to shell dough on US weapons. Thats the racket, everything else is a distraction
Having stockpiles of obsolete weapons to give away is a byproduct of having funded our military for decades. If other NATO countries were doing likewise they, too, would have stockpiles of obsolete weapons to give away.
The fact that it's just the US doing this is indicative of the overall military posture of the EU. It's reasonable to question whether they are prepared to do their part to defend themselves should Russia penetrate further west.
Plenty of european countries have given both stockpiles and modern weapons.
As an example sweden has given Strv-122, CV90, Archer, Saab 340 AEW&C and has offered Gripen fighter jet (but Gripen has been blocked by US/France). All of those are up to date weaponry, and besides that much from older stockpiles has been given.
That's just one example from one small country with less people than one city in the US.
This has very long term repercussions for the US. No-one is making the mistake of using a US jet engine in their design again and getting export controls because of that. Already plans are evaluated for switching to an upgraded Volvo RM12 or something from Rolls-Royce.
The same scenes must be playing out in various industries across Europe and the rest of the world. Such wheels turn very slowly, but they now turn away from the US defense industry.
Certainly a world where NATO countries spend <2% of their budget on defence but the shiny new weaponry all comes from US contractors doesn't seem obviously more helpful than one where they're targeting 3% spend but making a point of building domestic industries or buying from pan-European projects.
Plenty of NATO members already build and buy from non-US sources. France basically made it a principle because of their historic fence-sitting NATO policy, Sweden mostly builds its own (but licenses parts from US/UK like fighter engines), other countries are buying artillery or tanks from south korea, etc. The US itself buys anti-tank weapons and riverine patrol boats from sweden, dutch rifles, german handguns and much more.
"but the shiny new weaponry all comes from US contractors" is not true.
It is true that the US has spent far more on it's military and made it far more global than any other country. It is also true that the US acted as a guarantor for west Europes security for most of the last 70 years and that should not be understated. That era seems to have come to an end.
I'm not suggesting the US has ever been literally the only NATO member supplying arms. I'm suggesting US companies have gone from the top of the list for a lot of procurement contracts to the bottom.
Yeah! Just from Czech Republic - our old Mi-24 are shooting down Shahed drones daily, some of the first tan shipments were czech t-72s, we sent our old Kub SAM bateries, Vampire MRLS, BMPs, etc.
The EU froze over 200 billion Euros from Russian assets. Russia will never see that money again. Once Putin is defeated Ukraine's debt will be paid with that.
Also, please do think long-term: A victory for Ukraine and a second try for democracy in Russia will mean that the EU will regain huge markets right at its doorstep that need rebuilding and in the case of Russia some diversification would be sensible.
If Trump has his way, the US's "support" will have been in exchange for rare earth minerals. Not really support in the end though, if Ukraine doesn't get any security guarantee.
Not sure why Ukraine would believe any new agreement would be honored when the Budapest Memorandum turned out to be worth less than the paper it was written on.
They have, but they need to double it. You can't count on the US anymore, and Ukraine needs a lot more than it's getting.
And let's face it, the EU can easily afford it. Sure it hurts a bit. But more war with Russia hurts a lot more. The cheapest way out is to stop Russia in Ukraine, and not give him the opportunity to try again in a few years.
We can afford it, but it is very difficult to do politically. The rise of far-right parties has everyone spooked, and in ageing societies pensioners cost more and more money, while holding most of the wealth, and constituting the majority of the voting power. Working people feel increasingly disenfrenchised, and it is only going to get worse. At the same time we are judging climate change to still be a larger problem (or we are at least investing a lot more money into it), and there's this horrific fetish for fiscal conservatism in law and in practice.
If pensioners have most of the wealth, then they should pay those working class people higher wages to take care of them in their old age. That's one factor of many in to end this disenfranchisement.
Ukraine needs more manpower primarily, they keep saying it for a long time this is a critical issue, they have relatively enough equipment for waging war. At the end equipment can't solve it all, enough boots on the ground is what conquers or defends territories.
They don't even have enough 155 shells, long range drones, body armour, training facilities, fighter jets, bombers, cruise missiles, tanks, howitsers. The list goes on and on. It's exactly the opposite of what you are claiming.
They had to develop their own long range drones instead of getting off-the-shelf stuff. Germany blocked Taurus, Tomahawks were a no-go.
https://english.nv.ua/nation/generalsyrskyi-says-he-banned-t... (NV Ukraine, Jan 2025)
However, certain categories of Air Force personnel, after preliminary training in training centers, are reinforcing the Ground Forces and Air Assault Forces due to a shortage of personnel on the front.
https://archive.is/WKqxz (Financial Times, Oct2024 but updated)
The commanders estimated that 50 to 70 per cent of new infantry troops were killed or wounded within days of starting their first rotation.
So if they don't have manpower OR enough weapons, maybe when their head of state comes to ask for support from their biggest benefactor, he should, I dunno....not piss off his host? Wouldn't that help him get what he wants?
I guess it shows how critical is technology that keeps the human away from harms reach. Drones are a great example of that, especially how costly/hard it is to train a jet pilot.
With (almost) fully autonomous weapons and systems it comes down to simply who has the better economy and production lines.
How can you afford an indefinite war against a nuclear power? He will just drag you into a quagmire, which always works against the west. I'm genuinely curious what strategy Europe will have here to squeeze Russia.
Nukes don't give Russia infinite resources. Russia's economy is suffering. They've mostly ran out of modern tanks (except for the T-14 which still hasn't seen combat somehow), they're using donkeys for trucks now, their artillery has lost the punch it had two years ago. They're mostly sending demoralized soldiers in deadly human wave assaults, and dropping bombs on cities. That's all they've got left.
Russia has the economy of a medium-sized EU nation. The EU is vastly more powerful. If the EU wants to, they can give Ukraine everything they need to win. Only they're divided and unwilling to believe in their strength after 80 years of dependency on the US.
>Russia has the economy of a medium-sized EU nation. The EU is vastly more powerful.
This is why GDP is a useless metric. Last year it was reported Russia was manufacturing 3x more artillery shells than the US and whole EU combined.[1] Billion-dollar cosmetics and luxury goods industries don't translate well into battlefield success.
>If the EU wants to, they can give Ukraine everything they need to win.
Except manpower, which Ukraine needs and doesn't have.
> Only they're divided and unwilling to believe in their strength after 80 years of dependency on the US.
And perhaps a tiny bit cautious about escalating a conflict with a neighbouring country that happens to have the world's second largest nuclear arsenal?
That is absolutely a possibility, but not a certainty, and a very dangerous gamble to make. That said, Europe probably does need its own nuclear deterrent and its own anti-ballistic missile defense.
First, I've been hearing it all my life. More often after 2014, and very often since 2022. In 2022, it was "russia has days left of reserves".
Second, nationalism was always (since 1300s?) strong in there. It always united russians against the enemy even if they hated the goverment. That's why every incrusion attempt always failed.
Sure. We don't need incursions. They can stay and be nationalistic all they want.
We need to keep applying pressure until something breaks. There's a constant refrain of "Sanctions don't work. Please stop the sanctions." from the Kremlin.
> Sanctions don't work. Please stop the sanctions.
Examples? All I can see is majority of russians living their life as usual. Sure some transplants in Moscow are sad that their consumarism routine got distracted, but that is it.
As for money frozen in EU, IIRC most of it aren't realted to the goverment and just happened to be in trasit when sanctions started.
Every oligarch knows that Putin is the hand that feeds and biting it at best gets you in prison at worst an express descend to the ground.
In general I don't think sanctions work. They're clearly not working against Russia. EU countries still use tons of Russian gas, they just pay 5X more than they used to because now they have to stick their fingers in the ears and cover their eyes and buy the gas re-routed through India or Azerbaijan at a premium while they pretend they are no longer buying Russian gas. It is quite silly.
And a naval engagement to the Czech Foreign Legion :)
Russia has historically been very good at killing off invading armies through attrition, but that's not necessarily a strength when they're the invading army in similarly inhospitable conditions
Russia didn't lose to Afghanistan, rather Russia, Ukraine and Belarus dismantled the Soviet era occupation force. In fact the pro-Soviet government of Afghanistan lasted 3 more years on its own - unlike the US installed government which collapsed before US troops left.
Easy to defend mega land with harsh winters (but not so harsh anymore as they were during those failed campaigns), especially when both defeated invading armies severely underestimated... cold weather. Nobody is really invading russia here, whole world just wants to be left alone from them, including all former soviet republics (funnily this includes Belarus too).
That's not saying anything about their offensive capabilities, which as whole world sees are a fraction of what was thought about them. They really are supremely ineffective, corrupt and lazy in numbers and levels that cripple whole war for them. They can't produce enough new armed vehicles and their stockpiles from cold war are running very thin as per independent satellite analyses, they use stolen motorbikes, donkeys and golf karts for troopers now (with corresponding death rate). Their nuclear weapons are just a guarantee they won't be attacked on Moscow conventionally or nuclear in any way, nothing more. As we see all other 'doctrines' and 'red lines' fell apart with long lasting incursion in Kursk so that was just an empty bullshit.
They know all this, their country is falling into inflation spiral which can easily end up with people's revolt and I believe puttin' realizes how fragile his relatively soft power grip on russia is. Plus he has positioned himself as an arbiter between various power clans within his hierarchy, not as a single supreme single ruler whom everybody fears for life like in North Korea for example. He desperately needs to finish this war within a year or two since he is an extremely paranoid person. But he has some sort of effective reach or control over orange man and we saw what we saw, who knows why.
Myth. Russia had superior tanks and manpower. German high command had no idea of the depth of Russias armament industry or the number of troops (see eg the Hitler/Mannheim conversation).
Yes the winters did help, but they were still outnumbered, and outproduced.
My point is that the Russian people have a capacity for self-sacrifice that shouldn't be underestimated, especially when their (perceived) sovereignty is threatened.
During WW2, for example, the Soviets lost a total of 20-27 million dead. Only China, a country almost three times as populous, came close at 15-20 million.
My theory is Russia can continue to produce long range weapons and drones in factories near the Urals or even beyond in Siberia, far out of reach of anything the Ukrainians can get their hands on, and just outproduce the Ukrainians as long as it takes.
They're certainly trying. Had you asked me before the full scale invasion, I would have answered differently. But Ukraine still stands, and it's looking more and more like a Finland-like situation. After all the repatrionization propaganda that doesn't look good for Putin. And the Russian economy absolutely suffers from this, we just don't know how much.
The Soviet Union lost 20m+ dead because they faced an existential threat from an enemy that intentionally massacred many millions of people who lived there (including people who weren't particularly enamoured with the idea of a Soviet Union or Stalin as leader)
The situation isn't quite that bad in either Russia or Ukraine which was also one of the constituent parts of the Soviet Union. But it's certainly closer in Ukraine, even if most Russians hold an irrational level of enthusiasm for the war
It won't be indefinite, eventually the nukes will fly. On a long enough timescale, whether it's this war or the next or the one after that we humans are going to pull the nuclear trigger. The question is "for what reason?" This seems as good a reason as you can have. Much better than an accident or miscalculation.
The European countries that aren't closely allied with Russia and don't have nuclear power plants all over the place have collapsing economies because they're paying 5X what they used to for Russian gas.
It's really grim.
I don't think the EU thinks it can afford it at this time.
Loans are not the same as heavy weaponry and intelligence.
Other American administrations have been spending decades begging NATO allies to keep their militaries up to a higher standard. Their refusal to do so is now coming back to haunt the world order.
"Their refusal to do so is now coming back to haunt the world order."
I would think, the US going against the International Court of Justice, threatening allies over land and making deals with a official emperor is doing worse.
Putin obviously. And no, "formally" he is surely a elected president. Just one who talks about and compares himself to the great emperors of russian past a lot and acts pretty much the same.
There are some cases where that is true, there are some cases where Ukraine got the same stuff that is current with the US, and there are cases where Ukraine was literally the first user of new tech (the GLSDB, for instance.)
One reason for this mix is that the Russo-Ukrainian war has defied some US expectations of what future wars it might need to deal with might look like, making previously-retired equipment relevant again (the drone war has made a lot of retired anti-aircraft tech more relevant, because relative cheap short-range missiles and short range anti-aircraft guns are a lot more useful against drones than they are against modern fighters, for instance) and, in other cases driving new weapons development.
>the us is at least a generation ahead of that equipment.
Can you list the in service equipment that is a generation ahead of M777 and ATACMs? I sure wish we could get some of these wiz-bang fires assets out here in the First Island Chain.
While a replace for M777 may not be in service, the US had stopped manufacturing and continued only after Ukraine requested it. This indicates that it isn’t an integral tool to the US’ arsenal, and has been superseded.
> November 2024 BAE announced the opening of a new artillery factory in Sheffield during 2025 to resume production of complete M777 artillery pieces for Ukraine and to help fulfil orders for fresh titanium cast spare parts from the US supplementing its US parts factory which also resumed production during 2024.
Similarly, ATACMs production was also halted.
Really, your question, tone and phrasing really indicates that you are not really looking for an actual conversation but rather a gotcha moment.
It’s worth noting that variants of weapons and exist, and sending older ones to Ukraine does not imply that it is getting access to newest and greatest.
I made some grammar errors when i was writing this — i was on the phone. The gist is there; both weapons had their manufacturing ceased which means either the US had enough stockpiles or they were superseded.
The weapons were either sold to Ukraine or other countries, and it was only after Ukraine requested more of them that production started again, which implies the US had no need to produce them because they were superseded in US’ arsenal.
Furthermore, just because Ukraine received X weapon, doesn’t mean they received the latest and greatest variant that’s in use — they might have very well received a previous generation of said weapon.
Asking which weapon or system replaced them as is in service does not look like discussing in good faith simply because the systems might change or newer variants may be used.
>which implies the US had no need to produce them because they were superseded in US’ arsenal.
No, it does not imply that they were superseded. It means that the stockpile of weapons and spare parts was considered large enough to support the US's expected burn rate of material. Supplying Ukraine in a peer conflict changed that calculus, requiring new production to keep parts supplies above a certain desired threshold. The M777 is proving to be....not that reliable in the harsh conditions of the Eastern Front.[1][2]
>Furthermore, just because Ukraine received X weapon, doesn’t mean they received the latest and greatest variant that’s in use — they might have very well received a previous generation of said weapon.
This is supposition on your part....and it's WRONG. That's my point. You're simply stating things that are factually incorrect. Ukraine received M777A2s[3], the most modern variant of the M777 in service with US forces.[4]
>Asking which weapon or system replaced them as is in service does not look like discussing in good faith simply because the systems might change or newer variants may be used.
>Do better.
It's not a question of "variants", it's not a question of whether systems "might change", and it's not an issue of grammar errors. You made a false statement, perhaps unknowingly. I asked you to clarify with specifics, perhaps you know some weapon system I'm not aware of (despite having a rough idea of the IOC fielding plan for Marine fires assets in my AO over the next several years), and you've now made 2 posts bereft of details or references to obfuscate the fact that your original post was completely wrong and baseless. All this does is lower HN's already-low signal-to-noise ratio on military subjects.
US Army and USMC towed Field Artillery batteries are equipped with M777A2, the same weapons platform and variant we sent to Ukraine. We are not "a generation ahead" of the equipment sent to Ukraine. Period.
What i do not get is the lack of understanding that contractsecurity goes with the western world order too. Investments worldwide are as safe as a owing a mc donalds in russia, in a multipolar autorian world. How a whole world is willing to risk their retirement funds and pensions like this, for peanuts..
Trump is merely another step in the bar being lowered. And make no mistake, it can go lower.
The Western acceptance of authoritarianism in exchange for a good deal is what got us here. It's not just the US; it's Europe too. Putin did what he did because he knew that Europe was willing to exchange the end of Russian subordination to the post-Cold War world order for cheap gas. Middle Eastern countries have seen their awful human rights records punished by the granting of a World Cup by FIFA and European tourism to Dubai. Both China and Russia were made Olympic hosts in the last 20 years. Russia hosted a World Cup in 2018, four years after the invasion of Crimea and ten years after its invasion of Georgia.
Well China's economy is currently tied up in a housing pyramid scheme that's gone burst.
Russia's economy is on such a war footing regardless of if it wins or losses in Ukraine, the economic shock of the end of the war will bankrupt the country. See Dutch disease.
And no one wants to host the Olympics, it's a huge money sink.
So it doesn't really pay, it's just bankrupts you. Even Trump's America is having massive stock sell offs and other countries dumping the dollar.
The EU member states have their own foreign policy and extensive veto rights within the federation. It is not so strange that the EU itself has been slow, if anything I think we have pulled together better than expected.
Individual member countries range from having done a lot fairly quickly to active sabotage. We have member countries like Hungary and Slovakia, who are firmly aligned with the Russian side, as if 1956 and 1968 and the entire iron-curtaint-thing never happened.
Fico in Slovakia is a hopefully crumbling anomaly- the previous governement (while a bit unstable) donated a lot of material, including a criticalzly needed S-300 battery and Mig-29 jets. And even with all the Ficos rambling, Slovakia is making good money selling artillery (both SPGs and ammo) to Ukraine.
Austria donated what amounts to a couple of helmets but no one is talking about that. Must be nice being surrounded by NATO countries and a wealthy world police state across the world you can free-ride.
Because they thought(incorrectly) that we can "tame" russian threat by having a really good economic relationship with them. Turns out, they don't care, Putin will raze his entire country to the ground and kill hundreds of thousands of his men just to say he tried to bring the Soviet Union back.
This is incorrect. EU still buys Russian gas, its just re-routed through friendlier (than Russia) countries like India or Azerbaijan, and it costs a lot more than it used to because of logistics and transit costs.
What is incorrect? EU buys a lot less russian gas than it used to - that is an undeniable fact. And how exactly is russian gas re-routed through India to EU? Have you looked at a map lately? There is nothing in any other country that can match the output that was being piped directly to the EU from Russia. The pipelines to India and Azerbaijan are a tiny fractions of what was going to EU even when running at 100% capacity.
Trump's a bully, but he's a bully that exists because the lowest common denominator keeps getting lower.
Russia wouldn't have thought it had the leverage to invade Ukraine if not for their control over European petroleum supplies, leverage the Europeans gave them of their own free will.
Markets do not solve everything. Trump is the ultimate expression of this so far, but he is not the first.
The energy policy of most European countries was clearly mismanaged. Depending on the country, bad decisions have been taken either due to incompetence, bribery, political pressure, and psyops.
Psyops doesn’t just work to incite… an equally powerful goal is to normalise. Like normalise how a country that has unlimited sun and wind elected to use oil and gas from Russia.
A different nuclear energy policy would have changed Europe’s fate. It will do so again…
I mean I'm real content to blame the environmentalist movement on this, which very obviously bifurcates into "pragmatists" and "anti-nuclear". The anti-nuclear people will pay lipservice to everything else, but it's abundantly clear that their top priority at all junctions was eliminating nuclear power regardless of consequences and they'd believe convenient lies to that goal ("the natural gas is just temporary. We'll definitely stop using Nordstream voluntarily...")
Nah the anti-nuclear power people are not environmentalists. Those people would know that nuclear waste is handled far better than any other waste from power production. Instead the anti-nuclear power people are the immense number of people who are scared to have nuclear power plants anywhere near them. It doesn't matter how safe the plants actually are, people think they are crazy dangerous compared to other ways that power is generated.
Going back on shutting down nuclear would cost more money and energy than building out sustainable energy - just see how well UKs or Frances most recent nuclear experiments went - tens of billions over budget and nothing to show for it after a decade
This isn't a credible reason to wed yourself to Russian gas and decommission the plants Germany already had running. Despite three years of bombing the nuclear plants in Ukraine have not been (properly) hit.
Terrorist attacks on nuclear power stations can be dealt with via the standard security services.
German aversion to a functional army and nuclear energy has had consequences for the country and the EU.
Why is parity the goal? The US is on a different continent, and also (theoretically) defending US allies in the Pacific, and middle east.
It's Europe's backyard. Europe should be contributing 5x what the US contributes. They can afford it. It's the richest (per-capita) continent on earth. They outproduce Russia 5-10x.
I have been a strong supporter of US support to Ukraine and I think this meeting was gross and unbecoming, but Europeans need to wake up and understand that this is a problem they can, and have to, solve, not just as a supporting player to the US.
"We did as much as the US" doesn't matter. Give enough support to solve the problem. You have the economy and can, if you make even minor commitment — 5% of GDP would vastly outproduce Russia, for a small cost to living standards. The alternative is giving up.
This debate is probably a communication strategy to fuel anger in the american public while distracting / confusing other partners. From the time I could watch TV I always saw USA spend intensely on military and foreign policy. I'm trying to find when the reversal occured, but it's probably during the previous campaign, as a trick to blame biden.
I have said this many times. I feel, as an American, many people are tired. WE have no insight into the vast sums of money that are being spent by the DOD and where it is going. I see debt climbing and I have to ask myself, do I want my country to spend money on other countries or maybe focus on cleaning up our own house first? I would rather America focus on putting its own house in order, wasted spending, corruption, cartels, China buying up land, and the erosion of our education system.
Many of us no longer feel the juice is worth the squeeze in supporting Europe. We have done enough over the last 100 years. Yes we have benefit some from their troubles, which they caused, but that doesn't mean we have to continue to support them.
One thing to note is that you are looking at this as a government cost, whereas it’s seen as a massive mechanism of hard and soft power, with immense economic and political benefits for the US, including being able to do whatever it wants wherever it wants. A significant amount of the wealth of the US depends on that soft/hard power dynamic. Break one, break the whole.
But I agree with you. The US spends too much on military and intelligence budgets and not enough to and for its citizens. And this has led to the misery of so many Americans. The land of the plenty has not much to give to the ones that need it most.
And on the other hand, the immense asymmetry of (non-nuclear) military power between the US and the rest of the world should ring alarm bells across every nation right now. Especially so in the EU, UK and Canada.
Why is this massive military budget and complex supported by sacrificing public services, healthcare, education, and social services, and through higher taxation of the relatively poorest? And why is it not supported through taxation of corporations and the richest of the super-rich?
And for me, the most important reason for why I found today so upsetting:
What is true dishonour if not to betray a friend in need?
Well I'd argue that there was no such thing as 'friend' in the mind of people hosting that event. It was clearly abusive mobster negotiation tactics, immoral power play and profit extraction.
One party greated the other cordially in a suit. One showed up to meet the President of the United States in leisure attire! One had made an agreement with Secretary of State and then reneged on it publicly. This same individual then decided to threaten the President of the United Sates. Who exactly was acting like a mobster?
There is nothing immoral about getting paid for services or products. If you don't like it go somewhere else. Why is it that everyone expects hand outs from America but never once ask what can they do for America? It is Ukraine who is exploiting the American people for free arms. Finally an America stood up to their ridiculous behavior, the petty dictator was kicked out of the White House.
>What is true dishonour if not to betray a friend in need?
Great Powers don't have friends. Nor do they have enemies. They only have eternal Interests. (paraphrasing a quote often attributed to Henry Kissinger)
As I was looking for a more exact source for this quote, I stumbled upon this interesting piece in Time Magazine....from 1955:
https://time.com/archive/6798908/no-friends-no-enemies-just-...IT is high time the United States quit throwing money and materials around the world like a drunken sailor and settled on a foreign policy clearly consonant with our national interests first and foremost. We pile deficit on deficit until we threaten ourselves with bankruptcy.
So you have some good points about soft power. Yet at this time as I look at Americas GDP Europe is playing less and less of a factor in it. So as I said the juice may no longer be worth the squeeze. Also what is the point of soft power in Europe when we are being over run by immigrants? America needs to look to itself first. We can't be a strong world power for much longer if the issues at the southern border continue. I know no one in the world cares about Americas problems, they tend to ignore them and view us as something to use or get something from. Yet we have not only a right but obligation to look to ourselves first.
Ukraine is not and has never been an friend or ally to America. We were one of many parties to an assurance that we wouldn't level them if they turned in their nukes. We have given them aide in their time of need. There was a deal in place for more aide and the President of Ukraine came in, in athletic gear mind you, and reneged on the agreement and started grandstanding and threatening the US President in the Oval Office! This was a HUGE mistake, he basically said to America I do not respect you and spit in our faces. I know many people do not see it that way around the world but if a world leader comes to ask for aid from the country they are completely dependent upon for their survival and their plan is threats and leisure attire how is that not disrespect?
I mean fair play for being bold and all. Yet that was unwise in the extreme.
You're repeating all their narrative. Zelenskyy wore the same clothes as he did in canada, Sweden, France and I would assume any other country. This is most probably a a bad faith argument developed by Trump's team.
I fully understand this sentiment. After all, combined more than $6tn (!) have been spent on the rather ill-advised engagements in Iraq, Afghanistan and Syria. It's unfortunate that the US invested so much in these affairs that there is little capacity or willingness left now when it matters.
So help me understands Europe's reasoning for not keeping its spending commitments to NATO during peace time? We still met ours, still met all our obligations despite ongoing wars.
I agree now things really matter but why should America be on the hook for wartime sacrifices when Europe couldn't be bothered to do the easy part in peace time? No one ever answers this simple question. They all just down vote me which is fine but if there is a rebuttal to this let me know.
From my perspective most of Europe believed in the "end of history", i.e. a world where armed conflicts would no longer be relevant. They thought local wars were only instigated by "medieval barbarians" in remote geographic locations or by neocons and the military-industrial complex for the hope of increasing US influence (and profit). Many Europeans associated NATO with wars they did not fully support and were not at all convinced that the money there was well spent. One could argue that Europeans indeed overlooked the growing threat of another imperialist force and its military-industrial complex, Russia, and that at least after the invasion of Crimea in 2014 should have started taking NATO as their life insurance policy more seriously.
You got my upvote! If there's one good thing that comes out of Trump's position on Ukraine, it's Europe stepping up its own security and strength. This will be good for Europe and America in long run.
I watched the Trump Zelensky show today. I dunno about you, but I detected a possible calculated confrontation. I don't think Vance is a good actor. He took it to 11 too quickly.
These days the media demands wartime strategy be played out in real time detail. How is that beneficial for actual strategy? To counter this, Trump may be leaning into the media circus by playing some sort of ambiguous good cop bad cop card. Smacking Zalensky while buttering Putin's muffins and arguing against world leaders, might be what's needed to penetrate Putin's emotional bubble. A kind of Trumpian trojan horse. Fascinating stuff. I know many here wouldn't give Trump such tactical credit, but if he were short on tactics he wouldn't have won two presidential elections.
That's funny, I thought Zelensky was the one who came in calculating. He had already agreed to the "deal", but (a) insisted on not signing it remotely, but instead flying all the way to the US; (b) waited until he was on camera with Bush and Vance; (c) changed his tack and tried to get Trump and Vance to agree to more than what had been previously discussed, thus baiting them into confrontation; (d) hopped on a plane within 2 hours, when Trump had stated publicly "all he needs to do is come back and say 'I want peace'"; (e) headed straight to the UK where almost all the EU leaders were already waiting and had a photo op done.
It really looks like a carefully crafted narrative was planned and carried out to intentionally smear the current US administration.
Everything up to your last bit about smearing the US is not wrong. As you said, Zalensky insisted on flying in to make the deal, then stepped over the line relative to the original deal they were meant to be doing.
I don't think there's any smearing attempt on Zalesky's part though. Contrary to Vance and Trump's assertion, Zalensky has thanked the US a lot of times. He wouldn't be wanting to smear the US. Trump did begin the meeting diplomatically, it was going fine, he even complemented Zalensky's outfit. Then JD opened his mouth!
It's hard to know for sure what's going on, which may be the point. The theatrics of argy-bargy is like a smokescreen.
You are in luck! You will get more Chinese Gold Citizens buying up collapsing stock and any savings will be plowed right back into tax cuts. (For those with billions of course, not you.)
What we got, and get, out of supporting Western Europe at the end of WWII was that otherwise, the entire continent would have been run by the Soviet Union. Not just that, we got a valuable trading partner, and our rebuilding put an end to hundreds of years of European wars.
Not that you might care about the moral aspect of it, but we also finished Nazi Germany and prevented that horror from taking over the world.
What we got out of expanding the alliance to Eastern Europe was a further bulwark against Russia, which has always been an expansionist totalitarian empire that enslaves or kills anyone who disagrees with the dictator. It's no different now than it was under the czars.
Europe is basically America's backyard now, and Russia wants it. Giving up your backyard because your violent neighbor threatens you for it, doesn't make you strong, it makes you weak.
Not really sure I care if the neighbors across the water think we look weak just because we don’t want to defend them because they don’t want to be strong.
And bear in mind that doesn’t mean that we are weak…
And the us has called for that and the sabotaged that with policies again and again. The military industrial complex doesn't want a thriving europe at arms. And the Russians supported every longterm self defeating movement. And they won, first in europe, then in the us, finally in this thread .
> Not that you might care about the moral aspect of it, but we also finished Nazi Germany and prevented that horror from taking over the world.
There's a lot of research on how the Allies helped move many Nazi war criminals to safe havens in other countries, help the remaining Nazis into positions in government and business in West Germany, used the remaining Nazis as intelligence networks, helped them organize into wild-eyed anti-Communist cells all over the world, and of course absorbed several Nazi scientists into research institutions in the US.
In a moment of madness Churchill put out a plan to hire the Wehrmacht after their defeat to go invade the real enemy, the Soviet Union.
I am aware of the long history we have with Europe and how it came to be. Yet I am in the present and I no longer care what we look like to the rest of the world. I see problems at home and these are far more concerning to me then Russia taking over Europe. China is a much bigger enemy of America's in the Pacific. We should be focusing our defense spending there. Let Europe stand for Europe.
No matter what happens America will be blamed and shamed, we didn't spend enough, we didn't xxxx enough, if only America had done yyyy zzzz wouldn't have happened, and on and on. So I am all for putting Americas interests first.
Also I find your last sentence to be the antithesis of what I am talking about. Why does America look weak? Wouldn't Europe look much weaker??? It feels like gaslighting, like someone will call you names so you need to come and die for us! It gets old.
Regarding the ukraine war I don't remember any tangible criticism regarding the US. That would be way too hypocritical considering Europe aid has been too slow. At least nobody in my circle was asking more of the US. I really think you're being played. Also so far market are down, prices are up. Was it the best administration to deal with problems ?
I understand the parent last sentence differently. Considering America's might, giving in to a mediocre aggressor seems weak. It's not that you have to do it, but it was the previous foreign policy / aura of the USA. Leader of the free world IIRC. Now you're free to change course. But it would be wise to operate smoothly.
This weakens the US against China. Europeans have no stake in a big Pacific conflict and will be much less interested to back US war mongering now. It’s short sighted for us to forego alliances that were helping us build a world order and a trading bloc that isolated China.
Like I said bigger problems at home. That Southern border is a mess and needs to be addressed. That is America's largest security issue as it is how anyone will get into America. Well that and Canada, but they are less violent thus far then what is coming from the south.
I'm pretty sure America doesn't have to give up its world power just to deal with its southern border. If it does, it's going to be a lot weaker on both.
Define "giving up world power." Because last I checked, being a world power means taking care of your own nation first, ensuring its security, economy, and people are strong. If America can’t even secure its own borders, prevent foreign influence on its soil, or manage its own spending, then what exactly are we protecting?
Prioritizing America isn’t weakness it’s a strength. No empire in history lasted long by neglecting its homeland while overextending abroad.
Ukraine isn’t America’s priority or ally, our borders, economy, and strategic position in the Pacific are. Europe is more than capable of handling its own security, and if they aren’t willing to, that’s on them not us.
America looks weak because it has just lost the cold war. All the effort spent since 1945 to counter authoritarian superpowers have been thrown in the bin. Instead it turned into one itself. It is pathetic.
Pathetic is to have an authoritarian superpower on the same continent as you for 80 years and still opting to rely on a superpower an ocean away to be the primary defender of your interests.
Some of the countries in Europe to take a cue from Finland and not outsource its defense.
Sorry, I think my sentence was not very clear there.
Finland always seemed to be very sensible when it came to its country’s security. I realize “Finlandization” may have had a negative context but during that time Finland made sure it was prepared as militarily as possible if its political “non-alignment” approach failed. It didn’t assume anything.
My point was their approach to their security vs outsourcing defense was a more pragmatic approach considering where we have ended up in 2025 and one that other countries in Europe should have probably followed. If and when your “strong” partner moves away from your interests, you still need internal strength. To a degree Europe (save for a few countries) never expected their strong partner to get wishy-washy on their interests.
The cold war ended when the USSR ceased to exist. Russia of today looks much more similar to Europe of the 70's and 80's than it does to the USSR. It also looks weird that the "allies" spend so much money with Russia but worry about them so.
The USSR didn’t "come back"—it collapsed, shattered, and never recovered. What remains is a weakened, demographically dying, economically struggling Russia.
Territory lost by the USSR/Russia since the Cold War began:
The entire Soviet Union dissolved—Ukraine, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan are all gone.
The entire Warsaw Pact flipped to NATO—Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Bulgaria, etc. Germany, the biggest Cold War prize, reunited under the West.
Territory lost by the U.S. and its allies? Zero.
Russia isn’t a rising empire—it’s a wounded animal lashing out, terrified of its own irrelevance. They’re afraid, backed into a corner, and desperately trying to hold onto power. They don’t dictate world affairs.
And as for negotiating with Russia? The U.S. has been doing that for 80 years—and it never made us weak before. Why should it now?
America dictates terms not Russia, and certainly not Europe. If Europe wants to keep playing games, let them but America chooses when, where, and how we engage.
America is powerful because it operates as a global empire. Not by holding land, but by maintaining alliances. Everything you think is wrong at home right now would be infinitely worse if we didn't control global trade, force the rest of the world to buy our debt, and use soft/hard power to shut down every other actor from the Chinese Communist Party to ISIS - over there, not over here.
A lot of people in America, on both left and right, loathe the fact that we are this gargantuan empire. But the reality is, once you're at the top of the food chain, there is no easy exit. If America stopped being the world's only superpower, it would become a third world country immediately. You point out that America will get blamed for X,Y and Z. Of course. It already does. The only reason you don't experience the immediate consequences of that is that America (until today) held a lot of global sway. You can't just opt out of your alliances and still expect to have the preferential treatment you have, or the power you had.
We live in a republic that functions as a global empire. If we weren't that global empire, we would be Argentina or Brazil. You want to give up generations of investment in American supremacy for... what, exactly? Problems at home will not get better if America withdraws from the world. They will get much worse, because the only thing keeping this country from being a disaster is the fact that it is central to the world order.
And the only people who want it to not be central to the world order, who want to destroy the functions of government and weaken us on the world stage, are the autocrats who find America to be a beacon that they wish their populations didn't have to look at.
America is not perfect and you can be Bernie or Tucker or Trump and argue that we have no business doing it, but it's a lot better for you, me, and the rest of the free world that America is in charge of maintaining order than to have no one in charge of that.
So my statement was not that Europe looks weak, but that Europe is already America's plaything. Only a traitor would hand it over to the enemy.
Fair enough. But doing so 3 years into a war with a now half dead Russia is a different matter. It was the US and UK that took a leadership role in the beginning of the conflict ("for as long as it takes.."). It must be pretty convenient to have a big ocean between yourself and the consequences of your actions.
He believes that Russia's economy is not doing wonderfully, but not nearly as bad as the Western press says it is, and that whoever runs Russia is probably willing to put up with some pain a lot longer than Ukrainians can put up with no power no water no food, etc.
I dont think pain is the possible problem, total collapse is. Russia does everything to hide any pain and problems. Banks are forced to accept loans from soldiers and military adjacent companies while being prohibited from calling them in. The capital controls. The private sector is mostly gone, there is no local car manufacturing any more. 21% interest rates with an official 10% inflation. The increasing lack of official economic data being released...
Hard to tell, and I am not convinced if even the Kremlin has a good overview. In the end it does not matter that much. If Russia is really that robust then they wont stop attacking and if they are bluffing then Ukraine should not stop defending itself.
Most western countries are indebted way above the normal limit. I'm only a newb, but afaik, the global monetary system was wired this way. And US was said, being the currency reserve of the world, to have no problem with large debt. In reality, what I heard is that US inflation gets passed onto the world through dollar dominance. (not an unusual move for Trump to invert the logic to gain political point painting himself as the savior).
You never considered it was just a story to justify shaking "allies" ? I don't know what the truth is, but it smells like it.
And so far there's no announcement about investing in education or health, it seems quite the opposite, isn't it ?
I sincerely don't understand how there can be any trust invested in Trump and his speeches. So far all he's done is creating meme coins and reviving the ruble.
It takes time to turn a big ship. Why would I be excited to see more spending into government agencies until I am sure of how they are operating and what they are spending money on. Once things are cleaned up then you can start spending money as needed to get the results you want. It feels everyone is near jerk like, you actions didn't improve everything immediately so they were wrong. The reality of all of this will play out over the next few years.
But cleaning can't be done Musk's way. The whole system is kinda stable because everything is linked together. To start from scratch without anything in the meantime is just suicide.
It's like if a scientist what not giving food to an animal for a month to test if really food is needed. Well, he will conclude that food was needed, but now the animal is dead.
If this was really about cleaning up government, or balancing the budget then it wouldn't have started with small potatoes. You would immediately cut the low hanging fruit. Say, oil industry subsidies. That would get you something like 13 billion a year in savings.
All the destruction sown by DOGE (outside of USAID) represents (favorably) 0.2% of the US budget. Including USAID it's closer to 1.3% of the US budget.
At the same time Republicans are proposing reducing revenue by 4500 billion dollars.
Again these things take time. I can see how people don't like the method but I will wait to judge it by the results. Please bear in mind that Clinton fired 377,000 federal workers in the 90's. Things didn't come crashing down.
We need more oversight and less people imho. I am actually hopeful that they will have the ability to push through better software systems to track initiatives and spending. It isn't the number of employees it is where was all the money going, it was/is the lack of insight/transparency which has eroded my confidence in the federal government.
My true wish is they have the guts to pass legislation outlawing campaign contributions. It isn't just parts of the house that need a thorough purging to be honest.
Counter point Bill Clinton fired 377,000 Federal workers in the 90's and it turned out ok. Well aside from the Glass–Steagall legislation but that was legislation, still hurts though.
Not random shotgun immediate firings. Your weather forecasts are about to become less accurate because of some of these firings and planned improvements in them are not going to happen:
This is chesterson’s fence playing out in real life with the major superpower of the world and it has real consequences for people. It should not be the insane fiasco that’s happening right now with an unelected foreign citizen admitting in a cabinet meeting that they accidentally stopped Ebola vaccine financing. If you seriously think this is going to turn out well after we saw trump’s first term I just don’t have anything to help you.the funniest shit is that all of this upheaval is literally < 1% of the actual budget and it’s going to be touted as billions in savings by musk the grifter in chief. I don’t need time to see that this is a dumpster fire.
That is what we are trying to find out! We have no idea how much wasn't wasted so we are going looking. We can't get clear answers on how many land transactions ultimately go back to the CCP, so we are trying to find out! This is about increasing transparency. We may find out hey it is all amazing and we are super efficient with your money, that would make us happy.
> I see debt climbing and I have to ask myself, do I want my country to spend money on other countries or maybe focus on cleaning up our own house first? I would rather America focus on putting its own house in order, wasted spending, corruption, cartels, China buying up land, and the erosion of our education system.
Not helping Ukraine won’t solve any of that, though. Regardless of the US policy regarding Europe, I am willing to bet that military spending will keep ballooning now that the broligarchs are in power and fighting to redirect public spending to their pockets. Ultimately, I understand your sentiment, but this course of action will not lead to what you hope. If anything, everything will get worse because the people in power have no interest in fixing the issues you mentioned.
>I am willing to bet that military spending will keep ballooning now that the broligarchs are in power and fighting to redirect public spending to their pockets.
Why would you think that military spending would go up, given the tasks the executive has currently issued, and diplomatic direction indicated vis-a-vis other world military powers:
Because there is too much money to be made. Thiel et al. stand to win too much to let it pass. It’s like with SpaceX: in theory Musk is all for smaller government, in practice he wants the government to serve him.
Representatives and senators get a lot of political credit for the military-industrial complex, as well.
A great nation can do two things at once. The problem is the unreformable oligarchy turning into a sour gilded age zhe moment the Soviets falteted. Cant have a democracy with what are nobleman at heart at the helm.
One of the things that was highly propagandized was the "deep state" relationship with big oil and the whole conspiracy theories of billionaires influencing policy and pushing for war to get access to oil.
I get that people got into this narrative.
What I don't get is that you're now supporting a new groups of tech billionaires influencing policy to get access to rare earth, to the point of threatening to annex USA allies like Canada, and Greenland, and doing deals with Russia to capitulate Ukraine.
Yet Americans seem to be cozy with this idea, and support it, when in reality it's the same. In fact, it's worse because it's not even a conspiracy theory, it's out in the open.
Imagine if Biden or Obama had the Black Rock folks behind them when they took the presidency, it would drive some folks up the wall. The same folks don't mind having the Twitter Guy, Bezos, Zuckerberg... Can you help me understand why?
The reason the US is the global hegemon of the western world was because they won the cold war against USSR. Being the leading member of NATO largely contributed to that, and ensured US dominance in geopolitics and trade.
With Trump now in office, the US seems to be willingly breaking, or at the very least withdrawing from, the NATO alliance. With that they give up their position as hegemon, and sacrifice their influence on Europe.
To me, it seems like Russia is now winning the cold war, 35 years after it "ended".
If you compare to how things began in Cold War, it’s far from a win for Russia no matter how much it may take from Ukraine.
SU lost, here we feel some ripple or aftershock. US enjoyed years of prosperity, its people lived in much higher living standards for a long time.
What’s a shame for the US is the innovators dilemma that it was not able to improve its system after the pressure of competition was gone, and now inequality brought you Trump II.
Perhaps saying "Russia made the US lose the cold war" would be more accurate than saying "Russia won".
From a lost position, Russia managed to make the US resign from the game.
Unfortunately, EU is not an entity with single and unified view on things. In the case of Russian invasion of Ukraine, there is a surprisingly strong opposition to related policies in Brussels amongst the people in quite a few member states. In fact, many support Putin and now his best buddy Trump - with plain stupid belief that Putin/Trump wants peace and Zelensky wants to continue war. In short, EU (+ UK, Norway, maybe Switzerland) is simply not as unified against Putin as it may appear in the Brussels press conferences. Putting more effort (in money, materials, soldiers even) in this conflict will be hard to pill to swallow for large percentage of citizens and by extension politicians. What I see happening in the near future is more money flowing into militaries of the member states, which is a sad necessity by having Putin as neighbor. But I'm skeptical of EU countries becoming much more involved in the Ukraine conflict.
Britain, Germany, and France alone have the military production and economy to win the war. Doesn't matter if Hungary or Ireland or whoever back out of the consortium.
These three countries have been a bit unstable politically during the last couple of years. This did not help. At least they are going in the same direction and not shooting each other’s foot.
Except that since "war effort" is measured in $ the devil is in the details.
It's very simple to claim "we have given the most in military aid, in $" but much harder to look into it.
Then you find out that everything is priced insanely high, bullets and artillery that is identical to European (due to nato standards) can cost dozens of times more.
Then you find out that billions have been spent in private "consultancies" (I guess US military and navies have no clue how to organize logistical transports, even though we're talking about the biggest naval power on the planet).
Then you find out that Ukraine offered to come pick the weapons itself with their own ships to make it faster and save US taxpayers money and US said nope, we got people to feed with those contracts.
This is what people don't get. US military spending IS a huge part of the economy. It's jobs. It's not like all the money goes up in smoke. Some of it does, in the form of munitions, but someone has to make those too and the US pays for them.
US sent Ukraine 31 Abrams tanks so far. This is for the largest land war in Europe since WW2. Now, can we compare this to the amount of military assistance by the US to USSR during WW2? The US could have helped Ukraine win the war, but chose not to.
That's not true. As of 2024-12-31, the US had provided 64bn EUR of military aid to Ukraine, and Europe had provided 62bn. The US had pledged further 66bn and Europe 100bn. Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43073733
I have never seen a number similar to that quoted anywhere before. Can you name a source?
The BBC:s most recent rundown[1] has the strictly military support from the US accounting for a bit more than half of the total of the top-ten contributors (of which it is number one, of course).
When comparing dollar values for military equipment with other types of support, we should keep in mind that they are inflated. A lot of the equipment (ammunition, vehicles etc) are old things that were due to be rotated out of the stockpiles anyway. This is true for many (perhaps all) donor countries.
Example: GMLRS rockets have a shelf-life of 10-15 years and their disposal costs at end-of-life is not zero. Sending them off to Ukraine as they approach their best-before date does not incur much real cost on the donor, but the gift can be labeled as "253 gazillion dollars worth of ammunition." The value description is sort of true, as they will be used in their full capacity by Ukraine, but it might even save money for the donor who is the off the hook for disposal and was going to replace them anyway.
This is correct. Proof of this can be found in 37 places on government websites (I actually checked, took me three hours). If you add these up its obvious that the EU spent a lot more that the USA.
If you consider what EU countries pay besides arms and aid, for example on housing the millions of refugees from Ulraine or buying stockpiles of arms to be used on behalf of Ukraine in the future the numbers are much higher, between twice and triple the US budget. Even the sanctions against Russia and their weapon suppliers China, India, North Korea and Iran add to the costs of this Russian conflict. Also consider the EU pledges to rebuild Ukraine should be counted.
Today I estimate 1,234 trillion Euro's, part of which was spent as dollars, some as loans with the estimated 300 million of confiscated Russian bank accounts and assests from Russian oligarchs as collateral.
To suggest the EU/Europe has done anything close to the bare minimum for Ukraine is absurd and Europeans who think otherwise are as delusional on this as the long term usefulness of the actual EU
You assume EU united would act strongly in favour of Ukraine. But there's no guarantee of that. There are significant differences in how for example, Poland approaches Ukraine with how Germany does it.
I think, nations with bad historic experience with Russia support Ukraine significantly more.
Don't forget that Russia has been doing this for a long time. Chechnya, Georgia. Always the civilian population was brutely oppressed and murdered. He's always got some former USSR republic to exterminate. If anything it would be weird if he hadn't picked on the next one. The only difference is that Ukraine is a little bit closer to Europe than the others.
I'm not saying this means we shouldn't defend Ukraine. We should. But I am saying the outrage from the international community is a little hypocritical considering what Putin has been doing for decades. It's either because it's a little closer to our borders (and thus Europe is more worried about itself) or because they have valuable resources that our politicians suddenly care. I find that very sad. We should have cared before. Then we'd have saved many lives and this wouldn't have happened.
It's really got a very strong smell of "let's bring freedom to the middle east! Of course only where they've got lots of oil for us".
But it has always been like this, and people from the global south and former USSR republics have always recognized this. It's only now starting to become apparent to naive and propagandized Americans/Westerners.
Within the EU, it's mostly Germany's fault because their political leadership is too chickenshit to remove the debt limit and the ban on expeditionary forces from their constitution. 30 years ago, West+East Germany had world class armed forces, yet the current German military posture is ridiculous.
The US should keep its commitments, but there is no reason Germany cannot step up to the plate - especially given that France has a similar defense budget as Germany yet has an outsized impact on global security.
German political leadership needs to either stop blocking France+UK and defer to their security policy or build it's own domestic capacity.
They're running the same playbook they did with Yugoslavia. Sit around and do nothing until the US takes control. Not going to work out this time with the felon operating in chaos monkey mode.
I get my information from actual european reports, which is pretty far from russian propaganda. It's a little tedious to be told every time this is the case, and no amount of proof (signed and sourced from websites belonging to EU institutions no less) will change people's minds. That is what blatant propaganda looks like. Folks cannot contend with facts anymore in their rabid need to seem against whatever the demon of the month is. Sometimes in a conflict everyone is just garbage and that's okay.
If Europe's military were so strong, why does the US need any involvement?
There's a reason even Zelensky described the EU militaries as weak, and believes a European army to be necessary.
Don't confuse spending with strength either: The UK, on paper, spends 2.3% of GDP on the military. That sounds good - until you realize they have only 136,000 personnel total. That's not going to defend the UK from anything - it can't even defend Ukraine for a year.
You are asking the wrong question (or at least, a wrong question). It's not "why does the US need any involvement", it's "Why has the US insisted on involvement for so long?" (e.g. during the 1980s when widespread sentiment in Europe was for the US to close its military bases, the US insisted on remaining).
The UK does not rely 136k people to defend itself from military risk. It relies on its nuclear arsenal, which while not as large as those of the USA or Russia, it quite the deterrent all by itself.
> The UK does not rely 136k people to defend itself from military risk. It relies on its nuclear arsenal, which while not as large as those of the USA or Russia, it quite the deterrent all by itself.
It's a deterrent from invading the British Isles, which would require a navy that only the US has, anyways.
It's not a deterrent from challenging the world order. The US nuclear arsenal is the only one in the West that, if it were deployed, would end human society on a global scale.
Russia has designed its nuclear forces and defense infrastructure around a war with the United States, a country with a much, much larger nuclear arsenal than the UK or France. There's a possibility that if Russia decided to use its tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine (which it has threatened before), and the UK or France responded in kind with strategic nuclear weapons, that enough of Russian nuclear forces could survive to completely wipe out those two nations while also having weapons in reserve.
Its "nuclear arsenal" consists of a single missile boat on patrol with about a dozen or so ICBMs (which could certainly mess with major Russian cities. But if a Russian fast-attack sub (of which they have quite a few) gets it, bye-bye "nuclear arsenal".
> Since 1998, when the UK decommissioned its tactical WE.177 bombs, the Trident has been the only operational nuclear weapons system in British service. The delivery system consists of four Vanguard-class submarines based at HMNB Clyde in Scotland. Each submarine is armed with up to sixteen Trident II missiles, each carrying warheads in up to eight multiple independently targetable re-entry vehicles (MIRVs). With at least one submarine always on patrol, the Vanguards perform a strategic deterrence role and also have a sub-strategic capability.
Yeah, it's the reverse of what's often pushed in the media. There have even been initiatives for autonomous EU security projects, with the US (I think even Trump at some point, despite what he says now about NATO) being against anything that would undermine NATO.
Basically, don't piss off Poland, you'll need to defeat about 500,000 soldiers, though do you really need to march on to France if you win against Germany? Even if you did, that's about 1/3 the US military, and nowhere near as well armed, or well trained, or well psychologically prepared. If you're Russia, about 1 million soldiers should do the trick; and that's not hard when you don't have moral qualms and 21 million military age men to throw at the problem; and (edit) possibly an additional few million from North Korea for purchase.
As for nuclear weapons; Russia can probably bet that using a nuclear weapon from inside France, or inside the UK, as a first strike, would be too controversial to even do. The government would probably be sued by human rights lawyers from inside itself for even trying; convinced that it's better to take the loss while remaining on the moral high ground. What's even the point, when NATO predicts they have less than 5% of the defenses required for the inevitable retaliation? https://www.ft.com/content/5953405f-d91a-4598-8b6b-6345452ca...
> (edit to reply): Russia isn't winning against Ukraine.
"Don't piss off Poland?!" There won't be a large scale war against the Eastern EU started by Russia that does not involve Poland. The EU has stronger mutual defense clause than NATO article 5+6 (of course, it doesn't have anything close to the military might of the combined NATO countries). Once there is an all out war, Finland would mobilize its army, threatening Russia's northern flank. The Baltic would be closed. The black sea would be closed. All out war would be terrible, but the deterrence is still too strong in my opinion, as the price would be too high.
The problem / question is what would the EU (or NATO) do, if Russia starts a small scale hybrid war against Estonia or Latvia. Creating a small "local" insurgency, that takes over a majority Russian speaking town on the border. If the military alliances do not react united in such a case they are done.
I think the critical question is what would the allies do (especially the ones with nuclear weapons) if Russia actually used one. There's a lot of treaties, words spoken and on paper but nobody really knows how people would react to the idea of partaking in a nuclear war.
If they dropped a nuke on e.g. Lithuania would the French do the same knowing that retaliation would come that could wipe out most of their people and country off the map? Would any country do that for someone else?
> Even if you did, that's about 1/3 the US military, and nowhere near as well armed, or well trained, or well psychologically prepared.
Nowhere near as well armed as the US. But I would argue perfectly well trained. But I laugh at your assertion that the French military is not as psychologically prepared for war.
The population of Russia was widely disputed even before the war(With most estimates placing it at below 100M), and now it's basically a guessing game.
"that's not hard when you don't have moral qualms and 21 million military age men to throw at the problem"
But do you really have them?
Putin seems really hesitant to start a new round of mobilization and refills his army with volunteers. Some of which are voluntolds, but the regime seems to be afraid of the Moscow/St.Petersburg street, so to say.
His grip on the Russian nation, especially after 3 years of endless bloody slog with almost nothing gained, does not seem to reach into the "give millions of recruits weapons and they will use them exactly as told and there is no risk that they could rebel" territory.
> If Europe's military were so strong, why does the US need any involvement?
Because Putin is all-in, willing to sacrife the lives of big parts of his population for this purpose. And this makes him a formidable enemy. Does it have to be more complicated than that?
If that is the first question you ask when someone needs help, I guess you will not have that many friends.
And it all amounts to a bag of beans. If it's so impressive they can support Ukraine and render irrelevant any contribution that the US might make? One wonders why Zelensky is in the US pleading for US help?
In the US he needs to convince one administration (and realistically, one guy). The EU is 27 governments, each one with way smaller budgets than the US.
Anyway, you might have missed it, but Zelensky is also regularly asking for help in Paris, Brussels, London, and Berlin.
But Europe is not at war. It is Ukraine that is. But they need help with equipment, and balancing their budget. This is what they are asking for, nothing else.
Much fewer than 500k soldiers are needed for training Ukrainians.
Europe certainly has the means to support Ukraine financially, if the political will is there.
But it’s incapable of providing alternatives to Starlink, Patriot or ATACMs. Especially not at the scale required to make a difference in Ukraine. The withdrawal of these systems would be disastrous for Ukraine.
Especially if the US opens Starlink for Russia but closes it for Ukraine.
ATAMCs could be somewhat mitigated with heavily increased medium range drone production.
The game of shooting down everything Russia sends was always a losing game. At some point you have to start addressing the source of the attacks - i.e. strike hard at the Russian infrastructure.
Europe produces alternatives to Patriot (Aster). And ATACMS are not crucial in any way, these days it is Ukrainian produced long range drones that do the most damage behind the lines.
Ukraine cannot win without manpower from either the EU or the US. That's the reality on the ground. No amount of equipment/weapons (conventional) is going to change that.
According to the Austrian military, there’s currently about 800k Ukrainian soldiers up against 700k Russian soldiers.
Because a substantial number of Ukrainian soldiers need to be present across the Belorussian border and elsewhere in the country, the Russians have a meaningful manpower advantage on the frontlines.
Remember Ukraine doesn't need to take Moscow to win. Russia is burning resources hard to keep the initiative and achieve Putin's war goals. All Ukraine needs to do is continue to bleed the Russian army and wait until Russia has a hard economic crunch.
Hang on. The EU doesn't pretend to protect it's members militarily. However it's members can muster far more military force than Ukraine had. Modern tanks, modern aircraft, modern ships, modern submarines, modern artillery, more professional soldiers. NATO without the US is still a formidable force.
The core problem with the EU is that the EU was never a nation. We saw this with Grexit 10 years ago. There was a common currency with no common fiscal policy. A military is yet another thing that the EU does not have because the EU is not a nation. Making the EU a nation (the way the US is) seems to be a project of very few people in Europe. They like their nations the way they are.
Russia is basically calling the West's bluff that they won't use nukes to enforce their ideology and Russia won. Everyone wants to talk big until it comes time to actually enforce words.
> I don't think the West ever threatened a nuclear response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
I think so, too, but I also think it’s likely that, through silent diplomacy, there was a clear message “if you nuke the Ukraine, there will be a response in kind”.
Without the USA, it’s hard to keep that message, though. Neither England nor France can respond in kind to a tactical nuclear weapon, as they don’t have any.
^ people downvoting your comment are wrong; it's completely true. The nation-state is a martial construct; the difference between it and its neighbors is a line of demarcation upheld by an external-facing military, and its own legitimacy, economy, and system of laws and conflict resolution is enforced on the populace via an internal-facing "military" (police force).
(Edit: when I wrote this the parent comment was light grey, but now it's back to black. Perhaps it's a controversial comment.)
I think it's more complicated than that, no? Ironic too, that when you look at the things this site's moderator permits to be discussed, it's a hot reaction to a television performance. Not one person here is like, citing an expert source, or discussing the history, or talking about forecasts based on something interesting or new. It's all bloviating.
So what is your actual preference? That Russia simply be allowed to invade and take over Ukraine "because Ukraine was pretty damn corrupt anyway" ? What does that accomplish?
The point isn't to pick the "best democracy" as if it were a beauty pageant. It was to oppose unilateral military invasion as an instrument of national policy, which is bad regardless of the form of government of the victim.
Ukraine might have been corrupt, but it was a peaceful neighbor and evolving in the right directions. Russia is (literally) throwing bombs around, cutting internet cables, and generally being a terrorist asshole. And at some point, yes, an emboldened Putin will decide to invade a "good democracy". It's happened before.
The EU was united, namely in not bothering to help Ukraine. The US decided to want to help Ukraine and send weapons and set the tone and (slow) pace of the weapons that they sent. Only for them to pull the rug away later anyway. This is really terrible leadership, leaders who don't care about the results that they cause are poison. You can argue all day that it's sad and terrible that the EU wouldn't have helped at all. But under Germany's leadership at least this farce wouldn't have played out. You can argue then that it might cause problems later because Russia would be emboldened by a quick win in Ukraine. Fine but this is better now?
US policy is now one of forcing the world into a zero sum game and it is a shame because the world isn't zero sum. This means the world will loose the gains from friendship and cooperation that increase the overall outcome for everyone. It is like living in a city where crime is expected so everyone puts up iron bars on their windows and the parks are all locked-down nightmares. When there is trust and cooperation you can have nice things like open parks and friendly establishments but when trust and cooperation go away you get bars on windows. This is a shame. I am ashamed of the US. I am ashamed that we are so shortsighted and scared that we have to play the bully and force a minmax solution when things could be so much better for everyone.
> It is like living in a city where crime is expected so everyone puts up iron bars on their windows and the parks are all locked-down nightmares.
That's life in Brazilian big cities.
Brazil has been very violent for a long time because the government enforces a zero-sum game against the population. The poor half of the population is overwhelmingly colored people and the richer white half would rather burn it all down than share it better. Brazil is one of the most unequal societies on the planet.
If we go that direction globally, security will erode everywhere.
Trust me, we don't want that. You don't want every metropolis to become like a big Brazilian city.
Go find some Brazilian media website and read the news. It's pretty grim. It's what society is like with persistent high inequality, a forced zero-sum game to preserve status quo and the resulting general insecurity.
As someone who’s lived in Latin America this is something I try to point out to people in the US every chance I get. If you have hundreds of millions you can post up in some remote mansion and get things delivered but even then your staff might steal things, your kids are targets, etc. And for everyone else, even the 1%, it’s not going to be a fun life. I’d much rather pay some more taxes and know that everyone has a safety net and UBI so that a much smaller fraction (never zero) are going to be so desperate, drug dependent, etc to commit crimes, especially the harder core ones. If you’re in the top 1% and everyone else is poor and desperate you are going to lack connection, community and safety. That's not good. We are all happier in a more equal society.
Oh, are you talking about Ecuador? Or maybe it's most of latam at this point.
I am living now in Portugal (has its own defects, won't hide it) after 10 years in Ecuador. Here, people park their cars in the street and expect them to be there next day. That would be crazy talk in Ecuador.
And then in Estonia you can drop your wallet or phone, and someone will take it to the police, and you get it all back without even a cent missing. We have robots on the streets, we can leave things like bicycles outside, every store is 80% self checkout with no security guards to speak of.
I lived in Buenos Aires for a year and it made me realize how good I had it. The contrast is so massive that it might as well be two different planets.
Portugal has its issues and it has some bad places, but overall is the most peaceful place I ever live. I wish one day I could go back and live there, but by the look of it it has become expensive to retire there.
Being honest, this is 100% in big cities, but in the countryside it doesn't hold. A lot of cities between 100k-300k are pretty safe to live, people with gates leaves them open, even leave their cars entire open while getting a beer inside the house (all unlocked).
Comparing Brazil with Mexico with Madrid with Tokyo and coming to the conclusion that "is all the same" seems farfetched.
Policies that see "the poor" as the problem instead "poverty" create violent dystopian cities. Good policy works and make big cities great places to live. Reducing inequality, giving good safety nets to citizens, treating drug addiction as a disease, etc. make a difference. Not 100% of big cities are the same.
I am not American, so I could be wrong, but is San Francisco a good example of a city with low inequality? My understanding is that the opposite is true.
Most of the 50 most violent cities in Brazil aren't even the biggest in their State. The top 3 are all between 100 thousand and 150 thousand inhabitants. They all have homicide rates that are 2x to 4x as much as the national average. By comparison, São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro are much, much safer.
This list does not have the latest data from Brazilian cities. The Brazilian list I linked has dozens of Brazilian cities with a homicide rate of around 80 per 100.000.
Just a day or so ago, Trump was asked about AUKUS, the closest military alliance that the US is a part of. He didn't know what it was.
For some months now, the Australian Liberal party has been going on and on about building nuclear power plants.
It's not about the electricity generation -- when pressed they'll admit that it might be as little as 4% of the supply -- but secretly it's about giving us the option of building nukes to defend ourselves in case our relationship with the US falls apart.
We can't be the only country thinking like this. South Korea, Taiwan, Japan, Singapore, and many others have the industrial base and most have nuclear power plants already, nuclear engineers, etc...
I just checked: Singapore has started talking about building nuclear power plants also.
Not to go too much on an AusPol tangent, LNP Nuclear stuff is more about delaying the green-power transition.
It keeps coal / gas power around for a nuclear future that is decades away at best (and never more likely). It’s a sop to the oil and mining companies.
https://youtube.com/watch?v=JBqVVBUdW84
That is probably 75% of the reason, but it does dovetail very nicely with the acquisition of nuclear submarines with nuclear weapons capabilities.
I thought I was just imagining things, but I looked it up and it turns out that the Liberal party has been flirting with arming Australia with nukes since the 1990s or maybe the late 80s.
> In January 2023, it was reported that the submarines were likely to incorporate a vertical launch system (VLS) for land-attack missiles. This would be a first for Royal Navy SSNs, which currently launch land-attack missiles via their torpedo tubes. A VLS system was described as likely to increase interoperability options with the US Navy since future US land attack missiles may not have a horizontal launch option.
The Tomahawk and basically every similar cruise missile can easily be outfitted with any warhead. SLBMs aren't the only delivery platform.
the enrichment required for a bomb vs a reactor is a bit (a lot) different. how will all these countries that are not allowed to have nukes hide their enrichment facilities that cannot be used for reactor fuel? hollow out a mountain like NK?
Countries like North Korea and Pakistan managed to build nuclear weapons and credible enough delivery systems a couple of decades ago How difficult do you think it will be for other countries with today's much more modern technology if they really want to build them? Id be very surprised if the likes of Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Israel or even Iran don't already secretly possess nuclear weapons. I'd expext at least several others have ongoing programns - the cautionary lesson from the different fates of Saddam, Gaddafi, Zelensky and Kim has certainly been learned.
One way to read Iran's ballistic missile attack on empty Israeli desert is as a demonstration that Israel's defence is unable to stop anything even approaching 100% of ballistic missiles. With nuclear weapons, the cost of even 1 leaker is unacceptable. You notice Netanyahu's public feud with Iran appears to be winding down.
They assume there's a fixed amount of wealth to go around and if they give anything up they should immediately get something more valuable in return else they're losing out.
In reality, by making certain trades or investments new situations and opportunities can be created, making everyone better off.
In a zero-sum game you benefit only when somebody else loses and vice-versa.
Which means if you make a deal with someone and they benefit from it - you lost. In other words - you should only do deals that hurt others.
It's a truly vile view of world, but what's more important is - it's false and counterproductive. There's no place for international cooperation in zero-sum universe. There's just exploitation through military or non-military means.
In a zero-sum game world USA does not join WW1 nor WW2. Instead it waits for Europe to collapse and invade to establish "American Europe". Anything else is suboptimal.
NATO makes no sense in zero-sum game world. NATO clearly benefits smaller countries which means it hurts USA. NATO should be therefore dissolved and let's shake them small countries for protection money.
The funny thing is - in such a world USA loses and China wins.
> In a zero-sum game world USA does not join WW1 nor WW2. Instead it waits for Europe to collapse and invade to establish "American Europe". Anything else is suboptimal.
That would have led to Soviet Europe. This is a very naive take, the involvement of the US on WWII was absolutely a rational calculation based on a zero-sum game (defeating the Nazi and establishing spheres of influence). The game becomes positive sum on the basis of long term economic development.
If someone is winning, it must mean someone else is losing (hence the "deal" sums to zero)
There is no comprehension that an agreement might actually benefit both sides
This is presumably why you hear such things as "Canada is screwing us for 200 billion dollars a year" because we buy things from them
Edit: you can see it in this thread, too. As though helping poor people could have no benefit to the rich
I've seen it with people complaining about paying taxes for public transit, even though they only drive a car. Bonus points if they complain about traffic in the same rant without ever putting 2-and-2 together
By denying access to basic services like education and health care, brutalizing the poor and enforcing laws selectively (black kid with few grams of weed = dealer; white kid with 50g and a digital scale = user), the government makes sure that the only options available to poor black people are misery or crime. Prisons are overcrowded and become effective schools of crime. Once you're through the system, you have very little option besides continuing to practice crime to feed yourself.
An extremely regressive tax system and overly complicated bureaucracy, designed to extract bribes, all but guarantee that only the well connected can invest and thrive, and makes sure that there is very little social mobility. Free education is available at all levels, but public basic schools are atrocious and public colleges have competitive admission, meaning that those with access to private education growing up get a subsidized degree from the government.
Building codes are rarely enforced so slum dwellers need not be paid more than enough to eat.
It is all very well thought out. Brazil is not underdeveloped. Brazil is a slave society with extra steps.
“Stealing from the rich to feed the poor” sounds very good in paper. I live in a country that does something like this and what you’re asking for is to steal from the already overworked and overtaxed middle class to give it to those who refuse to work.
Interesting, so you are saying that Brazil can't make anything against inequality while other succeed better?
I've heard first hand from a business leader working decades with Brazil that they actively keep the poor people uneducated to better use them, although having those better skilled would increase the overall productivity.
No, the necessary changes are cultural; the government can’t and shouldn’t do anything about it. What they really shouldn’t do is give handouts, since that’s sure to perpetuate the inequality. Necessity is the mother of invention, teaching a man to fish, yada yada yada.
Cultural changes must come from inside. Trying to make cultural changes from outside is unethical (and gross). But those changes will never occur if you give handouts. Giving handouts is making them stay poor, artificially making their culture not evolve.
Brazilian poors are kept poor by design, it's a long standing project from Brazilian elites (agrobusiness, political dynasties) to keep the poor uneducated for better control and exploitation.
Cultural changes are hard to be enacted if there isn't political power for doing so, Brazil also produced some very well educated people who have attempted to change the status quo of basic education lacking civics/political thought, most notably Paulo Freire.
Still there is a concerted effort to keep the poor uneducated, voting is mandatory in Brazil and if you are a corrupt politician (as most are there) you really do not want the people to be able to figure out your schemes. You keep them out of civics, they are just cheap labour who cannot understand complexities of government, civics, and so on.
I believe you do not know Brazilian society at all, and are simply throwing some empty platitudes based on your misguided ideology. It's not about fucking handouts, those are simply necessary for a large percentage of Brazilians to survive due to the lack of opportunities and basic education which most of the population lives under.
> Nobody is "keeping them down" but themselves
You really are a true believer, personal responsibility can never overtake a system of oppression.
From inside the poor community. You have to let them find out by themselves that living in squalor off side hustles is a bad alternative to finding a stable job, behaving, and then prospering. Giving them money for nothing perpetuates these issues, since they don't have a reason to improve their situation.
I'm saying all these things because I am from a poor community. I know how things work in such communities, and it's nothing like well off people (like most of you reading these lines are) think it is. Nobody is "keeping them down" but themselves.
>You have to let them find out by themselves that living in squalor off side hustles is a bad alternative to finding a stable job, behaving, and then prospering.
Ahh yes, find out from their rich people run media with their rich people run government to get jobs run by rich people run businesses who aren't actually givng out jobs to the poor due to how their system works.
Yes, it's clearly the poor people's fault for being too stupid to want more money. Jim Crow would be shaking your hand right now.
>I'm saying all these things because I am from a poor community.
I come from a poor community too. If my grandparents didn't get "handouts" as you call them from food drives and food stamps, there's a good chance their 3 kids wouldn't have been healthy. Which of course means I wouldn't be born. My parents and aunt/uncle would barely have a chance to rise up amidts the need to buy food and pay rent to stay alive, and I'd likely be deleted with no opportunity because people like you insist on pulling yourselves up by their bootstraps instead of helping a community out so that the rising tides raises all ships.
Stop listening to rich people propoganda gaslighing you. They benefit from keeping people poor.
I said the rich should pay their _fair share_ of taxes, but you immediately took it all the way to “stealing from the rich to feed the poor”.
I think what just happened here is a good example of how far to the right (and towards blatant Aristocracy) we’ve come. The political spectrum is completely blown out to one side, to the point where mentioning paying taxes is considered off brand and bad, instead of patriotic.
That's quite a jump of conclusion. Astonishing actually.
First of all, poors, worldwide, are the vast majority by any measure you pick.
So poors, becoming majority, is a no point. Moot.
Now, to another point. Poor prospering.
Have you ever considered that poor prospering can actually be a good thing? More consumption, more taxes being collected across, more wealth spread and circulating on the economy. More opportunities for the poor, and the rich, who will have a broader audience to become more rich?
And now to the subsides. Think this improvement on wealth circulation as a business, a good business outcome, shall we? As so many business, owned by riches, which make riches more rich, are already heavily subsided by governments across the globe for so many reasons (internal/external).
It's not such a big leap for yes, to advocate to some sort of subside to improve poor's situation.
Your comment sounds very classist. A true symptom of the very problem we're and will be dealing with.
El Salvador is strong evidence that the issue is a lack of enforcement. It hasn't been well covered in the mainstream media because it goes against the typical narrative. Their homicide rate in 2016 was 107 - one of the highest in the world and several times that of Brazil. As of 2024 it's 1.9, a fraction of even the US' rate. [1]
The solution? Round up obvious gang members, who conveniently like to mark it all over their body, throw them in prison, throw away the key. If they get violent in the process then don't even bother with the whole prison thing. Were the people just terrified about this horrible abuse of power? No, their Supreme Court made an exception to allow him to run for another term and he won with 80%+ of the vote, his party gaining a super majority, and El Salvador is rapidly going from one of the most dangerous places on Earth to a very safe one.
"First they came for the gang members... and then life was pretty great and everybody lived happily ever after." BTW similar sorts of crackdowns have also happened in numerous places including Thailand and the Philippines (in both cases over drugs), with similarly resoundingly positive results. Enforcement works.
Let's see how incarcerating poor people in droves without due legal process will play out in the long term. Brazil has been doing that for a long time. We have very strong nation wide crime syndicates expanding into Latin America now.
The problem with El Salvador is that it's a better lock up 9 innocent people than let one guilty person go free type of problem now. And it is guilt by how you look and some association.
It's great if you're a tourist with limited Spanish ability and are tired of Costa Rica. Very shitty if you have any family members that get thrown in jail forever with out due process based on how the government felt they looked.
It's also apparently great if you live in El Salvador. His approval rating is > 90% and has been flirting with getting mighty close to 100% +/- statistical noise. Gang tattoos are not random - they are intentionally designed and chosen to indicate your unambiguous affiliation with a specific gang in order to prove loyalty and acceptance. In many cases they can also go much further indicating rank, crimes committed, and more.
They are also often done in very visible places, including the face and hands. Here [1] for instance are various individuals with MS-13 (which was a group initially started by Salvadoran migrants in LA) tattoos. You're not going to make a mistake there, and the gang itself would have also also taken care of imposters.
The groups expressing concern about the gang members tend to be Western human rights organizations in different countries. The president of El Salvador has offered to allow the countries of these groups to take in as many of the prisoners as they would like, if they'd like to more personally look after and ensure their rights. His offers have not been accepted.
I had to try to find a source for Trump being inspiration for Biff as it just sounded "too good" to be true and apparently it has been stated by screenwriter Bob Gale who wrote it together with director Robert Zemeckis:
It's funny as a non-US how many (older) films etc. he's mentioned in (or even cameos in), having never heard of him until (not long before) his first term.
e.g. I watched American Psycho last night, in which there's some 'is that the Trumps', 'why would Ivanka Trump be here'.
I dont remember how much it carried over to the film but in the book, Trump is the person the titular psycho...
> idolizes above all others. Bateman talks about him constantly, citing incredibly specific details of his life of luxury, and is often distracted by the thought of seeing Trump or his wife Ivana out in New York City.
I can top that. As a child I was a fan of a relatively unknown sitcom titled “Out Of This World” and I rediscovered it a couple years ago. It was truly surreal to hear Donald Trump mentioned in a show from 1987–1991. (American Psycho is from 2000.)
He says that, but what do you call being aggressive and hostile to allies -- i.e. threatening military force to take the Panama Canal and Greenland -- while aligning with Russia and China, who play the long game and will pretend to be friendly until the moment they see an opening and take it?
1. People think he's crazy, so he's taking advantage of how they underestimate him.
2. He's taking advantage of anchoring bias: he makes a completely outrageous first offer which then makes any subsequent offer seems more reasonable, even if it was higher than you would otherwise accept. He does this all of the time, and it's a standard negotiating tactic in general, but it sometimes works well for Trump because of how people see him (see point 1).
Yes, he's of the opinion that the alliances in security and trade have not been a net benefit to the US. Is that shocking to you? He's literally been saying that for years. And thus, he's acting to change those agreements to make them more advantageous and to stimulate domestic production to compete with foreign labour (that's ultimately what tariffs do). He's going about it in his usual bombastic and ham-fisted way of course, but he's doing exactly what he's always said he wanted to do.
It's completely self-evident that lots of manufacturing has left the US due to trade agreements. This has resulted in certain classes of cheap goods but also made the US vulnerable in key goods (like electronics), and inhibited automation.
It's also not at all obvious that the US has been more secure in its role as world police. Arguably, it led directly to 9/11 and decades of pointless death in the Middle East.
All of the arguments that the status quo was more secure and better economically are weak, at best, given the complexities of the counterfactuals.
I think the arguments in favor of a globalized economy, as well as the transition to a knowledge economy, are abundant and pervasive. I’m not going to argue in favor of them because they are already so powerful and obvious.
If people conflate their current economic misfortune with a US foreign policy of encouraging global cooperation and participation, then they haven’t thought much about cause and effect.
Someone who cared to address the newfound lack of upward mobility in our society would insist on domestic policies that ensured economic surplus was explicitly invested toward the public good.
It has nothing to do with "current economic misfortune". It's simply a fact that globalization makes a country more vulnerable on many dimensions. This was clear during COVID when all of the supply chains collapsed upon countries closing their borders.
While globalization certainly has advantages that have been espoused at length, little thought has been given to their clear downsides, like decimating domestic production and the vulnerabilities inherent to distributed supply chains.
As for the "transition to a knowledge economy", this too entails similar problems. The previous trajectory was simply untenable.
I’m against these vulnerabilities as much as anyone, but if we want to move the world forward as a whole, nationalist protectionism cannot take us there. If every country wasted its resources building up its own fully independent industrial supply chain, and kept it fully modernized abreast of other nations, the average citizen’s standard of living would have a very low ceiling indeed. There’s a reason why corporate mergers happen.
If you want to see truly prosperous societies then you have to maximize peaceful international cooperation through shared democratic values. That takes educated citizenry with post-material values who will be invested in the stability and longevity of such an international system.
And they need to cooperate against authoritarian bad actors like Putin, who seek to divide and conquer.
Trump's for whatever is good for Trump. Stopping a war so he can bring his buddy Vlad back in to the fold? Sure. Starting a war so he can annex Greenland? Probably also sure.
That's the other fun side of Trump. He says a ton of outrageous things but, if you like him, you just pick and choose which bits are ridiculous and jokes and which are truthful when it's actually impossible to figure out which is which. Is he going to take over Greenland with force? His followers will say probably not because they don't see it. Is he going to introduce tariffs to Canada? His followers will say yes because they do see it. Has he done either? Not yet. Will he? Who knows!
But whether he's serious or not about a claim really comes down to whether someone likes it or not. Regardless, I'd argue that's a really poor way to lead.
I don't like Trump at all, but I'm not blind to history. He likes building things, particularly with his name on it. Even with Gaza his inclination is to build something in that completely devastated area.
He's also very sensitive to public opinion of him, and he knows public opinion is against military conflict. People are sick of it.
So war is the complete antithesis of everything he's ever demonstrably cared about. That's a pretty solid piece of evidence that lets you distinguish what seems reasonable, but that gets conveniently ignored by people that let their feelings about him influence their judgment.
I think there's more going on with the war than just he's anti-war, but I can kind of see this argument. But if we take it as true, it would seem that he's bad at working towards the things he professes to want. He either doesn't understand them or he pushes to get the fastest result without thought as to whether that would be the best.
I don't like it, but I can't deny that he's made it work more often than expected. Possibly with some negative downstream effects we haven't seen yet. Time will tell.
> Even if you take him for his words, which you shouldn't
This is exactly the kind of unhinged take on Trump that drives me crazy, and I'm not even a fan. On the one hand you say he's a liar and you can't believe anything he says, but when it's convenient for you, suddenly everything he says is completely literal.
The fact of the matter is that Trump has never initiated any serious military action, and he has a deliberate and predictable tactic of making outrageous offers and threats to put people off balance to make them compliant and accept worse offers than they otherwise would have (anchoring bias). This is a standard negotiating tactic, Trump just does it bombastically like no one else.
> He's stated that he would let Putin "do whatever he wants".
The US is not the world police. Other people being warmongers doesn't make Trump a warmonger because he "lets them".
> He plans to "level Gaza" (which means genocide) so he can build luxury hotels.
No, he didn't suggest killing anyone, he explicitly said they would be relocated. That's closer to ethnic cleansing, but decidedly not genocide.
* After decades of reckless spending and lax economic management the US is going broke in a number of ways. In particular dealing with the national debt before and after Covid are very different beasts
* Coupled with similar problems in other countries and gradual global demographic decline, the global future looks like a zero sum game
* In its relations with other states, America has tended to leave a lot of money on the table since the Cold War era, in order to curry political favor, which it can no longer afford to do
* Republicans speak and campaign more openly about this than Democrats even though they both agree on the fundamental ideas I just outlined
* This is why Republicans are currently ascendant with the electorate and Democrats are seeing some of their worst numbers ever in favorability polls
* It is eminently reasonable to not prefer zero sum geopolitical games because they tend to cause poverty and war, but we've boxed ourselves into this future through decades of poor decisions
War is a negative sum game. Peace is a positive sum game.
The reality is China is now the top trading partner for most of the world. China is producing 50% of the world's steel. China has 200x the shipbuilding capacity of the United States, etc etc. Cooperation with China is positive sum for nearly the whole world, but China as the preeminent geopolitical power is incompatible with the unipolar moment where America led the world and decided the rules of the road, and could force dissenters to comply at gunpoint. China is far more relatively powerful than the USSR ever was, much less China+Russia+Iran+North Korea combined.
This is what we're seeing play out in microcosm in Ukraine, where Russia is to a large degree being backstopped by Chinese industrial and economic and diplomatic power. Hard choices are required, and there can be a lot of productive debate on the specifics of those choices. But much of "the west" seems stuck in the 1990s, where America can simply will the world it wants into existence by believing in it enough.
If America and the EU had started dumping 10% of GDP into the military 5 or 15 years ago things would likely look very different now, but we didn't and no one wants to do that now either because it would be incredibly painful for millions of people who in a democracy could vote out the leaders who enacted that policy. Hard choices are required, but we're getting mainly empty rhetoric and wishcasting, by those who wish things were otherwise. I also wish things were otherwise - but that and $5 will get me a cup of Starbucks coffee.
"The era of procrastination, of half-measures, of soothing and baffling expedients, of delays is coming to its close. In its place we are entering a period of consequences." - Winston Churchill
And what is striking is that, so far, China is effectively defeating the USA as the world leader, piece by piece, without firing a shot.
Or at least, has a golden opportunity window to do so within the next 2/3 years, while Trump/Musk & co are dismantling the country capacity to function.
China has done that by ruling internally with an iron fist and ruling externally with financial influence.
The U.S. is actually trying a play from the same playbook by abstaining from deploying troops.
When was the last time you saw China getting torn apart in the media for failing to prop up a failed state? They're doing "greenfield" diplomacy without historical baggage.
Free trade as implemented in the past seems to have been the opposite of democratic cooperation. Non-elected appointees making free trade agreements behind locked doors, which effect ignore the citizens interest and makes industry regulation irrelevant. It was free trade that enshrined current copyright laws world wide with 90 years after the authors death, which few people in the world voted for.
Free trade only reflect cooperation if done transparently, chosen by the people, and which does not bypass industry regulation that people voted on. If that is not possible then the trade agreement need to reflect the different national views on things like minimum wage, environmental issues, safety standard, animal well fare, justice system, trade marks, and so on.
Further to this point, what people call "free trade" is in many cases actually not free at all. A good example of this is the bilateral relationship with Thailand, they put tons of tariffs on US imports, and the US puts very few tariffs on Thailand. Why? The rationale for this is ostensibly that the US would like to have more political influence in Southeast Asia, or hasn't totally internalized that the Cold War is over, or something.
(It also so happens that Thailand places very low tariffs on Chinese goods - and their government has been currying political favor with Beijing for a long time - they are happy to enjoy unrestricted access to US markets and seem quite confident that the status quo will endure so if we are trying to buy political influence with them, we seemingly have been so toothless that it isn't even working!)
The US has deals like this all over the planet where it gives other countries unrestricted access to its markets, in return for what is not clear. A lot of these deals contributed to the movement of US manufacturing to places like Thailand, which hit the US working class in the wallet very directly. Sure there are also good deals that we should preserve as-is but it doesn't seem unreasonable at all to me that some of these be subjected to scrutiny and revision.
That’s why Trump saying he’ll normalize tariffs is popular:
Many Americans feel cheated, whereby they give better terms to other parties and don’t even get respect in return. So they now support a movement to mirror that behavior.
This is an example of the iterated prisoner’s dilemma: one side defected on a partnership for their benefit, trust collapsed, and now the originally cooperative partner is acting selfishly as well. Reciprocation is a fundamental part of relationships.
The US isn’t the entity that needs to hear “cooperating is better than a zero sum mindset”.
Edit to respond:
Most of those people are upset about that as well:
- foreign owned farmland and corporations;
- foreign owned condos, etc;
- inflated stock prices enriching Wall St relative to Main St;
…and so on. What you’re describing is the concerns of the petite bourgeoisie who have benefitted from inflated stock prices, housing prices, and land prices.
For Trump supporters, ending that distortion in the market while boosting domestic labor is a win-win.
Americans will “feel cheated” again when reality arrives and learn that a huge part of their economic power is based on the world dumping trillions of dollars of their savings into us stocks, bonds and real estate, thus making the US dollar artificially strong, making it possible for Americans to buy stuff and being rich. Wait until foreign money and trust starts leaving the US to see how “betrayed” you really get, now it has been la la land, let’s wait for the next act..
I assume the intended audience for the tariff talk is rust belt workers (who swung the election) who feel cheated for more dramatic reasons like their company folding while foreign suppliers thrive.
> Many Americans feel cheated, whereby they give better terms to other parties and don’t even get respect in return
> - foreign owned farmland and corporations;
That's hilarious. Many languages have a specific term for US private equity investors that rush in, buy up entire countries' corporations, then try to squeeze out every cent of profit.
> Many languages have a specific term for US private equity investors that rush in, buy up entire countries' corporations, then try to squeeze out every cent of profit.
Sure — the US bourgeoisie and petite bourgeoisie benefitted. But they’re not the ones supporting Trump or feeling cheated.
> But they’re not the ones supporting Trump or feeling cheated.
One of the groups most benefiting from the US dominance in the past decades were the farmers. Which is one of the larger lobby blocks and voting groups supporting trump.
And the logic doesn't compute either. Average people around the world got exploited by western, but primarily US, billionaires.
So the average people, the proletariat, should unite and revolt against those billionaires.
Instead the US proletariat voted to give billionaires even more power, in the hope that "their" billionaires would exploit foreigners more than themselves?
Free trade is built on top of economic systems which themselves are built on top of zero sum games. The only thing we can put economic value on are goods and services that use finite resources (oil, lumber, human labor, etc).
A forest, for example, has no economic value but lumber does.
Free trade may optimize how goods and services are dispersed but it can't escape the zero sum game that is foundational to economics.
I don't think it is merely a matter of redistribution. It can escape the zero-sum game through productivity gains, technological progress, recycling, and better legislation (for example, policies that regenerate forests). It may even create new industries as replacements. Because of this, I don’t believe it is inherently a zero-sum game.
> The only thing we can put economic value on are goods and services that use finite resources
A software patent does not consume physical resources (aside from the initial human labor) yet holds tremendous economic value. An app can be easily duplicated, making it a virtually infinite resource, while the patent remains attached to its novel functionalities.
There is always the possibility to dig deeper mines, explore further into space or just give people the possibility to live more a comfortable life.
But it is not only about that. Trade is also for comparative advantage. If you ever played settlers boardgame with more than two players you'll soon realize that whoever trades the most wins. And it does not really matter who you trade with, it is just reaping the benefits of trade instead of being stuck with 10 wood that is of low value to you but of high value to someone else.
What you're describing is a zero sum game. The world is limited to the board game, and whoever is best at trading and strategy collects the most finite resources and the others lose.
(Sorry if I lost the thread here. Most here were trying to argue that trade and globalization are a way to escape a zero-sum game).
I get your point, but I don't think a board game is a good abstraction to collapse the real world into. The world is not a fixed, closed system with finite resources. In a board game, expansion and innovation are not possible, only trading and strategy, as you mentioned, can optimise the system to some extent. Moreover, winning in a board game happens solely because of its rules, whereas in the real world, one person's success does not necessarily mean another's loss. Trade can be mutually beneficial, driven by each party's ambitions.
Innovation is an interesting wrinkle in the comparison for sure (I used the comparison only to continue with the previous commentor's point). Innovation only increase the potential usefulness of resources though. Assuming that will always avoid hitting the boundary of the zero sum game assumes perpetual innovation at a good enough pace to keep up.
Trade is an interesting one because it can be mutually beneficial, though it rarely includes everyone. Two countries can trade and both be better off, but other countries excluded may now be worse off. Trade also can't be mutually beneficial with regards to relative gain. Both sides can gain in trade or cooperation but one will always have gained more than the other. That doesn't make my point by the way, but an interesting related dimension to the whole topic.
The first tried to explain that it does not necessarily have to be a zero-sum game.
The second paragraph tried to explain that, even if you do see it as a zero sum game, trade between two parties, or trade in general, can give you benefits over ones who are not part of the trade.
Obviously I am trying to describe this in simple terms without writing a book. But i do think the board game analogy holds even though it is very simple.
That's a very limited (XIXth century?) perspective.
A forest (like, anything) has economic value, as soon as you get people to adopt/believe in it.
A forest may even have a greater economic value than the lumber it could produce, if it would, for instance, help/ensure the prosperity of something else that has economic value (leisure, wildlife, heat protection, soil water retention, etc.).
I completely agree outside of economics. I put much higher value on a forest than lumber. Economically, though, where is the forest ever accounted for?
In your strategic business plan, by IFRS accounting standards (existing and developing).
You have several options, account for it as lumber (but... well), or as a carbon sequestration well (so you could get carbon credits, IAS 38), or as an ecosystem providing services (several frameworks under work here), or as a contingent liability or asset (IAS 37, can be in the balance sheet if the probability of event/impact is high/certain).
Even if you forget to account for it, your insurance likely will remind you about it.
Once someone can "own" the forest, that be a bit of a cheat around the whole idea. I'm thinking out loud here, but I think all of you're examples are actually valuing the financial mechanisms rather than the forest itself.
The carbon credits are given economic value, its just not a physical resource like lumber so its harder to distinguish that the credit holds the value rather than the forest.
The US has never been richer, adjusted for inflation, both in aggregate and per person. [0]
The idea that there have been decades of reckless spending and the US is going broke I think is not at all a nuanced take.
Anecdotes about the inflation of prices of eggs (which is 0.05% of US economy) don't change the overall facts that are material.
I will grant you that debt servicing needs immediate attention. Blowing up 100 years of foreign policy has nothing to do with that, however.
The number of NATO members spending 2% or more on defense went from 3 to 23 in the past 10 years. Their spending almost doubled in the past 10 years, while the US only grew 15% (actually shrunk in PPP terms). [1]
The US has been successfully pressuring NATO allies to pick up the bill, without having to call Ukraine a dictator and cede Ukraine to Russia without US security guarantees, and promote politics of appeasement that will lead to China taking Taiwan which is the only material place that produces the future's most important geopolitical asset: chips.
The US looking to reduce debt also isn't compatible with raising tariffs on everyone including allies, reducing taxes and warding off cheap immigrant labour, it's the opposite. Trump seems to have 25% good ideas, 75% bad ideas, and 90% poor execution that causes a lot of collateral damage. Penny wise pound foolish comes to mind a lot when I look at his policy choices.
Averages hide extremes. In this case it hides how much poorer the poor got and richer the rich got. America is not "rich" in a way that benefits the middle class.
And to address that gap between the rich and poor, Trump is ... firing middle-class government employees, cutting taxes (which primarily favors the rich), and toying with cutting social programs?
"The number of NATO members spending 2% or more on defense went from 3 to 23 in the past 10 years"
Which is the reason that maybe Trump is not working for Putin? By scaring Europe into re-militarizing, that is bad for Russia.
Not just 2%, but what if this spurs Germany into "hey, lets ramp this Military up and take on Russia again". That isn't good for Russia.
And this Trump attack on Ukraine, will unite the Ukraine people.
The things Trump does backfires? Or is that the plan. He's getting a militarized Europe and a United Ukraine. If he wants the opposite, then this is really bad way of going about it.
EDIT: Just trying to find a silver lining. Maybe a wakeup call by a global all powerful tyrant will move the world toward some unity?
There is absolutely zero real life evidence that anyone can possibly point to that supports the Trump is secretly a genius and is playing 4D chess theory.
I think it’s pretty likely that he is smart enough to try and use “madman theory” to gain his advantage. Whether that plays out to be a good strategy in the long term remains to be seen. However, in the past it has worked to a degree when leaders have utilized it.
I didn't really mean he is doing it on-purpose, 4-D Chess style. Just a thought, he could be achieving the opposite of his desires, and by accident helping Europe?
If Trump does accidentally manage to unite Europe, have them end the Ukraine war, and all without US involvement and spending… he will of course immediately claim full credit.
how about a far target of doing anything possible against China? Abandoning EU (thus pushing them to ramp up) and seemingly siding with Russia if needed.
> By scaring Europe into re-militarizing, that is bad for Russia.
Any anti-Russian benefit that has is dwarfed by the pro-Russian benefit of having a wedge driven between the US and Europe, which is what is happening. Even a Europe that invests more heavily is defense is far less scary to Russia than the threat of US military power, especially in the short to medium term. The US has military capability that will be difficult for anyone to recreate, even advanced economies like those of Germany, simply because of scale and long experience.
The best outcome for the US/European alliance would be a more militarily capable Europe still strongly allied with the US. Maybe that was the 4D chess goal, but if so Trump appears to have way overshot it.
The problem I see is that while Europe is waking up to the fact that they need to invest more in defense, they haven't realized yet that they need to build a military that can actually project power if they want to replace/augment the US. That's a different beast. And you are right, no single country in Europe could do that, and it would indeed be very bad if they would try. What has to happen is that Europe, ideally including the UK, comes together to form such a military.
> After decades of reckless spending and lax economic management the US is going broke in a number of ways. In particular dealing with the national debt before and after Covid are very different beasts
Most of the reckless spending is by Republicans via unfunded tax which grows the deficit
Then when they’re in opposition they suddenly become deficit hawks
Republicans don’t mind the debt pile growing providing it’s the rich getting the money, they object when it’s ordinary people’s lives who are being made better
I don't agree with your conclusions, but I feel you're arguing in good faith and therefore don't deserve down votes.
I'm not sure America actually has left a lot of money on the table. I see America having benefitted a lot from the post cold war world order (as indeed have most of its allies), and my take is that the kind of extraction of value that Trump has been attempting is at very best only beneficial in the short term.
But again, I appreciate when people with different viewpoints can discuss them civilly, so I gave you an upvote.
Thank you! Yes I was, and I'm of the view that our greatest strength as a democratic society is our ability to discuss opposing views civilly. I spend a lot of time overseas in societies where this ability is not present and Americans really, really underestimate how bad things can get when you lose it.
So "leaving money on the table" is admittedly very vague, using it here I'm principally referring to two things:
1) For many decades we've had a trade posture and foreign policy regime which emphasized moving production offshore. This generated a lot of corporate profits and some consumer benefits but was absolutely decimating for working class incomes and job prospects. We "left money on the table" here in the sense that money which would have been generated in the US and paid wages in the US tended to end up mostly in the hands of wealthy people in poor countries (and to some degree in the hands of their middle classes).
2) The other way we left money on the table was by opening up our markets to countries which didn't reciprocate in kind -- we reduced our tariffs on them, and they didn't reduce their tariffs on us. This again encouraged the flow of production, jobs, capital etc. out of the US and again hit the most vulnerable economic classes hardest.
The net result of this is that we have a lot of money in the US in a record few number of hands -- when you add corporate consolidation & monopolization to the mix you have a pretty complete picture of why a lot of people in this country are struggling.
So did we benefit from these policies, yeah, we did in certain ways that accrued particularly toward the top of our economic pyramid, but it seems that the bottom of it has had just about enough of this and is getting loud about it at the ballot box.
Those are valid problems, but siding with Russia against Ukraine and attempting to extort natural resource wealth from the latter doesn't address any of those issues. I understand and to a large extent agree with the domestic discontent about who has benefited and who has been hurt by decades of American trade policies, although I think much of that complaining ignores the real benefits it brought to American consumers in the form of cheaper and more available goods. But addressing those issues doesn't require flushing American foreign policy and diplomacy down the garbage disposal and in fact doing so is likely counter-productive.
American working and middle classes have been devastated over the course of forty years by bad trade deals.
They’re the constituency that supports Trump.
Numbers like GDP or total wealth will be highly misleading — and it’s unsurprising that the opinion of the petite bourgeoisie (who primarily make up HN) differ from those groups.
What you're describing is an American domestic policy issue.
There's no dispute that America has become incredibly more rich and powerful over the past 40 years. The fact that that money is increasingly funneled to fewer and fewer people (as a percent of the population) is something that can be changed locally, without changing our foreign policy stance.
It's not a surprise that the "devastation" of the middle class coincides with the continued reduction of tax rates on the entities collecting all that money. The America that MAGA seems to think was great was one of higher taxes and more social programs.
can you explain how an increase in tax rate would help the middle class gain more wealth? it already makes sense that decreasing tax rate, and therefore increasing income, but decreasing income to increase wealth doesn’t make sense to me.
No, they’re coupled issues — eg, open markets forces domestic labor to compete unfairly.
The manner in which those people accrued wealth is deeply related to the issue, by subverting the working and middle classes domestically.
I understand that many of the petite bourgeoisie believe that destruction of those classes via internationalism is a means to usher in communist policy — but that’s opposed wholesale by the American working and middle classes.
> No, they’re coupled issues — eg, open markets forces domestic labor to compete unfairly.
You're still describing economic policies though, not diplomatic ones, and while they're not entirely disconnected, trying to fix international economic issues by burning down alliances is likely to result in a lot of negative second order effects while not even addressing the main economic concerns.
If we're ascribing bad faith motivations to particular viewpoints here though, I'll point out that conflating concerns about trade policies with the idea that America should entirely abandon any interest in the rest of the world is enormously helpful to countries that would like to pursue far more aggressive imperial ambitions currently being blocked by American power. Having rightfully angry people in America's rust belt become convinced that the only way to revitalize the industries that used to power their cities is to let Russia reform the Soviet Union has got to feel like the political victory of the century to Moscow.
Why isn't the answer wealth redistribution instead of tearing down the world order, tearing down the government, and hoping something positive miraculously comes out of it someday down the road?
Presumably because they view the US as best for their classes when it was easier to do business and less beholden to international affairs while simultaneously not believing that empowering the government in such a manner will benefit them.
When the party advocating wealth redistribution also calls them “deplorables” and flagrantly provides worse services (eg, NC disaster vs CA disaster) that seems like a reasonable belief.
If Republicans would be oh-so concerned about the US "going broke" they wouldn't be pushing through trillions in tax cuts.
And much of this meeting with Zelensky had nothing to do with the budget (or at least the bits I've seen). It's just Trump being upset Zelensky isn't bending over backwards to praise Trump and being obsessed with shown to look "better" than other presidents (which is why he goes off on a tangent about Biden and Obama, disconnected from what Zelensky actually said).
I don't think this is the future or anyone is boxed in.
Trump & Co are by no measure the sharpest tools in the shed. In Trumps own words they have been up against some really inept people, who have all lost credibility.
Therefore the counter-reaction, which is building, will come, and it won't look like what Trump & Co are used to dealing with in the past. I think that's what interesting about where the story goes next. Whose is going to lead? What are they going to stand for? How are they going to organize? Its an opportunity for the best in America to shine.
Not everyone benefits from cooperation. Feuds are a great "business opportunity" - while everyone's divided and at each other's throat, you can take them out (or extort/bully) one by one, without any consequences, especially if you have the biggest and scariest stick in the block. So, solidarity, cooperation, and people sticking up for each other are absolutely awful for thugs and bullies.
The US already had all the power when people called it the leader of the free world, when people start using the word "bully," that signifies a major shift.
It will result in a loss of power. Isolation is not a strengthening posture. You need allies to succeed over the long term. This looks like the beginning of the downfall of the United States from every measure.
I don't disagree. But then for most of the 7,000 years of recorded history, GDP (and all the might that wealth ensures) was strictly a function of population. It wasn't until European colonialism came in the 1400s and industrialization in the 1700s that guns, resource extraction, and productivity gains changed the game.
But WW2 ended colonialism and 90s globalization spread industrialization worldwide, leaving us all in the slow roll of reverting to the mean now. At the end of which, the ancient civilizations of China and India, with nearly 3 billion people between them, will return to global dominance.
Oh, I don't think it is the US as a whole that's meant to benefit from this coercive behavior. And it's not just the foreign policy. While Trump keeps pointing fingers at those "who are to blame for our problems" (transes stealing our children, biden stealing elections, immigrants stealing jobs and welfare, Ukrainians stealing aid) and the society stays divided on these issues, plenty of opportunities for business (extortion) arise for himself and his buddies, especially now that his hands are not tied by anything. This strategy worked wonders for another narcissist bully thug named Putin. That's basically divide and conquer.
> People broadly like americans and american culture
And from your own link to that survey where the US was #1 threat to world peace, the US was still one of the top places where the respondents wanted to live.
I don't think so. Admire its riches, and unwaveringly aggressive pursuit of commercial success perhaps, but like its culture, beyond the Hollywood blockbusters? That's not so common.
What will Donald Trump, Elon Musk and Peter Thiel's wealth look like when the us dollar isn't the main transfer currency, the world sees the biggest financial crisis in the last couple centuries and everyone wants to cash out on their US bonds because all of a sudden there's 0 trust in the US government?
That's what we're headed towards. The 'dark enlightenment' fascists think they can accelerate a switch of global banking moving towards cryptocurrency. Good fucking luck trading a bitcoin when normal finance is blowing up, grocery stores are going to struggle with stocking their shelves.
The thing that crypto correlated the most with so far has been tech stocks, the most exposed ones. So I don't think crypto will hold much longer than those and will crash earlier than the rest if your scenario was to be true.
Also, if crypto would be to become any money, then it would not produce any yield in average. So it would not be interesting to hold, the whole scenario makes no sense.
They don't have to care because there is so much wealth to acquire in the short term. Trump alone will enrich himself with billions in bribes from foreign companies. The DOGE/Project2025 annihilation of government programs will result in drastic privatization with all of the billionaire class benefitting immediately.
All of the dark outcomes you describe are possible while a certain class has profitted already so much they don't care and will happily retreat into their bunker.
The world, including the US, will be poorer and less safe if the US moves to zero sum geopolitics and mercantilism of 19th century. And the losses will be burdened on everyone else other than the very rich elites. Indeed, even a short review of America's own history would be proof of this.
Even the rich will be worse off. Just relatively less so. It's utterly irrational, but that's what happens when a population feels disillusioned with the status quo, and capital does all it can to push that unrest in any direction but reducing wealth inequality. Turns out the next easiest outlet is to appeal to humanity's worst tendencies, resulting in the rise of fascism.
This will play out over and over in liberal democracies so long as they abide a large wealth gap. It's anyone's guess whether we'll figure that out before there are no democratic states left.
The status quo in western countries of giving absolute primacy to the needs/demands of capital above all else has indeed failed. The share of national income going to the middle and working classses makes this obvious. Yet, this is not being resolved.
Instead, the very same groups that have benefitted from the status quo have managed to acquire power on the back of a disaffected populous, and they hold a fundamental belief that multi-lateral institutions/geopolitics do not act in the US's (or their) economic interest.
How did we actually escape the zero sum game that is economics?
Oil, lumber, plastics, steel, human labor, electricity, etc are all still finite resources.
It seems like we've been playing in a much larger zero sum game, and that allowed us to gain temporarily profit from that much larger game. We can't escape it though, only finite resources have economic value.
Because we found something to addd on to each of them.
Oil - nuclear power - renewable energy
Lumber - is renewable
Plastics - use less (packaging) and more renewables - but yea this is limited and we need all oil for this. Also recycling.
Steel - recycling
Human labour - animal power - engines - for thought - computers then AI?
Electricity - renewables - fission.
There is a lot of leeway if we don't waste the resources and ingenuity and discoveries have made it a non zero-sum game.
A related point I've heard here is that we ultimately only get one shot at bootstrapping ourselves into a truly advanced civilization no longer entirely reliant on finite resources. If we screw up the transition and expend those finite resources, especially fossil fuels, before we move beyond them, we won't have enough foundation left to try again. Nuclear and renewables might replace fossil fuels, but if you run out of fossil fuels before nuclear and renewables can pick up the slack, you're doomed to regress to a pre-energy society and it will be impossible to get back to a point where nuclear power is achievable without cheap fossil fuel energy.
The key here for me is that treating economics like a zero sum game now makes it significantly more likely we end up at a place where it really is zero sum because zero sum thinking is nearly always short-sighted by definition, and getting to the next level requires more strategic thinking.
That's a valid point. On long enough timescales, even stars will burn out. But the cap I was thinking of was less in terms of capacity and more in terms of longevity. There's an upper limit to how much energy we can generate with solar panels on Earth for example, but we'd be able to sustain that capacity for a long, long period of time.
On that kind of timescale, it's far less likely we run out of energy before we can move to a new alternative (perhaps an alternative planet). You're right that no resource is infinite, so maybe the better way to phrase it is resources where we won't run out of them before we are unlikely to need them again.
That probably runs into Jevan's Paradox - we may get more efficient but we'll just increase our use to take advantage of the resources we already have.
In what you describe I can't help but see us stuck on a treadmill, endlessly chasing the next innovation to replace the current tech before we run out of resources. We won't be arguing about oil the next time around, bit maybe lithium?
I can't help but wonder what the point is. We could just use less and accept enough rather than constantly wanting the next big thing. I could have 10% of what I have today and still live a more comfortable life than almost all of human history.
People working together are more productive than each person trying to subsist alone. The same goes for countries. The world economy is incredibly complex, and no country can produce everything by itself.
That works in the short term, but the broader game is still zero sum.
There's only so many resources to go around, and at least with how we treat economics the only things of value are scarce.
Innovations and cooperation can give periods of optimization so it feel like the zero sum is no longer zero sum. At the end of the day it is though, and there's probably a decent case to be made that what we're seeing happen today is due in part to us having optimized as far as we can for this round.
Division of labor does not go away. If anything, specialization and division of labor increase as the world economy becomes more and more complex and developed.
I say its short term because the inefficiencies eventually get worked out and we're back to a point where we're utilizing all the resources we can make economic use of and we again have zero sum game.
The zero sum game doesn't stop, we just found a way to unlock new uses or new resources such that we temporarily just compete to claim those new resources.
Think of it with land. If all the land we know of is already "owned" we must compete. If we discover new land everyone can scramble to "own" that land so it is temporarily not really zero sum. Ultimately land is finite though, and we get back to a zero sum game after a brief interlude.
Take a look at plots of land in your nearby city. Not all plots of land are equally valuable. Some are empty lots, others have skyscrapers on them that earn millions in rent. Your example of land as ultimately zero-sum misses something crucial: plots don't gain or lose value in isolation. The neighborhood and neighbors contribute strongly to each property's value.
When property owners improve their land, neighbors also gain value - creating a positive-sum scenario even within your 'finite resource' example. This continuous cycle of improvement and value creation isn't just a 'temporary interlude' before returning to zero-sum; it's the persistent engine of economic growth in the west.
Since Adam Smith articulated these principles of mutually beneficial exchange in 'The Wealth of Nations,' we haven't seen a return to zero-sum economics. Instead, global wealth has grown exponentially, despite population growth and resource competition. The evidence contradicts the idea that we inevitably return to zero-sum competition after brief periods of growth.
I see you thinking, wait a minute, shouldn't we be looking at wealth per capita? Yes we should. That has gone up dramatically as well. Around 1776 when Adam Smith wrote his book, global GDP per Capita was $1012 (estimated, adjusted for PPP, 2011 dollars ), in 2022 Global GDP per capita was $15 212 (computed) [1]
> When property owners improve their land, neighbors also gain value - creating a positive-sum scenario even within your 'finite resource' example
There is a finite pool of property and of buyers though. Its reasonable to assume they if one piece of property gains in value others lose value because they are now less desirable. I'm not arguing the math is absolutely 1:1 in price increase/decrease.
Its very easy to zoom in on one portion of a zero sum game and view it as non-zero. If costs are externalized outside the scale you're considering then it can in fact seem magical, but at the end of the day everything is connected.
If your neighbor's house goes up in price, yours is likely to go up too, all else being equal.
-
Economic interactions can create new (emergent) value, not just reshuffle existing value.
Adam Smith's recognition of this fact is what gave us the current western economies, where even poor people are relatively wealthy, compared to back in his day.
Adam Smith illustrated this 'emergent value' with his pin factory example: One person working alone might make 20 pins per day. But when ten people specialize and collaborate, they could produce 48,000 pins daily - not by using more resources, but through smarter organization. This 240x productivity gain created entirely new value without taking from anyone else.
> If your neighbor's house goes up in price, yours is likely to go up too, all else being equal.
Sure, if you're zoomed into a neighborhood scale. That wasn't my argument though, scale matters.
If your neighborhood sees an increase in value one across town could pretty easily see theirs go down. If your city goes up because it became more desirable for any number of reasons, other cities must be less desirable and seeing values go down.
We don't have unlimited demand for real estate. Buying real estate mostly in debt buffers the zero sum game somewhat, we have a finite pool of buyers but they aren't directly limited by a finite pool of money.
Edit because I forgot Adam Smith. He wrote of a fictional past and a fictional vision for the future. His examples are fine in theory but they weren't rooted in fact.
Ah, I think the pin factory was a place Adam Smith actually visited back in the day.
But... you have me curious now.
Does this mean you reject capitalism as a system?
And Karl Marx actually I think made similar observations, just came to his own slightly different conclusions. So I'm guessing you're not exactly going to be someone who identifies as socialist either.
Can you tell me if you come from some sort of interesting social/economic/political background? I'm fascinated!
I do actually support capitalism, though my opinion is that I only really support it in theory and that the few decades I've been alive have had too much market intervention to really be considered capitalism.
I generally would trust a free market to optimize well enough, much like I would trust "the mob" in a democracy to decide its own fate well enough.
I fall very must on the side of individual liberty. That means people should be able to do whatever they want as long as it doesn't impede other's rights to do the same. It also means, though, trusting that the outcome of such a system is going to be roughly optimized and should nearly always be better than a centrally planned solution.
In the context of housing prices, neighborhoods or cities rising and falling, etc I see that as a good thing and as a sign that markets are reflecting general sentiment among consumers. We learn from why we think one market is now more favorable and respond by shifting other markets to better match that demand.
Where Adam Smith really loses me is in monetary policy. Arguments of a world before money looking like someone with bread and in need of chicken wandering around to find someone with chicken and needing bread is just ridiculous. Societies without money, or with a very loose concept of money, were likely to be much smaller groups of people (think the Dunbar number) that worked to take care of each other. You may have had someone that made bread for the community and you just went and got some when you needed it. Everything didn't revolve around IOU transactions among unfamiliar parties because you were familiar. Money is way Kore useful as a medium when you don't really know or don't really trust the other party.
Oh! That's nuanced! I was just thinking that what we call non-zero sum thinking today is the basis of both capitalism and socialism. [1]
So if you reject it, I thought you must have some really interesting alternate economic theory you adhere to.
That said, do you think it's more likely that every single interaction between humans would be an exact -1/+1 value exchange, or do you think it'd be a bit more messy like -0.45/+1.213 . If the latter, couldn't -1.1/-4.5 or +2.43/+3.14159 also be possible exchanges?
[1] both capitalism and socialism (despite their many differences) share the premise that economic organization can create more value than would exist without it. They differ primarily on how that value should be distributed and who should control the means of production, not on whether value creation itself is possible.
The point I'm making is that it never stops being positive-sum. It remains true that it's better for everyone if everyone works together. If you halt international trade, everyone will be poorer.
There is presumably still a limit though. Resources can only be optimized so much, innovation and cooperation helps but that would cap out at some point.
We are escaping this zero-sum game with innovation. We are finding replacements for expensive materials or figure out how to use less of them. Innovation and knowledge are compounding: a bit more knowledge today means a bit more knowledge a year from now, and then a bit more knowledge a year later etc..
No, we're replacing finite oil and gas with other finite resources. Sun and wind require hardware to be converted into usable energy, that requires finite materials.
Sun and wind also require massive energy storage solutions to replace the ease of storing energy in the form of oil. Again that energy storage requires finite materials to make, maintain, and replace as they degrade.
Let's not confuse domains: while economics isn't (necessarily) zero sum, geopolitics (in terms of influence or territory) is. US policy has nothing to do with these two facts.
Yes, when you look purely at geopolitics in terms of influence or territory, then that's zero sum.
But even when leaving economics out of the equation, which I find questionable, there are plenty of other aspects of politics that are not zero sum.
For instance: climate politics, pandemic control, arms race prevention.
I don't disagree, but they all unfortunately take a backseat to geopolitics. When it comes to the behavior of nations, the playground politics of bully and victim has more explanatory power than all the high talk of the UN.
But is that really true? I wasn't talking specifically about the UN, but if you take a look at nations across the globe, also historically, is the behaviour of nations primarily ruled by zero-sum bully and victim politics, or by nash equilibria, i.e. compromises where both parties benefit? I would say that nations that are at war or threatening each other with war are in the minority, globally.
Hmmm, you raise an interesting question. I'm no game theorist, but are bully/victim dynamics and Nash equilibria necessarily mutually exclusive? What I'm getting at is: the threat of force determines every other player's optimal strategy, with a fight always being the last resort for everyone involved.
Under such conditions, Adam giving the bully his lunch money, Bob his homework, and Charlie his lunch may be the Nash equilbrium—that is, until Dave (who knows kung fu) moves to the neighborhood.
Two critical items who give away the total compromise of the administration.
During the conference Trump was asked when did he talk to Putin last time and said "a couple of days ago". No official communication was made about that. I am not referring to the initial call mentioned a few weeks ago.
A TASS reporter got into the Oval Office, and was kicked out when this was flagged by other members of the press. The normal accredited journalists can't easily get into the Oval Office, there is a much more rigorous process for that.
Somebody from the current US Administration, wanted this prearranged ambush, to be broadcast live to Russian audiences.
Not just the US but a lot of right wing or authoritarian govt in general.
The problem with this zero sum thinking is there is another player outside of the countries if the world; nature itself. Think natural disasters, climate change, diseases. No one can negotiate with it or form alliances. It does not care about our survival. The only choice we have is to come together to make sure we don't get screwed over.
Or... here's another strategy collect as much money as you can for yourself, and maybe your family... making hay while the sun shines... drilling and selling oil and gas... Demolish sanctions, play the stock market, kill off carbon taxes and environmental measures...
Sprinkle a little cryptocurrency backed money laundering here... some tax cuts there... Make sure your closest friends are well taken care of...
Then hole up in armed compounds with plenty of fresh water and air conditioning ... and say "f you" to everyone else.
Now you understand the rationale of America's new ruling class.
Those same people could hold up in a compound today. But they like the nice things, restaurants, social events, football games etc. They better start liking the locked down life now, because if things go bad their 20 security detail won’t protect them later.
20 armed men vs. their beach houses sinking into the ocean, forest fires burning heir land, hurricanes throwing everything every which way, and potentially nuclear hellfire... IDK, I'm betting on Nature (and man's folly wielding nature) on this round.
Which is why they build massive compounds both onshore and on various islands, and acquire the means to move between them unimpeded.
I don’t know if they’ve considered all the logistics but they do rather seem to be at the point where society’s ability to either ignore or impede them is to be done away with.
Zuckerberg will pay his burly security force by providing a better future for the security force’s family. Like fresh water and golf courses. Security forces will not leave the compound at the end of their shift-they will live there with their families.
(Edit fixed a typo in a word. Sorry I am on mobile)
Well, I am not an expert in governance. I just offered an example to how security forces would be compensated when there is no currency. One could imagine multiple layers of security forces... or some resources under the direct control of Zuckerberg and his direct reports, etc.... Granted, it would be a more dangerous and less fun world for Zuckerberg to live in, but I answered a hypothetical question.
Billionaire bunkers are just billionaire tombs - the only reason billionaires are in charge is the very society they plan to hide from in their bunkers. They have plans for bomb collars, but someone has to maintain them and they could deactivate them, and if your bodyguards want you dead then you're dead.
It doesn't have to be literal bunkers. Just look at the structure of your average "third world" city -- glass towers and luxury condos ringed by miles of shanty towns and slums -- and then a barrier and villas and luxury estates out in the countryside.
This is, in fact, how the end of the western Roman empire looked. No bang, just a long series of whimpers as the elite retreated to armed estates with private armies, taxes stopped being collected, overall trade declined, cities declined, and the agrarian peasantry became bound to lords and estates out of need of protection, etc. etc.
When civic institutions and the taxes that support them are openly attacked and predated upon, weakened and then combined with environmental, disease, or security crisis, one needn't think hard to picture the kind of eventual world that results.
Territorial disputes, when the negotiation terms involve only territorial changes is a zero-sum game. It stops being a zero-sum game once you add more terms.
A good example of an effective peace treaty was the Camp David accords that put an end to the Yom Kippur war of 1973. That used interest based bargaining instead of distributive bargaining.
The outcome that Russia is interested in this conflict is:
- help Ukraine facilitate the international recognition of that annexation
- Ukraine should not join NATO (this makes another invasion viable in the future)
In this deal, Ukraine gets:
- a ceasefire
- some peacekeeping help
These terms are pretty mediocre for Ukraine. This administration seems to be inclined to think that's the best Ukraine can get and they should take the offer to prevent further losses.
Oblasts like Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, etc. have a high percentage of ethnic Russians living there. That would remain a barrier for Ukraine to achieve peace even if Russians retreat to pre-2014 borders. Nobody knows exactly what percentage of Russians live there because the last census was long time ago.
Imperialism and expansionism is often rooted in the idea that the peoples of different countries and their respective governments have different merit or value, and one should rule over the other.
Once you start talking about hierarchies among nations and ethnicities, you are starting to establish connections with other concepts that relate to one type of people being exceptional and entitled to rule over others: nationalism and racism.
Imperialism, nationalism and racism are deeply interconnected: if all peoples had similar value or merit there should be no need to change borders because what's outside your borders is similar to what's inside your borders.
The way imperialists talk by highlighting how exceptional your nation and people are or can be, and contrasting against other nations and peoples. And how expanding and ruling others would further improve things.
That would not be a barrier for peace in Ukraine. The war is not between Russians and Ukrainians, but Russia and Ukraine - in fact, that area voted for Zelenskyy. [1]
No, where are you getting this from? His value proposal was that he was a) an outsider in politics, b) russian speaking ukranian. He was elected on on the platform of reducing corruption and negotiating the end to the Donbas conflict.
Electing a president on the promise that he would stay out of politics. Ha!
Idk if he came up all on his own with the idea of becoming president by first playing one on TV, but I've got to admit it's absolutely brilliant.
The logic seems to be that if he's played good guys on TV, it means he already knows what common decency looks like to regular people, unlike the hardline nomenklatura gangsters who live by their own sort of thieves' honor.
Fascinating approach, and one common to East European worldviews: "these people are evil because they don't know how to be good". It's a supremely compassionate view, even if it's proven more than a little counterproductive over and over.
> A good example of an effective peace treaty was the Camp David accords that put an end to the Yom Kippur war of 1973
You ignore the fact that in Begin and Sadat, Carter had parties on both sides very willing to sign a permanent peace deal. With Sadat even sending multiple proposals to the US & Israel prior to the 1973 war [0]. While Sadat & Begin are no saints, the incumbent and entrenched wartime leader in Golda Meir had to be thrown to the cribs for peace to come to fruition, something that the Trump Admin now seems to demand of Zelensky.
Every peace negotiation process can be messy. But in the end they found a compromise that both parties were content with and have had peace for decades. That's to me a good ending.
This is a common take, but a pretty dishonest one (by the article author of course). It ignores the Egyptian conditions (accepting a withdrawal _in advance_, but negotiating peace afterward), the Israeli reply (offer to unilaterally withdraw from the Canal - set to December 1973 following Israeli elections), and the Egyptian need to fight to 'restore their honour' (as Sadat's wife stated).
Zelensky is no saint (the press ignores his flaws), but actually all parties to the conflict are rather close. The one remaining issue is guarantees to Ukraine (a very reasonable demand), and if Putin finally bends on that an accord will come very quickly.
Trump and Vance also emphasized that Ukraine’s very weak, on camera, and then Trump spent a very weird amount of time taking about how tough Hunter Biden’s laptop was for Vladimir Putin, or something, which he just brought up out of nowhere.
I think it’s a safe assumption their deal sucks.
[edit] I don’t care about downvotes but if anyone downvoted because they think I made this up… watch the video.
My interpretation is that this conversation had many layers. One of such layers was that the Trump team claimed Zelenskyy campaigned for the opposition, Kamala Harris.
And one of the objectives of this whole situation was to frame the discussion as a humiliation ritual or character destruction to show what happens when you are not aligned to deter others from doing the same in the future. Shaming individuals who are not aligned is a recurring theme in rallies. e.g.: "Do you see this? Do you want to be seen treated like this? don't campaign for our opposition".
Yes this episode about Putin and Biden was bizarre. The world was watching how Trump was arguing for sympathy for Putin, e.g. quoting Trump: 'Putin went through a hell of a lot with me ... it was a Democrat scam ... and he had to go through that, and he did go through that'.
> The inquiry reported that Trump withheld military aid[a] and an invitation to the White House from Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy in order to influence Ukraine to announce an investigation into Trump's political opponent Joe Biden, and to promote a discredited conspiracy theory that Ukraine– not Russia– was behind interference in the 2016 presidential election.
The U.S. pulling back from policing the world is good for everyone except the europeans who were free-riding on the american military budget. How many deaths and trillions of dollars of waste resulted from liberal internationalism in the 20th and early 21st century? Vietnam, Korea, Iraq? The Iraq War should have discredited the whole project and resulted in throwing the “promoting democracy” folks into gulags. But they regrouped masterfully.
The reality of the matter is that world was going that way anyway, as a result of weakness and mistakes past admins couldn't remedy (including Trump's).
The Russian army is IMHO not anywhere near collapse, it's suffering many casualties in a useless war (for Russia), but ultimately they have x4 people and industrial advantage (!). Trump is being very crass, but any US admin would seek to close this up since simply put Ukr is losing - yet Putin cannot take Kyiv either. What's left is everyone wasting a lot of blood for a some land in Donbass.
The pressure is applied too much on Ukraine though - Putin needs to made to climb down a bit, which is difficult given his advances but maybe doable (I think a threat of unilateral EU forces deployment could do it).
Yes, exactly, and that's the one huge issue with overt Machiavellianism as a strategy.
The big question I've been asking myself for a while now is, why isn't that plainly obvious to everyone in the US? Why isn't it plainly obvious to Trump himself and to his fans?
I think the reason is American Exceptionalism, and the cultural power it has in the US.
If you start from the premise that you play in a completely different league than everyone else, there isn't much to gain from building cooperative structures.
Interestingly, I remember even Peter Thiel saying in a podcast I listened to many years ago that he thought American Exceptionalism was the biggest cultural weakness in the US.
The lines on the map in the Ukraine war do not change in Ukraine's favor unless one or both of the following happen: 1) The United States gets directly involved, and/or 2) strategic weapons are used. The Europeans are not going to be willing to sacrifice their vast social programs for a massive defense build up. I think everyone realizes this, and I think the recent election results in multiple countries there make this point.
You are complaining, I think, about the style here. An argument in the Oval Office. Well, the United States is the main reason that Russia, after its disastrous and frankly juvenile attempt at an invasion, hasn't been able to gain additional territory after the war went into the defensive. Let me repeat that: The United States is the reason this war is still on-going. And as a result of this fact, The United States is the one that gets to dictate terms.
>>The Europeans are not going to be willing to sacrifice their vast social programs for a massive defense build up.
I think you might be very surprised about that, countries on the eastern end of the EU look ready to make that trade without hesitation, as they were invaded by Russia in the past themselves and can understand the risks. Poland is already at 5% GDP spending on defence, and by all indications that number will only grow. That's war-like levels of spending.
> countries on the eastern end of the EU look ready to make that trade without hesitation
I don't think so, there already are populist opposition parties in most of these countries that want 1. their country to be more pro-RU 2. to keep the welfare state for their populist supporters going
As someone who is from one of those countries - I don't see that at all. In fact I'd say that the national mood is such that if we were attacked the nation would overwhelmingly support going to war with Russia with or without NATO support.
That's the rub, isn't it. The bluster about willingness to face Moscow in a war is all because of Article V and the assumption that the Americans will come and participate in a nuclear exchange.
Yes, the US gets to try to force a Ukrainian surrender, we're all complaining that's a grossly immoral use of power. I don't think the Ukrainians are going to go along with it yet.
The Ukrainian terms are "all of the land back plus Crimea".
Do you understand that this does not happen without the following: massive American mobilization, 2/75 or the whole of the Ranger Battalions jumping, all US Armor units deploying to Eastern Europe, all of 4th, 5th, 6th, and honestly 7th fleet re-deploying to the Med for support operations. A massive amount of U.S. casualties.
Is this doable? No doubt. I am out of the Army, but a lot of my boys are still in, and they would love to do a peer fight instead of whatever it was we did in Afghanistan.
But I will be the adult here and point out that this is stupid.
What Ukraine needs and wants is a mechanism of a security guarantee that actually works (whether it's foreign troops stabilizing the eastern areas forever or get back enough nukes to keep Russia away). This is a life-or-death question to Ukraine because without plausible and enforceable security there will not be a Ukraine.
Ukraine can certainly give up their now rump states of Donetsk/Lugansk plus Crimea if they were getting something like that in exchange. But until there is even a remote possibility for such security all they have is their terms of getting all their land back. If Ukraine now agreed to "peace" where they give up the land to stop the war then they would have to deal even further in order to gain enough security to prevent the next war from ever happening.
1. Yes I know, the average age of the Ukrainian conscript is 45, which is why I referenced that number.
2. The “so what” is that it’s pretty hard to argue that the war is an existential event if you are not drafting the portion of the population best able to make war (young men).
Ukraine is desperate. It's (currently) a war of attrition, it keeps going until one side suffers too much and can't replace stuff. Each side has constantly shifting limiting factors.
This is also why we've seen multiple headlines about Russia running out of stuff: they did run out of some things, then shifted to other stuff and ran out of that, then shifted to other stuff… — Ukraine has a shortage of both guns and young people right now.
I don't agree how you would need so many forces or have many casualties given Russia is struggling right now even with Ukranians.
A no fly-zone alone would greatly diminish Russian capabilites, of which the West could easily do given the dire state of the Russian Air Force and their AAD. After that it's just a point it's a just mopping up any artillery duels and then letting the Ukranians advance in.
I know that it feels like the military situation is like that. In reality Russia is much weaker than people think. Three years of war will do that to a country.
All that is needed is sanctions and enough resources for Ukraine to defend itself. And the military intelligence as a force multiplier.
Thats exactly what we have been providing. And it was working. Russian inflation is a 20%+. They are running out of soviet era equipment. They are running out of easily conscriptable men. All of this is documented using open sources.
All that was needed was time. Time for Russia to implode.
But democracy is a fickle thing, and Putin was counting on this. America will have to live with this period of infamy for a long time. And the world will suffer the consequences.
Since the war began I've been hearing both that Russia is weak and about to collapse, and also that if the United States doesn't directly intervene the Russians will drive tanks into Berlin by Christmas. If they are as weak as you say they are, and I'm inclined to agree, then Europe can handle this, yes?
I never said they were pushovers. Just that they were weaker than people thought.
It is clear that Europe would have more difficulty going it alone, since it does not dispose of the intelligence assets that the US has. Spy satellites, SIGINT planes, logistics, etc. Having to go it alone would clearly also impact the morale and thus the political will. But if Putin would decide to invade for example Poland, there is no doubt how he would fare.
But from an industrial and economics point of view there is no comparing. Contrary to what mr Trump has been saying, Europe has paid for more than half of the expenses so far. The overall defense budget of Europe was 217B$ in 2019 and has been steadily increasing to 258B$ in 2021 [1]. For 2024 it is at 326B$ [2]
Compare that with Russia that had a 184B$ budget this year [3]. And that is whilst being on a war footing.
Also. Let's not forget that the US, together with the EU (and Russia) offered security guarantees to Ukraine, in return for them giving their nukes to Russia (since that was making everyone anxious). Our support for them is not some sort of "gift" out of the goodness of our hearts. It is a solemn promise that we made, in return for our peace of mind. Surely the US is not the sort of country that does not honor it's commitments, but backs down when the going gets tough?
You mean a memo, with no enforcement mechanism and no treaty stipulations. There were no guarantees involved. Everyone understood this at the time but for whatever reason that particular piece of paper comes up time and again and it gets equated with actual binding treaties. It was not.
I understand what you’re saying but appeals about “solemn promise[s]” comes across as emotional blackmail and, for Americans at least, doesn’t have the same rhetorical weight anymore.
Man this "Russia is running out of XXX" tale is becoming quite old and not being taken seriously nowadays - year by year goes with the same narrative and it's only getting objectively worse for Ukraine...
Any single force that drops a nuke today [1] will get retaliated by _all_ the other nuclear powers, even allied ones, at once.
Why? Because that will be the only, short moment, where each other will have the single opportunity to:
1/ affirm they are able and disciplined to use it (credibility),
2/ disarm the offender (own security)
3/ reinstate the balance of mutual dissuasion (global security)
Playing it diplomatic would be a hint of either submission, fear, or incapacity to act against the offender - which none of the nuclear power would want to give.
And however strong, a country can defend against one strategic attack, not against a multisided one.
[1] doesn't matter what the target is: as soon as it's another country, you're toast.
You're saying you believe the response to Russia dropping a nuke on Ukraine would itself be nuclear in nature? There's no way anyone would do that, it would trigger a nuclear WWIII. No nuclear power (Russia or the others) would just sit by and let a nuke get dropped on their own head. They would immediately escalate back.
That’s exactly the doctrine in mutual dissuasion: offensive use of a nuclear weapon breaks the statu quo, where the equilibrium is only ensured if no one uses it.
The first that breaks the statu quo is not a reliable power anymore in this equilibrium and must then be disarmed.
Multilateral escalation ensues as a logic step. There’s no WWIII because this happens and is « settled » in a matter of a few hours.
Don’t want it to happen? Don’t ever use a nuclear weapon. Simple as that.
I still don't follow why the first response has to be nuclear. You could respond conventionally, and if another nuke gets used 1-2 more times, then escalate. You can get the point across without actually responding in kind the first time.
Because it’s a matter of both time (if you don’t react definitely, that means that you may have the weapons but not the discipline to use it, so no credibility), and deterrence (conventional destruction is not a deterrent in this case, and you will only refrain from using your nukes if your are confident that the response will be more nukes towards you - in which case, your initial military objective is void, because the consequence of your action is that you don’t exist anymore).
I'm sorry, I still don't follow. Both of those just sound incorrect on their face.
> if you don’t react definitely, that means that you may have the weapons but not the discipline to use it, so no credibility
You can react "definitely" with conventional weapons. I don't get it. If for some reason you really think they won't get the message that your threat is credible, you could even run a nuclear test somewhere. I see no reason why you have to perform a nuclear attack here.
> conventional destruction is not a deterrent in this case
Sure it is. Destroying/disabling your enemy's nuclear facilities would jeopardize their security, no matter how it's done -- which is absolutely a deterrent. If anything, doing so with conventional weapons should make your enemy worry more, not less.
> and you will only refrain from using your nukes if your are confident that the response will be more nukes towards you - in which case, your initial military objective is void, because the consequence of your action is that you don’t exist anymore
> I see no reason why you have to perform a nuclear attack here.
You reason like a person here, not as a state.
It’s not a matter of life and death for a few single individuals in a triangle. It is of millions of individuals at once, and whole countries.
You do not want to leave the option of a potential other nuclear attack, the scale of the damage is nothing comparable. You do not want the statu quo to be broken, to have been broken. The fact is was shows that the state in front of you (which triggered the initial nuke) effectively lost its sound mind. There is a single solution to that, however brutal it is. And that’s the perspective of this single solution that is at the core of the deterrence: if you shoot, you have the absolute guarantee that you’ll be dead in return. So you don’t shoot.
If there is no such guarantee of retaliation, you have no incentive not to use it.
> It’s not a matter of life and death for a few single individuals in a triangle. It is of millions of individuals at once, and whole countries.
OK, I think this is why we disagree -- because this isn't the scenario I was positing. I was thinking of a case where a "small" (tactical) nuke would get dropped during battle on military forces, to get them to stop fighting. Not a strategic nuke in a population center actually trying to kill millions of people. Those will provoke very different responses in my mind, and I don't think the strategic case is likely. The tactical case is what I'm not so sure Russia will shy away from.
It’s been made very clear to them by the OTAN (https://www.nato.int/cps/fr/natohq/topics_192648.htm?selecte... ) that it was the red line before a « fundamentally change the nature of the conflict ». That’s the diplomatic way to say: you want to nuke? Just try it, something might happen to you, fast.
China also discouraged Russia to use it, even small ones.
The OTAN capacity may seem reduced without the USA, but escalation is very much more likely since Europeans realize/accept that Russia only speaks/understands « strong language ». They got the memo several times from the US that appeasement seems not to be a working response at this time.
> It’s been made very clear to them by the OTAN that it was the red line before a «fundamentally change the nature of the conflict».
"Fundamental change in the nature of the conflict" sounds to me more like "you will now be fighting NATO", not "NATO will immediately retaliate with its own nuclear weapons." And even if they did mean what you're saying, I don't see NATO or any member following through with this.
To be clear, I don't think anyone's use of nuclear weapons is likely. I'm just saying that if Russia ends up in a situation where its only avenue for "winning" ends up being the use of nuclear weapons, I wouldn't be surprised if it actually uses one.
Note that NATO talks about the « nature », not the « scope » or region of the conflict.
I don’t think nuclear is likely either. Because of the deterrence.
But again, if Russia thinks its only way of winning is firing a nuke, I do believe they will not have the time to be disappointed about their miscalculation.
Because the retaliation is a no-brainer (and again, the scenarios have been discussed and examined for decades, and the procedures are all ready to run).
It will not be about only Russia/Ukraine or Russia/NATO afterwise but about the whole world doctrine on nuclear arsenals and their use.
If we're scared of that why don't the US surrender.
If that's the fundamental issue, everyone needs nukes, every small country.
You don't want that. Living in a small Scandinavian country, I.do think we should at least discuss it now. We can't win any war, but we could ensure nobody else can.
Whatever makes you think they're able to drop a nuke? They have tried to threaten with that by running trials and the tally is two out of three times there was a catastrophic failure, of which one failure was in the silo itself.
Because they don't want to start a nuclear war. It's really as straightforward as that. If we assume they are willing to go for a nuclear exchange then it's a different kind of conversation, but no military expert considers this a likely scenario.
But even Russians indicate that their mid range ballistic missiles don't need nuclear wareheads to cause untold destruction - it was Putin who said that even without nukes their new missiles can level a city. He seems pretty confident in that, despite western intelligence indicating that the missiles are most likely a bluff as they are barely operational.
That's not what military experts are saying. If the nuclear fallout reached NATO countries NATO policy would require a "proportional" response, which again, military experts suggest would be a small scale nuclear strike on a Russian facility of proportional impact. The big question then is what would happen next - either both sides cool down and see where this is going, or Russia starts attacking targets within NATO at which point we're at full WW3 level. The "nobody is going to drop a nuke back" is either extremely optimistic or extremely naive.
Keep in mind article 5 says "react as it deems necessary".
> will assist the Party or Parties so attacked by taking forthwith, individually and in concert with the other Parties, such action as it deems necessary
If Poland triggers Article 5, just because fallout came to its borders, other members are free to send them iodine tablets and lead tents, rather than starting WW3.
Again, the point is - at that point we're guessing. If Poland gets radioactive fallout on its terittory we don't know how exactly NATO would choose to react.
>>It's not a start nuclear Armageddon article.
I didn't say it was - but Russia "dropping a nuke" brings us closer to the possibility of nuclear war, not futher away from it. And according to people who are actually working with/for NATO, military generals in eastern european countries, it is not completely unlikely that NATO would decide that a strike into Russia(nuclear or not) wouldn't be off the cards if Russian nuclear strike on Ukraine brought fallout into NATO countries - and if such a strike was conducted, we don't know how that ends.
While Poland can trigger Article 5, and current US admin will most likely tell them to shove it, maybe deploy some forces there. US weakening ties with EU is going to make nuclear war less likely.
Even if the next US president was very gung ho about it, the fact that Trump got elected again means the US isn't a stable partner. You don't want to enter a ten years war where every 4 years your ally might just decide to leave you hanging.
> you really wanna weigh your odds of nuclear devastation on a guess?
No. But my point is you are oversimplifying it. Article 5 isn't a go to war button.
If Poland was to consider it an attack, that's not important. The question is would other members consider it an attack. To that the answer would more likely to be no.
I don't know of an adjacent country going to war because wind blew the fallout/chems its way.
> other non-EU countries are already producing Nukes as preparation. I'm unsure about that.
It could be US divestment leads to lower chance of WW3 in 5-20 years, but greater chance of WW3 in 20+ years.
>>I don't know of an adjacent country going to war because wind blew the fallout/chems its way.
You remind me of a semi-famous study that the American army did at one point. They wanted to estimate the risk of accidental detonation of a nuclear weapon, and concluded that the risk is zero because it never happened so far.
> They wanted to estimate the risk of accidental detonation of a nuclear weapon, and concluded that the risk is zero because it never happened so far.
Given it didn't happen so far, I'd say they were right on the money.
While mishandling and accidents did happen, the number of failsafes guarantees you have to purposefully activate it. Most nuclear weapons nowadays just don't have a way to reach criticality outside of nano-second controlled timing array.
> military experts suggest would be a small scale nuclear strike on a Russian facility of proportional impact
You could attack those facilities with conventional weapons too. What would be the point of using nukes to achieve the same purpose? All it would do is to make it more likely they'd escalate back.
on the contrary, even China would retaliate. It's the american equivalent of going into a texas bar and shooting a clip. You are now a proven reckless danger to everyone else and they will retaliate at once in your direction, regardless of if you were being stupid or had a specific target.
They do that because the alternative is a shootout at everone and many people in the bar will die. No single person/country is going to take those odds in an era where there are thousands of nuclear warheads now.
Yes. Because resorting to nuclear weaponry is very specific.
Doing so, you break the statu quo on mutual dissuasion, and not one nuclear power wants that.
If one country drops a nuclear bomb (especially after a long escalation as we are in), other nuclear powers will _have to_ reinstate the previous dissuasion statu quo, as well as assert their status of equal nuclear powers.
And there's a single path to that: radically disarm the offender country, as soon as possible. There's indeed a risk of global nuclear war, but the most probable risk is the annihilation of the offender country + a few other casualities.
The scale of time in this matter is not in days, it's in a few hours at most: it's already been scripted in procedures for years, rehearsed, and it's already been shared among nuclear powers. If we're still able to discuss it, it's because of this doctrine of mutual dissuasion precisely.
And what about the longer term? No one wants to commit to this fight, how much worse is it next time? What lesson does Putin learn when he can take Ukraine? Because even if he only takes part of it on paper, he’ll end up with the whole lot. That’s what the mineral “deal” with the US really is - it’s a bribe: “when we’re in control, you’ll still get the minerals”.
How stable will the world be when Russia wins, Putin is able to rebuild, and then they want somewhere else?
You tell me, which fight is more winnable? This one or the next one?
we all remember how trustworthy his words were right before the full scale invasion: UK intelligence services warned in public about Russian tanks, supplies etc amassing near the Ukrainian border, warning about what looks like preparations for invasion.
What did the Russians claim?
"Nyet invasion, just some push-ups next to border!"
So far in 3 years of war the US has, for something like <10% of their military budget, destroyed a huge chunk of Russian military capabilities, without having to set a single US boot on the ground or losing a single US citizen. On purely selfish terms, that's an undeniably great investment.
But it's not only that. The US has an immense amount of soft power that it squanders if it completely mistreats, and even blackmails, its own allies — which it is doing right now — to appease hostile powers like Russia.
So with that being said:
It's ridiculous to jump to "we're gonna have to deploy x y and z batallions" when the US administration is not even doing the BARE MINIMUM, many tiers below that: they are publicly praising Putin and berating Zelensky. So it's pointless to talk as if this was about direct military intervention when in fact even soft diplomacy is going to the way of appeasement.
Part of the issue with tech people discussing this is that they assume there is a tech solution to "human meat sacks are needed in order to control a geography". There isn't, at least not yet or anytime soon.
>massive American mobilization, 2/75 or the whole of the Ranger Battalions jumping, all US Armor units deploying to Eastern Europe, all of 4th, 5th, 6th, and honestly 7th fleet re-deploying to the Med for support operations. A massive amount of U.S. casualties.
You did not take note that the Russian military is collapsing: they need north corean soldiers to come to keep up. They need Iranian drones to keep up.
Russia has NO defensive capacity left on either other borders, neither internally.
Putin, as well as Trump play it like they have a strong hand because they know they don’t really have it and they are scared others would notice it.
It is not immoral, it is amoral. There is no moral in geopolitics and international relations.
The US are not doing anything new. It's just that Trump's style is very "in your face" and that the public have been fed so much BS about "good", "moral", "democracy", etc in international relations that they actually believe it.
It's just as irrelevant as saying that state of individual cells is something you should ignore when establishing diagnostics of a herd.
There's a difference between low pondering and null influence within equations. And if the complexity of the phenomenon exceeds what we can forecast relevantly with equations, then pretending that we know which factor will have significant role all along the development of the situation and which are meaningless is not acting with much sagacity.
It's not a narrative. It's really a statement of fact and very relevant. That's how it works: countries act to further their interests whatever the "moral" might be.
The US, like other countries, have sacrificed tens of thousands of people or more, even entire countries, in pursuit of interests amd broader objectives, for instance.
OK, if we can dictate terms, let's tell both sides to be at peace... and while we're at it, Russia should join NATO, and let's get a side of Freedom Fries. ;-)
I understand that you are joking, but part of the problem with how people talk about this issue is that they are either not serious (you) or are imagining that this conflict is similar to things they have seen in a Marvel comic book movie (most of the rest of this thread).
I feel like that's how most people talk about most issues these days. I blame the comic book movies. Alongside a host of other innocuous looking factors that add up to the total disempowerment of the individual. The hell can any of us do, other than...?
It's exactly for those reasons. Just google Putin's speech in Munich's security conference. First, note in what year it has happened and then just listen to his speech, it isn't even long.
I will listen to it, but first tell me - are you suggesting that Russia is an autocratic oligarchy where any dissent is immediately crushed because Russia wasn't allowed into NATO? If it was in NATO, it would suddenly have fair democratic elections?
No, I'm not suggesting that at all, but oligarchy and lack of democracy mostly hurts the country in internal politics, not external. The war would just not have happened. As for how bad the oligarchy in Russia is now / would be (if it joined NATO) - it's no one's business but the Russians'.
The thing is - you might be right. Or you might be completely wrong - these discussions happened almost 30 years ago - even if Russia was allowed into NATO when it was originally planned, its descent into autocracy might have caused it to be kicked out, or it might have left on its own accord. Or it might have decided to attack Ukraine anyway, even while itself still in NATO. I wouldn't be so hasty to declare that if only Russia was let into NATO 30 years ago this war wouldn't have happened - we don't know.
I'm sorry, but that makes no sense to me. An attack has to have very strong reasons, as any attack is very costly, no oligarch would spend money for no reason.
So they would seek some gain then, right?
What could an oligarch possibly gain from starting a war with an allied neighboring country?
And why doesn't U.S. attack other NATO members now?
Surely it has (and had) as much oligarchy (if not more) as Russia has. (I hope you won't argue it doesn't? Since even something as ridiculous as the fact of having lobbying being absolutely legal - just can't coexist with the lack of oligarchs quite by nature/definition).
> And why doesn't U.S. attack other NATO members now?
They are. Commercially first. Through technology second (the dependance of the world upon US software and hardware technology is the perfect kill switch - and the scale and pace at which we are going to need to get out of it is immense now that it is intimately tied to our professional and personal lives... but we have no choice).
And they might go further if those firsts are not enough.
It is not a matter of concurrence. The European market is going to be a closed, dead market to US technology.
We in Europe would never have invested so massively to rely on USSR or post-2008 Russia software/hardware tech, for obvious reasons
But we did on USA tech, for obvious reasons too (common history and values, democracies, multiple war allies, cooperation, and... US used to be the beacon of progress and freedom), that have all been brutally thrown out.
"An attack has to have very strong reasons, as any attack is very costly, no oligarch would spend money for no reason."
So why did this current attack start? It's been 3 years and there's a dozen theories as to why exactly, there is no "strong reason" anywhere to be seen.
"What could an oligarch possibly gain from starting a war with an allied neighboring country?"
Again, why is Russia in Ukraine then? They went from being brethren to portraying Ukrainians as fascist scum that need to be exterminated. Why is that?
"And why doesn't U.S. attack other NATO members now?"
Because it has more to gain by not doing so.
Again - I really can't see how you can confidently say that if only Russia was let into NATO 30 years ago this current situation wouldn't have happened.
> So why did this current attack start? It's been 3 years and there's a dozen theories as to why exactly, there is no "strong reason" anywhere to be seen.
> Again, why is Russia in Ukraine then?
The strong reason for this attack was Russia's security concerns got ignored and stepped on by a military alliance (NATO).
The military alliance that claims Russia to be their most probable enemy and thus a military alliance AGAINST Russia.
The military alliance first broke some spoken agreement with Russian of non-expansion of said military alliance. Then did that again and again to the point where NATO wanted to advance in its expansion so much far as to the neighboring country to Russia.
This is simply not acceptable for Russia, so it had to prevent that expansion, which it did. It could only be done by force, if the other side refused to drop possibilities of joining NATO. They didn't drop them - they got invaded for demilitarization. They resist - they die. The ones who don't resist (civilians) - aren't targeted at all (however, in a war there are always casualties among civilians).
> They went from being brethren to portraying Ukrainians as fascist scum that need to be exterminated. Why is that?
Because that's what Ukrainian officials policy was towards Russian natives living on their land and daring to speak their native Russian language.
> I really can't see how you can confidently say that if only Russia was let into NATO 30 years ago this current situation wouldn't have happened.
How is that not clear? If Russia would be part of NATO - it would have 0 security concerns of NATO expanding up to its borders. If there would be no security concerns - it wouldn't start the special operation, there simply would be no reason to, as Ukraine would probably in that case be a part of NATO as well (as well as Belarus and probably Kazakhstan and some other ex-USSR *stans)! Just that simple.
> The strong reason for this attack was Russia's security concerns got ignored and stepped on by a military alliance (NATO).
If it were a simple individual somehow escalating to nation state level, I could understand them being initially forced to use deception, but not so for an entity that is already a nation state. Especially not so for a nuclear nation state!
Right before the outbreak of the full scale war (ignoring ~2014), Western intelligence services observed troops, tanks, military materiel amassing on the Russian / Ukranian border. In an attempt to dissuade Russia from invading the UK intelligence services decided to predict Russia's invasion publicly.
Russia repeatedly claimed "Nyet, nyet, no invasion, just some push-ups next to border!"
If a nuclear power were acting on existential security concerns, the last thing it would do is hide the connection to security concerns and pretend just doing some push-ups on border.
To me this invalidates this whole theory of yours and imcritic
>>This is simply not acceptable for Russia, so it had to prevent that expansion, which it did. It could only be done by force, if the other side refused to drop possibilities of joining NATO
Russia can't and shouldn't have any say in what pact or alliance a sovereign country on their border wants to join. They have no right to. And well done preventing NATO expansion - where now thanks to their actions NATO did expand right to their border. Really 4-dimensional chess play guys.
>>The ones who don't resist (civilians) - aren't targeted at all
Yes I'm sure all these bombs falling on Ukrainian hospitals are just targeting errors.
> The strong reason for this attack was Russia's security concerns got ignored and stepped on by a military alliance (NATO).
If it were a simple individual somehow escalating to nation state level, I could understand them being initially forced to use deception, but not so for an entity that is already a nation state. Especially not so for a nuclear nation state!
Right before the outbreak of the full scale war (ignoring ~2014), Western intelligence services observed troops, tanks, military materiel amassing on the Russian / Ukranian border. In an attempt to dissuade Russia from invading the UK intelligence services decided to predict Russia's invasion publicly.
Russia repeatedly claimed "Nyet, nyet, no invasion, just some push-ups next to border!"
If a nuclear power were acting on existential security concerns, the last thing it would do is hide the connection to security concerns and pretend just doing sonme push-ups on border.
To me this invalidates this whole theory of yours and imcritic
That's a convenient narrative but it overlooks the desire to prevent normalization of hostile takeovers.
Russia tried to pretend that its satellite states and NATO were similar arrangements (with the latter thus being under US control), because that would make it seem like they were on even ground.
To the extent it ends up being true, it will be due to Russia's influence (conveniently allied with others' authoritarian tendencies).
The strong reason for this attack was Russia's security concerns got ignored and stepped on by a military alliance (NATO).
NATO is a defensive pact. Putin invaded Ukraine because he wants their port, arable land, and because he wants to go down in history as "reuniting" the Russian empire. Also, Russia has wanted to exterminate the Ukrainian cultural identity, which they've tried to do since before the Soviet Union:
Putin's whining about NATO is pure bullshit propaganda. Just like his claims of Nazis in Ukraine. It's all fiction, where he writes Russia as the victim.
There are Russian nationals that live in almost all the countries all around the world. So that's not bonkers, the logic is sound.
Now what's important is when some region has mere fractures of a percent vs when its something like 25%. If your country has 25% Russians and you oppress them - I think Russia has obligation to defend them.
That's exactly what it is and I have no idea what sort of insane, convoluted logic you use to come up with any other idea.
but then it turns out that its arms can be used OUTSIDE of that block
Ohhhh, I see. You believe that defending from an invading force means that you can't attack anything beyond the border? So Russia could just build an ammunition factory right across the border and Ukraine is somehow morally bound not to attack it? Completely insane.
> A defensive pact provides weapons to a country defending itself. What is so hard to understand?
Whom was Ukraine defending by killing people in its own Donbass and Lugansk regions? Surely not the people living there, as the bullets and rockets were flying towards them from Ukrainian soldiers.
> Not to mention that actual NATO countries are afraid that Putin won't stop on Ukraine
It looks like it's better if they in fact fear that. Less wars that way. If only they stayed neutral, not anti-Russia. But no, they all wanted to provoke the bear for some reason.
Well, hear it roar now.
> Dude you need to lay off Russian propaganda for a minute. But you know what really happens? Russia forcibly issuing native Ukrainians with Russian passports to say "look these are russian citizens now, we need to defend them!" and kidnapping Ukrainian children to forcibly integrate them into Russian society. Not to mention all of the murder and rape, but that's standard fare for the Russian army.
Dude, you need to lay off Ukrainian propaganda for a minute. But you know what really happens? Russia gives money, homes and jobs to the people that voluntarily agree to relocate to it. No one is forces to. And there are lots of reports from those people being thankful to Russia and condemning Kyiv and Zelensky, because what in fact happened is that it was Kyiv that either targeted those civilians or used them as a shield (lots of videos of Ukrainian combatants taking positions right next to houses full of civilians).
How can anyone forcibly issue a passport to someone? Just try to think from time to time. Children get evacuated to safe zones. Of course the safes zones are in Russia now, but no one is held prisoner/captive - they are free to move wherever they like whenever they like. You just painted a humanitarian mission as terrorists kidnapping children. That's just disgusting.
> Yes, Azov batallions were a huge problem in Ukraine.....and they got completely eliminated and people put behind bars before the original 2014 invasion.
Lol what? Who eliminated them? Could you give a few links to the news where Ukrainian officials imprisoned any Azov combatants for their nazism and nazist swastika tattoos?
As far as I know - they were mostly killed in battles between 2014 and now by separatists and Russians. Ukraine never reprimanded any of their nazi battalions for wearing swastikas. They never prohibited their 'trezubets' (trident) SS nazi symbol of that battalion and nazi 'black sun' symbol (that is just quite common among nazis, not especially Ukrainian ones).
Please don't cross into personal attack, no matter how wrong someone else is or you feel they are. Also, if you could please avoid name-calling and flamebait in your posts here, we'd appreciate it - you've been doing quite a bit of that as well, unfortunately.
>>But no, they all wanted to provoke the bear for some reason.
Maybe the bear should stay within its borders. No one provoked Russia to do anything.
>>How can anyone forcibly issue a passport to someone? Just try to think from time to time.
You deny them any services until they apply for a Russian passport as again, we know happened.
>>Russia gives money, homes and jobs to the people that voluntarily agree to relocate to it. No one is forces to. And there are lots of reports from those people being thankful to Russia and condemning Kyiv and Zelensk
You're free to gaslight yourself into believing this along with the rest of complete lunacy in your post.
>>Children get evacuated to safe zones.
If you think this is what happens you're drinking the Russian cool aid swallowing the straw along with it.
Could you please stop posting in the flamewar style like this (in addition to not posting personal attacks, as I've asked elsewhere - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43224164)?
It's not what this site is for, and destroys what it is for.
1. NATO, while being openly hostile towards Russia (you may read the current NATO's doctrine where Russia is named as the #1 probable enemy of NATO), attempted to expand to Ukraine, which is just not acceptable (to Russia) at all.
2. Russian nationals (and Russian speaking Ukrainian nationals) got oppressed in Ukraine, but that happened mostly as a result of the division of country into two parts where one was pro-Russian and the other was pro-West (EU, NATO).
I don't think the 2nd reason would even occur, since if Russia was in NATO - it would rather even seek Ukraine then joining it too. There would be no 'maidans' (coups) in Ukraine, there would be no division of the country and thus the oppression of Russian nationals (and Russian speaking Ukrainian nationals) just wouldn't have taken place then.
I think the conflicts concerning Russia then would rather shift towards Middle East (like Turkey having some beef with Russia over who supports whom in Iran, Palestine, Israel and so on) and maybe towards China/India.
> NATO, while being hostile towards Russia attempted to expand to Ukraine, which is just not acceptable at all.
That literally didn't happen. Ukraine and Georgia sought NATI membership, and in the 2008 NATO summit were (largely at Russia’s urging) rebuffed from being given Membership Action Plans; Russia immediately invaded Georgia, and Ukraine abandoned pursuit of NATO membership.
Then, in 2014, the Ukrainian people threw out the pro-Russian leadership that had come to power in the interim. Russia invaded large swathes of the country and, after that, Ukraine’s government again started seeking NATO membership.
There were no approaches by either side being made before the invasion. Pro-Russian propagandists like to pretend the 2022 escalation was the initial Russian invasion, ignoring most of the time the war has been being fought, so that they can blame the war starting on Ukraine’s response to the invasion by which Russia actually started the war.
Nobody gave the slightest fuck about Russia. Even the annexation of Crimea and the proxy war in the Donbas was mostly ignored.
There was ZERO chance of Ukraine joining NATO. Do you really think that Hungary, Germany, Slovakia..... would vote for Ukraine membership while there are still disputes in the Donbas and about Crimea?
@2) Sure, and Hitler also only saved the Sudetendeutschen.....
Putin himself said 2002 that he would have no problems with Ukraine joining NATO:
“I am absolutely convinced that Ukraine will not shy away from the processes of expanding interaction with NATO and the Western allies as a whole. Ukraine has its own relations with NATO; there is the Ukraine-NATO Council. At the end of the day the decision [on Ukraine joining NATO] is to be made by NATO and Ukraine. It is a matter for those two partners.”
Considering that Trump now, all but disbanded NATO there should be no more reason for further Russian attacks, no?
But really, just read and watch Russian media, listen to their politicians. The aggressive imperial aim is very open, transparent and also accepted by the people.
It really is tiring listening to the Russian apologetics coming from other posters in this thread.
"Russia felt threatened"
No. Nobody wants to invade Russia.
The deal since the end of the cold war has been this: Russia can do whatever the hell it likes inside its own borders. Its oligarchs with Putin at the front can rob and pillage the country to their hearts content. Putin can use his loyal FSB to suppress the opposition, rig elections, and dominate the domestic media and brainwash his population to believe whatever he want them to believe. The rest of the world will do no more about this than hand out tiny wrist slaps, while holding their noses and trading with Russia. They kept their seat in the UN security council. They were invited into G7. They were treated as an equal to larger, richer, liberal, democracies.
The only reason there is war in Ukraine is because this incredibly generous deal was not enough for Putin and his ilk, they wanted more. More influence, more power, more vassals. They want to restore the mythical glory of the Russian empire, or the Soviet empire, or both. They want all the territories that Russia has ever held dominion over. Getting control over Ukraine would have given that dream a big territory, population, and economical boost.
Are you Russian top military executive or a president of Russia?
No? Then don't speak what Russia did or did not feel.
> No. Nobody wants to invade Russia.
Then don't name Russia as the most probable enemy in your militaristic charts in your military alliance that keeps on expanding beyond reasonable limits.
And don't expand your military alliance that close to Russia's borders.
> The deal since the end of the cold war has been this: Russia can do whatever the hell it likes inside its own borders.
The other side of the deal was NATO not getting any expansions packs. But oh, shoot, it just slipped and happened to expand to... how many countries since Soviet Union got dissolved? ah?
Destroying Soviet Union was not enough for the West and so it wants a piece of Russia now? If you think so - then come and die in Ukraine, you are welcome there.
“I am absolutely convinced that Ukraine will not shy away from the processes of expanding interaction with NATO and the Western allies as a whole. Ukraine has its own relations with NATO; there is the Ukraine-NATO Council. At the end of the day the decision [on Ukraine joining NATO] is to be made by NATO and Ukraine. It is a matter for those two partners.”
Why should nations be beholden to verbal agreements that were never ratified by their elected officials, between parties that didn't exist any more in the case of the Warshaw pact and whose legal successor nation official stated they had no problem with it.
Thats silly.
Should NATO have never had any talks with Russia about a possible NATO membership because of that verbal agreement with the leader of the Warshaw Pact Gorbachev?
That was in 2002, when it looked like after years of cold war U.S. and Russia can finally become good allies. That was before U.S. along with a group of other (mostly NATO) countries invaded Iraq in 2003 without any mandate in U.N. and which Russia has opposed to and before the invasion of Libya in 2011, before U.S. carried out Arab Spring in 2010-2012 and before U.S. carried out colour revolutions, especially Rose Revolution in Georgia in 2003 and... Orange Revolution in Ukraine in 2004.
It is not a secret at all that U.S. carried those out and then it became quite clear that U.S. installs marionette regimes here and there and one of the places was... Ukraine.
Right after all those Russo-American relations going up, up and up merely some years ago.
Russia didn't like being stabbed in the back at all.
You can't really bring non binding, non serious agreements that were never put in writing or ratified and that all parties declared no longer relevant back from the dead and feign moral outrage. That's ridiculous.
What does "legally binding" do good at all? There are no other laws other than the rule of the strength.
U.S. was strong for a long time. It did whatever it liked.
Now Russia restored some of its strength to the point it can show others that sometimes you have to listen to when a bear warns you (quite calmly and nicely first).
Many people (even Americans) claim U.S. is not a democracy. Every country has corruption to some degree. The only backing and staying power there is - is the force a country has and its willingness to use it to defend something.
Easily imaginable: every country with big enough nuclear arsenal could be viewed as a country holding the fate of the world in its hands.
But since there can be multiple such countries at the same time and since no one has stopped developing arms/tech even further - I wouldn't call it a paradox when one nuclear country feels threatened by another group of both nuclear and non-nuclear countries coming closer and closer to its borders.
The difference between a rational person and a narcissist is this: one recognizes the sufficiency of world-destroying power, the other will always demand more, regardless of the absurdity.
NATO is the "Keep Russia At Bay Club". Why on Earth do you think it would welcome Russia into it!? That's like the Neighbourhood Watch letting the local criminal gangs join.
There's a reason Sweden and Finland joined NATO recently.
Because if it provided the resources that were requested from the start Russian offensive would have been pushed out of the country 2 years ago. America(and most European countries too, to be fair) sat on their hands for ages before approving actual military aid. Famous thing about Germany sending helmets while other countries were sending tanks etc.
But also because if JD Vance wasn't such insufferable prick without an ounce of tact there's a good chance the agreement yesterday would have been signed. That is not Ukrainian fault, it's 100% the fault of current American administration.
Letting your interests always go last, and letting people who depend on you and have worked against you(remember Zelenski campaigned against Trump), demand things and reproach you in public, is not tact.
The one who lacked tact was Zelenski, not Vance. As Trump said, "You're in no position to dictate what we're gonna feel."
As for aid, the arrogance in assuming the aid was mandatory and failing to give what you want the way you want is wrong and evil, does not endear people to aid you.
And besides, any delays in aid had a much lesser effect than the EU countries buying russian gas at exorbitant prices. The sanctions imposed were immediately sabotaged by buying russian gas.
As for aid, the arrogance in assuming the aid was mandatory and failing to give what you want the way you want is wrong and evil,
This is insane. He's been constantly begging and thanking the US for support for years. At no point has he even come close to "assuming the aid was mandatory".
To claim that Zelenski lacked tact while Vance did not is similarly nuts. Anyone who watched the video would understand that.
Some of the spending actually is mandatory, because it was passed and apportioned by Congress (but may not have been dispersed yet), and I think Zelensky can be forgiven for having some level of expectations on more aid given the bilateral security pact Biden signed last July and the overall glowing reception he gets in the press.
Hard disagree. The way he treated Zelenskyy who was their guest is unacceptable and completely tactless. He acted as if he was scolding Zelenskyy. The entire comment from Trump "look he dressed up!" was juvenile, showing zero respect. But then he called him a dictator not long ago so I don't know what I expected.
>>The sanctions imposed were immediately sabotaged by buying russian gas.
Because it wasn't possible for EU to stop buying it on a dime, not without letting its citizens freeze and go without electricity. You can argue that well, they should have gone cold if they care about it so much - I'd argue that the EU countries have stopped buying Russian gas and resources as soon as they possibly could.
>As for aid, the arrogance in assuming the aid was mandatory
That's not what I said - I said if the aid was provided when it was requested the war would have ended already.
Zelenskyy famously stopped wearing civilian suits, and is always wearing military-style clothes in public appearances to symbolise how he's defending his nation in a time of war. It's a reminder to other leaders that it's not just another trade deal, that this is a real shooting war and people are dying.
Trump hates this, and thinks it's disrespectful that Zelenskyy doesn't wear a suit when he comes to the US on official visits.
Trump generally can't stomach a real fight, and Zelenskyy can... visibly.
Hence the reaction from Trump. Zelenskyy made him feel shame through his mere dress, his shirt, so he had to do something or say something to feel in control again, to feel powerful.
>Zelenskyy famously stopped wearing civilian suits, and is always wearing military-style clothes in public appearances to symbolise how he's defending his nation in a time of war. It's a reminder to other leaders that it's not just another trade deal, that this is a real shooting war and people are dying.
>Trump hates this, and thinks it's disrespectful that Zelenskyy doesn't wear a suit when he comes to the US on official visits.
That's why they invited dress uniforms...the ones with the jackets and ties.
No, there's definitely no "dress code" in those circles.
A dress code is specifically something you impose to lower-ranking ones. That's why Trump did not like it, and why this journalist seemed upset: they couldn't bear that Zelenski was not submitting to their, very closed-minded WASP dress code for underlings.
When you're the head of state, or in power circles, there's something else, that's called a _dress standing_, which is different and opens a much wider area of possibilities.
And by that standard, boy, did Zelensky outfit outranked everyone else's in the office!
Yeah, no. Nothing in that discussion was tactful on America's side. This is oligarch's trying to gaslight, lie, and extort a country while getting cozy with an enemy they fought for decades. And their remarks were absolutely juvenile. THat's not how we treat allies (or at worst, ,enemy of an enemy).
I would also like to mention that quoting past military service in a discussion on geopolitics is boot as fuck. So is referring to your trade by it's ID number and not just it's name.
That would be incorrect. It refers to the embarassing shit people in the military do, typically right out of basic (boot camp). Everyone is a little bit boot in the beginning, you just learn to cut it out.
And no, the infantry aren't stupid. Thinking that qualifying as an Infantry Officer means your qualified to run the entire war is stupid.
You’re right, one should not need extensive ground combat experience or PhD level fluency on this topic to be equipped to identify that the war is in the defensive (my initial claim, still true), and changing the equilibrium requires a massive escalation from the United States (also still true). You can continue with your name calling, if you like.
Maritime power vs continental power [0]. Trump sees the world from a continental power viewpoint. In the recent past the West used to see, and operate, the world from maritime power point of view. Incidentally, China used to think like a maritime power as well - until Xi became president.
China trades with almost every country in the world-that is maritime power. Since Xi became president China is acting more like a continental power-looking at land expansion at the cost of trade. Granted China did not attack Taiwan yet. Hopefully Xi sees this folly and does not attack Taiwan.
Don't be. I'm neither American nor European, and from my vantage point this is far less America's (US) fault than it is Western Europe's. US has been asking Europe to increase defense spending for years now, and at the beginning of the war it was below 2% (Germany was spending 1.25% in 2018). Trump said this very publicly in during his first term, and he was ignored and mostly ridiculed. Same thing with the Gazprom deal.
Europe's defence should not be entirely on the American tax payer.
This is a simplistic, even childlike, view of the relationship between the US and Europe. The situation is the way it is because the US wanted it like that.
Statesman like Dean Acheson and George Marshall designed it this way.
To throw 75 years of relative peace and stability away because you feel it’s unfair? A world that revolves around American military, economic and cultural power, and uses the U.S. dollar as its reserve currency unfair? It galls me that small, arrogant, petty people with no notion of history are throwing all this away because they have a schoolyard understanding of fair and unfair.
Crimea was 10 years ago now. And Obama at that time didn't intervene, in fact he called on Europe to spend more on defense. Europe is much bigger (in population) and richer than Russia. This is a different situation than the cold war.
> This is a simplistic, even childlike, view of the relationship between the US and Europe. The situation is the way it is because the US wanted it...
People who do know history would tell you that you don't get peace by dismantling industrial and military capacity. To blame this on "because the US wanted it that way" is just naive. The US might have wanted it that way, but so what? It happened because it was easier to sell domestically compared to allocating hundreds of billions on say, 5th gen fighters.
> It galls me that small, arrogant, petty people with no notion of history are throwing all this away because they have a schoolyard understanding of fair and unfair.
Or maybe your ivory tower understanding simply ignores the realities of the working class people who voted for Trump to do away with these policies.
I've got to imagine this forum is officially compromised at this point with these style of posts on here?
I'm shocked by the level of pro-Russia content coming from you and other posters. I hope it's just brigading. I'm devastated if any meaningful amount of Americans feel this way. It's a fall from grace I didn't think I'd see in such real time.
The fact that you interpret any pushback to your opinion as pro-Russia is one of the main problems in modern discourse. You're so ideologically captured that everything has become binary.
Quite the opposite. I've just come to the realization that discourse with individuals arguing in bad faith is more harmful to society than any fleeting chance I may have of convincing the individual their path is the wrong one.
Long threads with little chance of convergence are boring, fewer people read them, reading new articles is more interesting, and people got shit to do. News at 11.
> Europe's defence should not be entirely on the American tax payer
True. However.
The US has wanted to play a major role in Europe for 80 years because it meant they controlled the narrative. This, co-incidentally was favourable to European countries because they could spend their money elsewhere.
Over the past few years the US has decided that it would prefer to play in the Pacific rather than Europe and so has been edging away.
It's true that Western Europe has been slow to respond, but it's also important to acknowledge that Trump just changed the pace of this redirection and so it's not entirely on one or the other side.
> So we raised [the defense spending of NATO members by] $130 billion almost immediately. We had a meeting with all of the [NATO] countries. I said, “You got to pay.” We got $130 billion more — more.
You fell for the propaganda. The US is not spending for Ukraine the way Trump is trying to make it seem. Sending old equipment that is expensive to dispose of helps the US two-fold.
And yes, fighting indirectly with Russia is also helping the US two-fold. Or, was until Trump decided to wake up as a sleeper agent .
> ending old equipment that is expensive to dispose of helps the US two-fold.
You fell for this propaganda. That equipment is "old" doesn't mean it isn't actively being used. The US military uses and maintains old equipment where it still makes sense, and where there is no viable replacement.
I have made the same argument long before Trump was in the picture. Stop associating everything with Trump or propaganda - people can hold opinions which don't agree with yours.
The world _wasn't_ zero sum when we had limitless economic growth. But growth has effectively ended for the majority of people. And resource constraints look they will define the future.
Extracting resources has always been the central tenant of industrial society, and there was always somewhere new to pillage. With literally nowhere on earth left to expand this global juggernaut, it's not clear that our zero sum utopia can continue.
I'm not defending Trump's actions by any means; spitting in the face of your friends is the last thing you want to do when times are lean. But at least this administration sees the writing on the wall: business as usual is dead and we're entering an era of zero sum contraction. Their response is insane but at least they acknowledge the problem (unlike traditional liberals and conservatives who think we can keep tweaking the current system forever)
You realized all the markets have (until very recently) been going up, all the economic indicators showing green, and business was booming. My portfolio was up.
That economic activity is growth. It was still happening. Just the middle class didn't participate like it used to like in the 50s. Because the marginal tax rate back then kept as much wealth from pooling at the top.
Economic inequality is the problem, not lack of growth.
Majority of who, exactly? Where is the boundary of the dēmos from whence the word "democracy" comes?
Is it even constant for all things, or should powers of self derermination shift as group sizes change: what power should the people of California and New York have to tell the people of Texas that there are decisions they cannot make? What power should the USA have to tell Russia or Ukraine what to do?
Because the US is a minority of the world. So is the EU. So is China, despite being larger than both combined.
Half the world lives within 3300 km of Mong Khet, Myanmar; should they determine all world rules down to planning permission, or just global matters such as mandatory climate change reaponses and enforcing global treaties?: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valeriepieris_circle
Minorities have the right to make/propose all the rules they want. What I mean is that majorities can’t be forced to comply. That wouldn’t be a democracy. By the way, minorities and majorities are fractal.
So why can a single executive decide to force rules in? Why is an unelected, unvetted team of a few dozen people capable of firing millions of employees? WHy can a court of 9 people not voted in determine the law of the land?
Not really shocked such a take is contradictory in and of itself.
>Allowing minorities to define the agenda, no matter how glamorous it seems, is the path for disaster
.
It's a really good thing every civil movement, including the civil war itself, disagrees with you. No progressive movement ever suddenly started with a bunch of people changing their mind on a dime withno infuence from the "minorities" first.
Of course, majority is not very cleanly applicable yous politics. Less than half (which according to Mirriam Webster is the definition) of the votes cast in the last election went to Trump/Vance, and with such a poor voter turnout it was even further from a majority. Meanwhile the electoral college is working against the idea.
That may be the narrative that the GOP has sold to the right, but it’s simply not true. Crime is down from what it was decades ago. The US is far from perfect but it’s not the crime ridden hellhole that the right portrays it to be.
I’m also not sure how you think the Trump administration’s actions are addressing this. He pardoned Jan 6th rioters. He’s defunding federal infrastructure.
This is just so blatantly disconnected from what’s happening.
The EU contributes and has contributed quite a lot more than the US has to Ukraine.
In addition, most US contributions are done in the form of donating surplus/outdated military equipment that was manufactured by the US defence industry decades ago, at a fictional list price.
And yet, way too many Americans seem to think that each billion-dollar contribution the US has done to Ukraine consisted of someone taking that money out of the US treasury now and giving it to Zelensky as a sack of cash or something.
No, the money left the US treasury many years ago, and went to US defence industry. The aid bills also typically contain an agreement for future spending on US defence industry to replace the donated equipment. In each case, the tax money went to US companies in the MIC, and it is quite something to see how so many people on the right wing now thinks this is a bad thing.
Just imagine for a second that your country is being invaded. Just imagine your friends and family are being killed by an invasion. That your whole culture is under threat. Just look at what Russia does with places they invaded and culturally assimilated. Everything you love might be gone if you capitulate.
It’s not that Ukraine doesn’t want peace, but on fair terms, not by giving Russia everything they want. Not by ignoring the sacrifices.
Please read up more on the history of the region and what led up to this war.
My country was invaded many times. We have lost some chunk of land which we can't get back unless there is all out war with countless life lost. We are third world country we don't have backing of US to continue a prolonged war.
And the US thinks that’s ok. They want Ukraine to give up the territory Russia took by force. Everyone else wants Russia to respect the agreed upon borders.
Russia is not going to give up that territory. Are europeans to go war with Russia. Unless that happens only ukraines would get slaughtered. While USA and European military industrial complex would profit.
You are advocating for giving in to the bully in the hopes that they will stop bothering you. The reality is that the bully will never stop, Russia’s aim is total annexation of Ukraine. Making peace without proper guarantees would be to ensure more Ukrainian people will die in the future.
Ukraine is special because it’s so close to Europe, and many countries on the border feel they could be next (the Baltics, Poland)
The inequality in the world is staggering, and Trumps administration will only make it worse. We need people to come together and help eachother out, and the autocrats and warmongers make this very difficult.
Sorry but europe would be the warmonger here. Trump surprisingly seems to want end war.
If my country started a war with my neighbour, the Europeans, USA would have urged us to stop it and make a peace deal. Would blame us for starting a war on silly issues, our culture etc. The west should do the same make peace not war.
With all respect, this shows a lot of lack of recent history. It was Merkel and other leaders who tried to get closer to Russia, and Russia was part of the NATO accession program up until 2008, when they bombed an apartment complex. It was Obama who after that, tried to reset the relationship. Russia was welcomed in the economic program and many ties were forged so to get closer (like the OSCE) and to prevent what was happening, right now.
When in 2014 Crimea was annexed, this was a clear breach of trust on the side of the Russians, and the deals and cooperation agreements that were made.
Nobody in Europe wants the war, but we all fear that Russia won’t stop at Ukraine. Their policy is very clear.
Now you can argue that Russia seems NATO as a threat, but they could have been part of it.
If you can please read the Russia analysis above, it’s very well researched and shows where Russia coming from, and also possibly how we can move forward.
That's exactly the opposite of what the West has been doing to Russia since at least 1993.
The by far most egregious offense having been the utter disrespect shown to the CFE treaty.
Also not a single leader on Ukraine's side (until Trump) but even tried negotiating with Putin beyond Zelensky's 10-point "peace plan". The only exception being Zelensky himself during the Istanbul negotiations. They asked Russia to retreat from Kyiv to "enable" those negotiations and after Russia did so, for yet unknown reason Ukraine withdrew and refused to engage in any further negotiations.
No. The US wants Ukraine to capitulate. If you read some history and learn what happens when a country capitulates to Russia you'd realize that's much, much worse than resisting.
If you are really sincere, I invite you to ponder this video essay by Sarcasmitron. It explains why this familiar talking point has some basis in truth, but doesn't hold up on closer scrutiny.
Well if you are in war with a country, you should at least try to understanding their perspective from their viewpoint to understand their motivations. If you want to prevent more conflict at least..
The context is that Russia kept expanding for 13 years under the same dictator, and then this time is the straw that broke the camel's back. The trust was broken several times.
I don't really care to understand the mindset of a dictator. They want power, resources,or reputation out of it. There's not a lot of justified reasons to lead an assault that will cost millions of your citizen's lives.
I agree we shouldn't take the mindset of a dictator seriously, but we should take the threat of a superpower seriously. And we should show respect to a superpower as long as it's a superpower, because getting into conflict with a superpower can cause WW3.
I don't mean with that that I fully agree with their standpoint, but that we shouldn't fuck too much with them, because they might fuck with us.
Ultimately it's the weakest justification to allow Russia to do what it was always going to do anyway. There's not much to really discuss here unless you thought Russia was a credible place in the last 20 years.
That sounds like a prejudgment. You say Russia would have done this regardless of NATO's actions, but you don't know that. And you're downplaying the importance of NATO's actions and it's influence on Russia's actions.
The truth of the matter from Ukraine's perspective is that this never would have happened if Ukraine was a NATO member.
NATO hasn't moved aggressively on Russia.
The motivations for Russia and it's neighbours for their opinions on joining NATO are the same. Russia doesn't invade NATO members. That's why Russia's neighbours want to join and why Russia doesn't want them to.
I think it's because the US did sort of promise to block expansion, but then changed its mind and in now in hindsight it doesn't seem like they managed it very well but don't want to look bad.
The only part of you post that can be steelmanned into what can be considered an argument is "NATO expansion". And that argument falls apart if you actually think and explore it for like 15 minutes. Like, what is NATO and its purpose, how does "expansion" actually work in terms of process, what events took place on the continent between 90s and new NATO members joining, what else could have compelled parties to go through the process and how durable that would be?
And then the rest of your "question" is straight up factually false.
Well if it's so clear to you, why can't you give a straight up argument? People always say things like "explore it for 15 minutes" or "think about it" or whatever. But I think people are just repeating what other people say. And yeah if everyone's opinion is like this, and you explore it for 15 minutes, and you're the kind of person that repeats what everybody says, then I can understand. But then you can't explain why you actually have that opinion.
Eastern Europe rushed towards NATO as soon as the Russian-controlled Eastern Bloc dictatorships crumbled, to secure themselves from falling prey to Russia ever again. Existing NATO members were for a long time very lukewarm about the idea of accepting new members.
The US did not push or expand NATO onto anyone, but Eastern Europe did everything they could to pull NATO towards them to gain additional security against the very same Russia that had just reluctantly agreed to the dismantlement of their dictatorships and removal of their armies from Eastern Europe.
Are you not aware that the Russian-run communist dictatorships were not voluntary, but forced upon Eastern Europe? That's the key to understanding everything.
the problem is that simply asking the question plays into the hands of Putin.
In war, the objective is to get the other party to stop fighting. Either by destroying his means, or by destroying his will. If you can get enough people to believe that a war cannot be won, or that it is not just, then they will stop. And you have won. See Psychological warfare [1]
This is why Putin is menacing with nuclear weapons, even if he knows that he cannot use them. This is why Putin is making statements about Ukraine being a fascist nazi state, that he just had to invade for the good of the planet. This is why reliable / true statistics about macro-economics and battlefield victims have become state secrets.
Every time someone naively, but sincerely, enters in the reasoning of Putin, the public debate is shifted a little bit to his advantage. This is what is referred to as a Useful Idiot [2]. And due to Brandolini's Law, otherwise known as the Bullshit Asymmetry Principle [3] it takes time for people to be educated.
So people get frustrated with having to explain every time. So they just downvoted you. I guess.
So what is your argument, that we should go on fully with the war and send more soldiers to the front? Because we don't want to make any concession with Russia? Because we don't want to sympathize at least a little bit because that would make us "weak"? So we should go on and risk WW3?
"We" (americans) aren't doing anything to help, and are in fact withdrawing support. "We" honestly don't have much say in how the ones who actually fought against our supposed enemies should feel (to reverse a recent quote). Trump is kissing the ring so it's very clear we're already making consessions.
>So we should go on and risk WW3?
Well this is part of why your top comment was unpopular. Ukraine is not going to start WW3. Our inaction only accellerates the possibility since this was already winding down.
As others said, you are repeating Russian talking points. Blaming the one attacked for causing a mass scale war instead of the agressors or the spposed "allies" deciding to betray them and help the enemy.
My reply was just based on your question, the point being that your question originated in Russian propaganda. That it was based on dishonest reasoning by Putin. And that asking the question was helping Putin. Read a history book: anyone can give reasonable sounding justifications for invading a country. At the very least leaders need support for their wars, so nobody lets loose the dogs of war, saying "yeah I just want their stuff". In geopolitics, the truth is not always in the middle.
But if you're now asking me my personal opinion, should we "continue the war", then, yes I think we should continue to enable Ukraine to defend itself. So if Ukraine wants to send more soldiers to the front, to defend their nation, then yes we should support them. Note: that does not automatically mean sending American or European soldiers, but that was never on the table.
We should continue to support them because we engaged ourselves to support Ukraine in the 90's, when we forced them to hand over their nukes to Russia.
We should continue the war because as both recent and less recent history has borne out, allowing Russia to perform a landgrab will give the wrong ideas to other countries, ultimately resulting in geopolitical instability everywhere.
We should continue to allow Ukraine to defend itself because demonstrably, it is effective.
I have kids, and do not want WW3. But if after losing hundreds of thousands of men, during a three year war, Putin has not started a nuclear war; do you really think he will start one now? If anything, supporting Ukraine will prevent future conflict.
All of this is obvious for anyone who has performed even a cursory study of history. Which probably explains why you were downvoted.
Why is this Russian propaganda? The agreement was not official, but it did certainly seem to have happened. If you open up history books you should also understand that.
In fact I have read the history books (have you?). Yes it happened. Many things were said in fact during the negotiation. That generally happens during negotiations whilst people are trying to find a solution.
During scores of negotiations, over a period of months if not years, at one instance the phrase was uttered. Then it was retracted. It was never restated. It was not in the final agreement.
Does it mean that anything the Russians said at some point in time during the negotiations, even if it was retracted afterwards, should apply?
If you were negotiating a contract, do you think that sort of reasoning would fly? If so I have a bridge to sell you.
This is why it is propaganda. Because it is self-serving and disingenuous.
Are you sure that your original question was a sincere question?
I never said that no questions should be asked. And there is indeed a risk to standing up against agression. This is why it is very important to manage escalation risks, and the various American and European administrations so far have taken great care. For example by not supplying strategic weapons, and by disallowing strikes on certain Russian targets.
Also, note that there is also a risk of not standing up to agression. The price of doing nothing is not zero.
All I said was that one should take care not to be instrumentalised by unwittingly propagating false propagandist narratives. I think we can agree on that?
my understanding of the video, and after having read the historical book "Not One Inch" by ME Sarotte [1] is that during the numerous meetings between the US and the USSR, over several years, at one (1) time George Baker said the famous "Not One Inch" (which I highly recommend)
Not only was this subsequently retracted, but it was never repeated, and it was not in any of the treaty texts. Russia had essentially lost the cold war, was so near to collapse that it needed billions of dollars from it's previous enemies, and so never asked for any sort of confirmation because they knew they wouldn't get it.
It's a bit like, calling the AT&T hotline 20 times, and when during one conversation the agent tells you by mistake that you can have free internet for life (without written confirmation), upon which you then loudly complain that AT&T is in breach of contract.
As the book and the video also remind people, it's not the US that extended NATO. It's the various countries that spent 40 years behind the iron curtain, that were so eager to join NATO that they essentially forced their way into NATO, against the wishes of the US. And given the various Russian invasions the last 10-15 years, history has more than validated them.
The west tried for years and years to accommodate Russia, and only gave weapons to Ukraine in 2016 because ... in 2014 Russia invaded Ukraine? Let's not forget that in the 90's, Ukraine was the third biggest nuclear power, and gave away it's nuclear weapons to Russia at the behest of the rest of the world (who were afraid of nuclear escalation), but only in return from security guarantees, from Europe, the US and even Russia. This deal was very much not at the initiative of Ukraine.
Supporting Ukraine is not a moral issue. It's a contractual issue. We wanted to reduce nuclear proliferation 35 years ago, and -at the time- were willing to pay the price. It's time to make good on that promise.
I'm not talking about the fact that Ukraine is seeking NATO membership now, I'm talking about the fact that NATO agreed to not expand to Russian borders and did anyway, putting pressure on Russia.
The controversy regarding the legitimacy of eastward NATO expansion relates to the aftermath of the Revolutions of 1989, when the fall of Soviet-allied communist states to opposition parties brought European spheres of influence into question.
Russian authorities claim that agreement on non-expansion of NATO to Eastern Europe took place orally and the alliance violated it with its expansion while the leaders of the alliance claim that no such promise was made and that such a decision could only be made in writing.
Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, who participated in the 1990 negotiations, subsequently spoke out about the existence of a "guarantee of non-expansion of NATO to the east" inconsistently, confirming its existence in some interviews and refuting in others.
Among academic researchers, opinions on the existence or absence of a non-extension agreement also differ.
OTOH, I understand there was an actual drawn up agreement regarding Ukraine giving up post Soviet nuclear weapons, Russia agreeing to Ukranian autonomy and the US agreeing to provide secuirty for Ukraine.
Regardless of whether there is a drawn up agreement, still the expansion of NATO to the Russian borders is putting pressure on Russia I would assume, and can cause conflicts.
But yeah it would certainly help if they would make the agreement more official.
Nobody wants to invade Russia. The only reason Russia and Putin are opposed to NATO expansion is because it stops them from being able to bully their neighbours. Calling that "putting pressure on Russia" is crazy.
Russia started the war by invading Ukraine. Russia can end the war any time they want by simply moving all of their troops out of Ukraine and back behind their border.
Any concession to Russia means we are saying that it's ok for nuclear-armed states to invade their neighbours at will, and to expand their territory at will, because "oh no, ww3!".
That is unacceptable. That is unjust. There is exactly one guilty party in this conflict, and it is not Ukraine. We do not appease dictators who invade their neighbours.
Before I started delving into this topic, I also thought that Russia was just doing this because they are a crazy war machine. But after I looked into the history of it, I can understand better that Russia does have some reasons to feel threatened by NATO. And yeah, if you threaten a country, you can expect conflict.
We should rather go into conversation with Russia instead of ignoring their perspective and continue with things causing conflicts with them.
You've been explained why several times by now and you're just dismissing the argumenst with "well Russia is just defending itself".
Actions speak louder than words. You can justify with all the quotes you want, the point is that reality is before our eyes. I don't sympathize with dictators waging wars for 13 years over much smaller countries.
I'm not saying Russia is just defending itself. I'm saying there was an agreement between NATO and Russia which NATO broke. And since Russia is a superpower, it can start a war, and it can result in WW3. So it's maybe wise to try to make a deal to get peace.
Are you surprised a country with Russia as it's neighbour wants to join NATO? Especially since it has been an important part of the defense of the European union.
Putin has been stuck in the cold war since forever. His expansionist ideals have been visible since forever.
Note that Georgia joining was also on the table. Several months after this summit Russia trounced Georgia in a few days and since then there has been no serious movement towards joining NATO.
Russia likely expected the same outcome in Ukraine but as we know now that didn't materialize.
Well, already in April 2008 Ukraine got a pledge in Bucharest that they "will become" a member of NATO, which is before the mess in Crimea and Donbass and even before Georgia got smacked which are the usual examples of Russian early aggression.
There's also Putin's 2007 speech in Munich about them being really pissed with how they are treated, does that count? Other than that there's the second Chechen war and maybe the time the Russians rushed some peace keepers into Kosoy.
Yeah but the other countries were already added, so the pressure for Russia was building up. So I don't understand why it would be an unexpected action of Russia.
Yeah but we could have prevented it, so that means we wanted to so badly expand NATO that we would go into war with Russia for it? Why can't we stay put and maybe try to talk more? And now that we have an opportunity to talk or make a deal, and we blow it off as being in bed with Putin?
Because we don’t want to be told who to voluntarily take into our alliance by an opponent? Are you going to give china everything they ask for next because they take Taiwan if you don’t?
But NATO first agreed not to expand to countries along Russia's border, because they see that as a threat. But then NATO did anyway. So it's not like we're being told by Russia what to do, we made an agreement.
And Russia is also a superpower, and we don't want to be in conflict with them. So yeah it's not that everything they say we should abide to, but we should also not think that we can do everything without upsetting them.
NATO didn’t agree to not expand, some ministers of some member countries verbally said that NATO wouldn’t expand. It’s not like there was a treaty that was signed and then ignored.
Well I guess that for Russia it doesn't really matter if the agreement was official. They still feel threatened by it, and they have been saying that, and NATO still went on.
I think this view us a overly flattering interpretation of events.
The basic facts is that the US did give serveral verbal promises that NATO wouldn't expand, and that the later written treaties did not make such promises.
It is however not clear at all from the evidence that the US ever said that they were retracting the early verbal promises.
Further the Brookings piece you linked is trying to make hay out of the fact that the verbal promises were explicitly "only" about expansion into Eastern Germany, which is really just childish: If someone says you can't borrow their shovel, that's not to be understood as them allowing you to borrow anything else they own without asking.
The point is that while it's true that the US never signed anything that prohibited NATO expansion to the east, they were aware they did at one point promise just that.
Then later, as the US changed its minds during spring of 1990, the strategy seems to have been to just pretend not to remember those earlier promises and by narrowly focusing on German unification hope that the issue of the wider European order didn't come up again.
One thing that is really remarkable with all these accounts of how there wasn't any pledges is that the talks were only about German unification in the most narrow sense, and nothing else happened. So the Ion Curtain fell but the US was apparently entirely uninterested in talking to the Soviets about what the new overall structure would be?!
Independently of your overall point, what strikes me here is that Trump could not possibly care less about any promises that the "US" may have made. He is effectively breaking every deal ever made, with no regard for any continuity of policy (not just now, think the Iran deal in his first term). With Zelensky yesterday, he again went on about this ceasefire deal would be with "him", not like "the other presidents".
In this context, its a bit rich for the pro-Trump "great peace negotiator" group to imply that the US needed to keep verbal promises made 35 years ago. It was, after all, just what some dude said one time.
He's maybe breaking continuity of the US as a whole, but in general he seems to be quite consistent in his actions and motivations. And maybe he's the first president in a long time that actually understands Russia's perspective.
From the last presidents he's the one that started the least wars. I don't understand why people are saying that he's pairing with Russia when he wants to end a war that's been going on for 3 years.
Some games are indeed zero sum, some are positive and some are negative.
You could also see that in a positive light : Europeans might get a better armies / defence in 10 years compared to if the USA continued its past behavior without Trump
Larger armies are negative sum for everyone. Historically, per capita GDP was flat until the 18th century, because wealth was measured in gold and people thought the best way to be rich was to keep robbing and colonizing one another.
I really don't understand this take, any other European country could fund the Ukraine war to continue.
The US no longer wanting to fund someone else's war is about as far from 'forcing' as you can get. Plus it doesn't even sound like we're withdrawing all funding, instead we're attaching a few conditions in hopes to end the killing.
The behaviour makes them at best a laughing stock but at worst a liability. Who wants to keep their money in the US anymore? Trump could announce next week he's freezing all European assets to fund his annexation Greenland.
Not just does the US no longer want to support Ukraine, it is basically siding with Russia by not taking a stand and criticising Ukraine. It’s neglecting the interests of it’s ally by only including Russia in negotiations.
On top of it all, it’s extorting Ukraine into giving up it’s minerals while giving no assurances in return.
And finally, most important for long term, it’s a complete policy reversal to its NATO allies, which will have a long term impact on US transatlantic relations for decades to come. Before, US was the only country to invoke Article 5. Now its recognising a weak moments for its allies and is exploiting that opportunity.
It isn't about funding. It's about denigrating our allies and attacking the victim of aggression, while praising our adversaries and aggressors. Realpolitik is (correctly) in vogue as a correction to bad policies, but ideas and justice still matter.
> Realpolitik is (correctly) in vogue as a correction to bad policies, but ideas and justice still matter.
Realpolitik is, first and foremost, about (arguably ruthless) pragmatism. What's going on — the US antagonising all its allies and forging new alliances with unreliable partners —— is not pragmatic in the least.
The US hasn't put as much in compared to Europe as they'd have you believe. Whilst Europe has sent fewer weapons, they've been supporting monetarily. And the US was sending stockpiled weapons, marking them at book value, and then reinvesting that money into US defence firms to buy new weapons.
And let's remember that most of the Ukrainian refugees have been hosted in Europe [1], something for which I am proud of being European. This has a monetary cost that Trump's administration seems to ignore when they keep saying that the US have spent far more than Europe to help Ukraine.
Has nothing to do with it. I wrote my comment to create an equally absurd and meaningless point to illustrate how silly that "the war would end if Russia would leave" mantra is.
Like my comment, it's technically true and completely not worth discussing, because it will never happen.
By that logic, the world should have just given Hitler everything he wanted too, right, because Germany leaving would never happen. The Soviet Union left Afghanistan when the costs got too high. So did the US. Under what basis do you aver that Putin leaving Ukraine can never happen?
There is a legitimate debate as to what cost is worth paying, if any (as well as what cost comes from not doing anything - ask the Baltics), but to present the situation as fait accompli?
The US did nothing but benefit from the war really. So any talk about ending support being in the United States' interest is a serious misreading of the situation.
The US was sending old equipment. To replace it they were and spending money on R&D and manufacturing of current and next-gen equipment for the US military, not Ukraine.
The US got to observe and study the use of it's older equipment in an actual land war against a geopolitical adversary.
The war has demonstrated US equipment superiority over Russian equipment.
The US did not send any troops, only old equipment and some money.
Regarding "hopes to end the killing".
The killing can end today if Putin withdraws. He is the aggressor who attacked without any justification or provocation.
If somebody invades your neighbour's apartment and starts looting and hurting them, do you just say "give up, it's easier"?
The US and the west as a whole are already a very big winner for the war and it was 100% worth the investment. But for how long should it continue? Ignoring Trump's terrible negotiation strategy I still think there's value in some sort of ceasefire. Continuing a brutal stalemate is not something we should take lightly just to burn through a few more Russian tanks. It's mostly just T-60s and cheap Iranian drones left anyway. They've been thoroughly embarrassed.
The history of war is full of unhappy truces and compromise. WW2 type victories are extremely rare and take massive sacrifice.
Of course, but it is extraordinarily optimistic, naive even, to think that freezing the conflict now without any security guarantees for Ukraine is anything but a gift to Russia, who will turn to preparing the next invasion.
And keep in mind, we're not doing the sacrificing. It is Ukraine who is doing the fighting and should be calling the shots here, with our material support since we don't want to send troops (until now).
> freezing the conflict now without any security guarantees for Ukraine
From what I've read I think the only plan put forward is to have Europeans run the DMZ? The US having troops there would probably be a no-go since that's the primary power-conflict (even above NATO). I don't think there's any other option as historically there's always a third party regulating it. Maybe a subset of UN where possibly even China could have troops there.
Not sure what guarantees would exist for breaking the ceasefire though, besides the usual full sanctions/weapons/maybe troops. Who knows what happens now though :/
Why? Some accounts believe Russia will break by the end of this year as its terrible financial situation catches up to it. People are starting to doubt if they can even launch a nuke any more. It seems wise to me to push a bit harder to see if you can tip a military adversary over the edge and force a full capitulation, rather than giving them time to recover.
As long as China supports Russia there is no way Ukraine is going to break Russia. Putin cares nothing about the human cost from his side and it's unlikely Ukraine can have enough of an advantage to be able to push back.
See the "spring offensive".
The reality is more or less a stalemate at this point. While the Trump administration treatment of Zelensky is a disgrace the reality is that some sort of ceasefire around the current borders is going to be the outcome that ends this war. We can work on forcing Russia to withdraw via economic and other pressure after the hot war is over. Just like we broke up the Soviet Union.
This idea of one more year and Russia will break is just a dream with no connection to reality. Putin is going to send a million man to fight with sticks before Russia breaks. And they will.
Trump is pushing it after having talked to the Russians. I mean I don't have a direct line to Putin but if Russia isn't open to a ceasefire then none of this even matters. The fight between Trump and Zelensky is about Ukraine agreeing to a ceasefire.
Trump also wants to annex Greenland, take over the Panama canal and make Gaza into a beach resort. Also let's not forget when he sent out his son in law for a school project (peace in Isreal) who came back with a detailed plan without ever talking and involving the Palestinians.
The problem with a ceasefire is that Russia has an endless history of accepting negotiations only to use them to get a tactical advantage. It is standard practice for them. So of course Ukraine is very wary unless that can be prevented.
> the reality is that some sort of ceasefire around the current borders is going to be the outcome that ends this war.
No, it won't. With sufficient outside political pressure on Ukraine, it might happen, but (like many ceasefires) it would only be a brief pause, not an end to the war.
> We can work on forcing Russia to withdraw via economic and other pressure after the hot war is over.
Sanctions almost never work without someone actually fighting on the ground. If they are not tipping the balance of an active internal or external conflict, they can be endured basically indefinitely.
(Not that Trump seems inclined to either try to force Putin to withdraw or to maintain sanctions, in any case.)
> Just like we broke up the Soviet Union.
We didn't break up the Soviet Union, the republics of the Soviet Union broke it up, largely because of a crisis of legitimacy resulting from a hardline coup against a mildly reformist leadership. The main immediate US contribution, though, was bogging the USSR down in the long war it fought in Afghanistan by aiding the forces opposing the USSR there, the outgrowth of which was both the disatisfaction that provoked the reform efforts and the strong negative reaction to the subsequent hardline coup, not sanctions imposed without an ongoing armed conflict.
China can only support Russia in some specific, not too invasive ways. If structural points of a country break, there's no support recipe for that.
Financial and economic weaknesses are also working against Putin and his team from _within_ Russia.
> Just like we broke up the Soviet Union.
It was not entirely broken, since we have the living proof of it today in the Kremlin - same operating mode.
> Putin is going to send a million man
Why is he resorting to North Korean soldiers then? (which even then aren't infinite). Obviously, he has a problem at recruiting/training his own. Which puts him at odds with his own population.
So whose soldiers will it be next? China? not likely willing to deal with that. Iran? same. African countries? Not their war, they tell it themselves.
The issue is that Putin has cornered himself and his country, willingly, knowingly, into a no-way-out road. He had other options of both perspective and action.
The word on the street is that he's using North Korean soldiers because he can get them and he prefers that they are killed and not Russians. But he'll send Russians too.
You're applying western thinking here. The same sort of western thinking that thought Putin wouldn't invade Ukraine because what's in it for him or imagine some red lines or whatever. Russians aren't western. They don't think like us. The west always does this.
There isn't such a thing of at odds with his own population in Russia. Again you're applying western thinking to Russians. Check out some Russian jokes.
Russia's population is 140 million. They're not going to run out of people. 17% of those or about 24 million are fighting age males (18-44). If you really need to you can definitely recruit 15-60 and woman.
Not sure if this is what you meant by logistics.
If you're thinking about supplying and maintaining their physical presence in Ukraine it doesn't look like that's a problem either.
They're also still exporting weapons though significantly less than they used to export.
Maybe they can't sustain 10 years of war with the west continuing or increasing their level of support, assuming Ukraine can, but they are nowhere near being forced to stop [the] war.
Population alone and artillery alone are the ingredients of logistics, not logistics itself.
The failure of the initial 3-days invasion was a demonstration that the « great Russian army », even with the support of Wagner and Tchetchenia, was unable to plan, execute and sustain a flash attack.
Yes, they may improve in the meantime. But that takes years of discipline and continuous training. So while that’s an option for them, that’s also a weakness that can be decisive.
Is China supporting Russia? I see opportunistic grabs for cheap oil and gas but nothing more than that. It’s not fixing the rampant inflation and growing budget deficit.
> We can work on forcing Russia to withdraw via economic and other pressure after the hot war is over. Just like we broke up the Soviet Union.
You think Trump plans to maintain sanctions? You sweet summer child.
North Korea is a China agent in this context. China is pretty much supplying all the goods that went away due to western sanctions, everything Russian factories need, and buying all the exports that the west is trying to sanction.
My statement had nothing to do with Trump maintaining sanctions or not. If he doesn't some future administration will. US relations with the Soviets also fluctuated during the cold war.
> China is pretty much supplying all the goods that went away due to western sanctions
This is not correct. Some countries are being used to bypass sanctions, including China, but this isn’t happening with government support and the extra costs of evading sanctions are putting inflationary pressure on goods in Russia.
> buying all the exports that the west is trying to sanction.
Barring oil and gas, there’s nothing Russia has that China wants. And even then, they don’t have the infrastructure to buy the volumes to replace European purchases, thus the black hole in the Russian budget.
Nothing happens in China without government support. In China you either do what the government wants or you are in jail or dead.
If Xi wanted Russia to stop the war, Russia would stop the war. The war is useful for China because it splinters the west, they get leverage over Russia, and it normalizes the kind of actions that it wants to take in Taiwan.
If China objected to North Korea sending troops to Russia then North Korea would not be sending troops to Russia. Pretty much all of North Korea's trade is with China. For sure North Korea has some degree of independence but sending soldiers to die for Russia is not worth it if it upsets China. This is clearly a nod, nod, wink, wink situation here.
"Most of Russia's exports to China originate from the mining and petrochemicals sectors.[64] More than half of Russia's exports to China come from mineral fuels, oil, and petroleum products (60.7%), followed by wood and wood products (9.4%), non-ferrous metals (9%), fish and seafood (3.5%), and chemical products (3.3%). China is also gradually becoming a major consumer of Russian agricultural products.[24]: 64
The main categories of imports to Russia from China are machinery and equipment (35.9%), clothing (13.7%), chemical products (9.1%), fur and fur products (5.6%), footwear (5.3%), and furniture (3%). Chinese electronics are steadily expanding their presence in Russian.[24]: 64"
Comparing silly “CHINA COLLAPSE IN THREE DAYS” YouTube videos to economic analysis of observed facts, some of which I’ve pointed out, is not really a comparison, is it.
In the military context, breaking formation and abandoning your post (as you suggest) is a punishable offense, even with death.
By the way, if you’d like to see a real life example of this neighborly coercion you’re so concerned about, Russia is the most guilty party with its blocking units. As a matter of fact, given the tremendous amount of dead on the Russian side, you should be appealing to Putin to stop this, not Ukraine.
A fine attempt to turn things on their head, but again the only one who enables the fighting is Putin's Russia.
The conflict can be stopped right now with loss of territory so long as Ukraine is given trustworthy guarantees that Russia won't invade again as soon as they've licked their wounds a bit. That is the ask, and the only one who can provide that is realistically the United States, or Europe with guaranteed support from the United States.
Russia broke treaty, law, moral foundation and democratic order for a second time in a decade to try and take all of the Ukraine.
You appear to forget history, but plenty of citizens were able to leave through the back door while able-bodied citizens were required to do the only reasonable thing a democracy can do and defend its sovereignty.
First with what they had, then with conservatively provided weapons as other countries tried to figure out if Putin would actually use nukes, and finally with more effective munitions when it was apparent he would not.
No neighbor is locked in, and the US embarrasses itself as it simps for Russia in the UN and parades the president of an invaded democracy around in a jester hat.
The alternative is that Ukraine loses land, US sucks up a bunch of ukrainian resources from what land remains, and their people reach depression level poverties instead. All while probably being at risk of another way in 5 years and Trump help Putin recover faster than Ukraine every could in this situation.
The human cost for this sad excuse of a "peace treaty" will completely decimate Ukraine and simply delay the next attack.
We are burning generations of alliances, goodwill, and our own enormously successful system of government for what? Absolutely nothing. Our entire country is being sold out so a few corrupt billionaires can make out like bandits.
This it the end of an 80 year era. The US will never have as much influence and prosperity again.
Maybe I can't expect an answer from you but maybe someone that agree with your comment can clarify for me:
Why did suddenly "end the killing" become a talking point for the people supporting this/Trump? "End the Killing of *american soldiers*(outside US)" seems like an consistent message but when this group didn't give 2 shits about Iraqi, Afgani, Vietnam, Libya, Syria, and even essentially justify warcrimes and killings, how can the movement stay morally consistent to "Oh we are doing this to save Ukrainean life" as a slogan?
"We don't want to spend our money on other nationals, but we are ok in having colonies or natural resource exploitation at your expense" is the only sensible interpretation of current presidents behavior.
A stance that seems pretty aligned with every war since 9/11, just more explicit and any pretense such as "spreading democracy" or "WMD", and less willing to commit (american lives) for profit. Wasn't support for Trump against deepstate and all this "benefiting deepstate at the expense of the common people" wars? Why can't the movement just own up to it all.
I think many were also against those wars. I would prefer much more surgical strikes rather than war, ultimately those special ops were the ones that were successful against those involved in 9/11.
There also was no forced conscription in those. The military members knew what they were getting into and made a choice to sign up anyway. That's no longer the case in Ukraine, the border is closed, citizens cannot leave, they are being rounded up and forced into a few weeks of bootcamp then to the front-lines to die. That's the antithesis of freedom.
Europe doesn’t have the resources in a lot of cases. To start, a lot of what the US gave isn’t cash, it’s old equipment that was in long term storage. You can’t just place an order for 100 infantry fighting vehicles and get them in a month. For other forms of equipment, the US has a ton of industrial capacity that Europe simply can’t make up for.
> it doesn't even sound like we're withdrawing all funding, instead we're attaching a few conditions in hopes to end the killing.
There is currently no funding for Ukraine from the US. Trump has dangled offers of assistance “with conditions” but nothing concrete. Even this minerals deal didn’t actually include any security assistance or funding for weapons.
> The US no longer wanting to fund someone else's war is about as far from 'forcing' as you can get
It _was_ also their war, because it's Europe that's attacked through Ukraine, and... Europe (and Ukraine, actually) used to be allies.
Well, here we are: the USA is _not_ anymore an ally to Europe, and is objectively becoming, as a state, an adversary, so here is the most likely survival plan available to Europe now:
1/ find new partners (Canada/Australia of course; as for the big one, will be India and/or China);
2/ increase its own defence and technologies to be more independent from US ones (will hurt, for sure);
3/ close its market to USA (will hurt heavily on both sides);
4/ not even talking about the cultural reframing that will happen.
It's not a matter of "if the USA doesn't fix its course within 4 years", it's happening now.
And no one wins at this. Certainly not the USA. Trump will be gone and forgotten in a few years. USA will take, at the very best, 40/50 years to fix the damaged trust towards Europe, but also towards any future partner: how do you expect to sincerely partner with a country that behaves so erratically every 4 years, and now even ambushes guest state representatives in front of the media?
Interesting, I’d like to understand your argument. What exactly are you trying to say? I’d say what you see as kindness and generosity, was not so much that as a tool, to create and maintain an American economy that far outweighs its actual importance. Aid, Commoditised people, Petrodollar, Reserve currency.
One thing, I’d like to understand is do regular Americans think that the country, following an isolationist policy will out compete the rest of the world?
I agree with you. You put on your own oxygen mask before you can help others. The US has debt interest payments of over a trillion dollars a year - totally unacceptable. We can't keep funding a war that can be willingly ended.
Learn how to make a point without sounding like you don't know what you're talking about about. Spending money on this isn't helping 'us' in any positive way.
I have a different take on this situation: I have felt for about a decade that it was time for my country (USA) to slowly ease away from being the sole dominate super power and figure out how to live in a multi-polar world. I am not a fan of President Trump but I wish him good luck in moving us in the direction of coexisting with Russia and China because I think it is in the best interests of most people in most countries. I was disappointed by Zelensky yesterday and I don’t believe he acted in the best interests of his people. I like Ukraine, wonderful country to visit and nice friendly people. I would like to visit again when the war has ended.
Think a lot of people here are missing the forest for the trees. We are witnessing the collapse of the unipolar world order that has brought relative freedom and prosperity to most of the world for the last three and a half decades.
I don’t know what comes next. No one does. But Europe needs a deep-rethink of a lot more than just defense if it wants to have any say in what the next world order is going to look like. Otherwise, we’re looking at four decades of less peace and less prosperity.
Here in Sweden, following news of “peace talks” where both Ukraine and Europe were sidelined, the prime minister referenced a “new Yalta” as a troubling scenario, especially for small nations like ours.
Whether intentionally or not, the USA is relinquishing its role as global hegemon, and at least the baltics and nordics are contemplating the ramifications.
As a Canadian to a Svenskar. Your last sentence makes me wonder what we're really angry at the Americans for. Most folks in my country have pissed on Americans for as long as I can remember for thinking they are the world police and "keeping world order". Well uhm, turns out they were and now we're annoyed they don't want to do it anymore? It's interesting, feels like to a degree some folks are pissed off about America stopping the very thing they wanted them to stop? Interesting times.
There is more than one way to stop being the leading economic and military stabilizing force in the world. The "table flip" doctrine is not generally considered to be among the top candidates for "responsible and stable" transfer of power.
We are not angry at the US for defending the democratic world order. We are angry at the US for things like Gitmo, withdrawing from the Rome statute, supporting an alleged genocide in Gaza etc.
What they are doing now is saying might makes right, marking and end of the reign of the liberal democracy.
No dispute there, I think I was wondering aloud if there is a bit of cake and eat it too, going on? And if so, to what degree? I think it's hard to have that perspective well from my vantage point hence the question/pondering.
People have been critical of the US when their admin lied about weapons of mass destruction, did massive amounts of drone strikes on civilians and put people in a concentration camp. "World police" is just a polemic description of that, it's not the content of the criticism.
Now there's country that traded nuclear weapons for protection by the US that is being invaded by a fascist dictator. Meanwhile the US admin is gaslighting everyone and lying about these basic facts and tried to humiliate and personally attack their president in public.
>Now there's country that traded nuclear weapons for protection by the US that is being invaded by a fascist dictator.
Are you talking about the Budapest Memorandum? According to Wikipedia, it says
>Seek immediate Security Council action to provide assistance to the signatory if they "should become a victim of an act of aggression or an object of a threat of aggression in which nuclear weapons are used".
So AIUI, that's a guarantee that the US will defend Ukraine if Ukraine gets attacked by Russia with nukes. It's not a guarantee that the US will defend Ukraine if Ukraine gets attacked by Russia with non-nukes. So I don't think the US has violated the agreement. Russia violated the agreement by attacking Ukraine (Russia was a signatory, and the treaty also says the parties won't attack each other with any type of weapon).
But had Ukraine not agreed, they very likely wouldn't have been invaded. Meanwhile Putin was threatening to use nuclear weapons if western countries would have directly intervened. This threat is looming over _all_ negotiations and actions.
So really Russia is getting away with invading Ukraine and expanding their territory and use their nuclear arsenal indirectly to achieve that.
I had not heard of any real level of anger toward the USA from the average Canadian (the exception being as a response to the now-delayed 25% tariffs). Same applies here. Your average Swede is not angry at the USA for what it’s doing right now. The closest sentiment that’s broken through the mainstream is maybe “unease.”
I wonder if the “have your cake and eat it too” dissonant thinking you’re hitting on is actually maybe easier found in the USA, and sort of on the other side of the spectrum. Plenty of folks voted explicitly for Trump because of his inward-focused, isolationist agenda. What they don’t realize is the extent to which the prosperity that they’ve seen up this point was dependent upon the rules-based order that their chosen leader is actively dismantling.
Question about Sweden: the US influenced your decision to abandon nuclear proliferation about two generations ago. A major factor in wider strategic weapons today is whether Elon Musk would fund you or your adversaries’ satellite, targeting, etc. Is that what a “new Yalta” looks like?
In this context, “new Yalta” is more in reference to the carving up of “spheres of influence” by the big players, without the little players (the ones being carved up) having a seat at the table.
The right in ascendancy treats Yalta like a movement by the Roosevelt left to give Stalin concessions in a New World Order. That’s the phrase they want promoted. In particular, the UN and adjacent developments stem from a small number of great men. So, the right is happy about a new Yalta between Musk, Trump, and Putin.
Or is it Putin, Trump and Xi? That’s how I see it: Trump has hinted that the Panama Canal and Greenland are for sale. So the left way of looking at a New Yalta reflect multipolar colonial ambitions.
I agree, however the unipolar world ceased to exist a while ago. My take on what we are witnessing is that the US finally acknowledges that what has worked in the unipolar world won’t work in the one we have.
What does this even mean? The world was working just fine before a nutjob with an axe to grind with the west decided to invade its democratic neighbor.
The world was not "working just fine". It _appeared_ to be "working just fine" but it isn't.
Take a look at U.S. shipbuilding capacity, U.S. military equipment maintenance, and the defense industrial base that is maintaining the _appearance_ of the powerful status quo. This isn't unique to the U.S., the same is happening in Russia.
Turns out it costs a _lot_ of money to keep this charade up for everyone.
Off the top of my head apartheid in South Africa, ethnic cleansing of Albanians and genocide in Serbia, WWII... maybe indirectly, end of oppressive horrible USSR where I was born
With Russia and China reaching out to each other after many decades of nearly no contact and Trump reaching out to Russia after about a decade, it might as well be a sign of the very opposite.
This might genuinely be the birth of a true unipolar world order.
With who in control? A Russia, China and US alliance? This seems very unlikely to me. All signs indicate we're moving to a multipolar world as far as I can tell.
China owns an increasing majority of global GDP and Trump seems to be either taking a path of peace, populism and or stupidity by pulling America out of its global alliances.
That’s one possibility; a different one is that Trump considers China as the real contender for the US in the 21st century, and wants to pivot the US attention there (and out of Europe.)
I'm not a military strategist but if one believes that the real power competition in this century is going to be played between the US and China, it would make sense to concentrate on that direction. And if so, Europe becomes a distraction.
The US performs a two-fold security function in Europe: first, it protects Europe from extra-European threats. Second, it protects Europe from intra-European threats. If however the US exits Europe, both kinds of threats become a reality overnight. When you think of what Europe is going to do if faced with any of these situations, it becomes very clear that China has absolutely nothing to offer on either front.
The extra European threat is not protected by the us anymore. And what even is an intra European threat? US is gonna intervene in a German - French war?
Ideally there would be a 20 year plan to drawdown in Europe and a replacement security architecture. I don't think there's currently any strategic vision, not that Biden had one either.
The idea that Trump’s brain is capable of producing original, substantive thoughts resembling long-term geopolitical strategies based in reality is adorable.
That's not a good-faith argument, sorry. Please be intellectually honest by attacking the strongest version of Trump you can imagine, not the weakest, brain-dead, reality-detached version of him that's easier for you to attack.
Ukraine’s situation is better than many people realize, and the US, in siding with Russia, may be betting on the wrong horse.
The EU has provided more aid to Ukraine than the US, Ukraine drone production is through the roof. Europe needs Ukraine and its army as a bulwark against Russia.
Ukraine’s situation is worse than many people realize. Ukraine is losing the war right now with roughly equal support in monetary terms from both US and EU! They have huge manpower problems because of losses and apparent political inability to mobilize enough men. Even if EU suddenly doubled its aid to compensate (which I think is _very_ unlikely), there are gaps in weapons production in Europe, e.g. for SAMs.
Manpower was always going to be their hardest-to-overcome problem in a protracted war. The relative population sizes when the war started meant they needed an extremely positive kill/death ratio (if you will) just to stay at parity.
Being on the defense and retreating gives exactly that parity. Soviet doctrine even has a number for that which is somewhat close to the ratio of Ukrainian to russian populations.
Yes, they have serious advantages from being on the defense, and a lot of other things working in their favor. I just mean that it was clear from the beginning that that was the thing that couldn't really be adjusted by aid (short of direct involvement of other militaries) and where the numbers were extremely not in their favor, so it'd be the thing to watch out for, as far as what might eventually force them to cede territory for peace or even to outright lose, even if foreign aid remained steady.
We have powerful weapons now. Manpower is not the (most) limiting factor. If the Ukraine had 10 times its current long range drone production, the Russians would start whining about peace deals.
Yes, and from the videos all over the Internet, a lot of what those weapons do is kill people. If just blowing up machines won the war, Ukraine would have declared victory in the first year.
There are lots of potential limiting factors, population's just one where Ukraine started at a big disadvantage and that can't really be made up for by foreign aid, unlike munitions or food or what have you (short of other countries outright sending troops). Weapons can be sent, but if they run short of people to use the weapons, to the point that they can't maneuver, can't credibly threaten counter-offensives, eventually can't cover the entire front... then things start to fall apart.
Like once they survived and repulsed the initial attempt at blitzkrieg, and things settled in to a stable-ish front, population is the particular figure that would tend to give you a knot in your stomach, looking at the on-paper situation from their perspective, and the prospect of a long war.
Oh, sure, mess up their logistics network enough and they'll have trouble keeping their front resupplied. I don't see evidence that it's happening yet, but sure, saturate important targets with enough bombs and it will eventually, hopefully Ukraine finds a way to do just that. I'm sure it's at least helping, even what they've managed to do so far. It might be a big part of why Russia's having trouble putting together major offensives.
I'm not disputing that there are ways to win a war other than killing all the other dudes, I'm just pointing out that if Ukraine got backed into a corner, the smart money very early on was it'd happen either because "allies all pack their bags and go home" or "they run short of manpower".
How would you categorize Russia's manpower problem, given that they need to rely on North Korea for people, have to send injured soldiers back to the front line, and suffer multiple more deaths and injuries compared to Ukraine?
It's bad, but not as dire. Russian losses are very likely higher, but if I have to guess - multiples of 2 and above are just propaganda mixed with wishful thinking. They still didn't need to resort to further rounds of mobilization since 2022 or large scale usage of conscripts. And I don't understand what "North Korea" argument even is - Ukrainians would love to rely on someone else! But no one is willing to help in this department.
I mean, are Zelensky or Syrskyi willing to share truthful information with you in private? If so - good for you, otherwise I'm not sure what "first hand" reports you can use. I'm relying mostly on data about obituaries collected on both sides as proxy for true figures.
If you use Russian recruitment and army size numbers, you get much more realistic figures https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ja6-espHVSE. Russia is up to ~700k to 800k casualties Russia has lost ~3-4x more people than Ukraine so far.
I think that's probably a good estimate for the Russian side, while 200k casualties total for Ukraine is a joke. Aren't even their official figures for wounded in the 400k range?
Ukraine didn't release casualty figures for a long time (though to be fair, Russia government doesn't exactly post daily casualty figures either, the Russian casualty figure is divined by infering what we can from Russian media), the Western press released a figure for the Ukrainian forces, which is probably quite low, and the figure hasn't increased in almost a year.
It's sort of like how Western press has been claiming for over a year that 20,000 people have perished in Gaza, and the figure never goes up.
This is the most recorded war in history and I know someone(History Legends)offering a good amount if you can show him videos of these Russian meat wave attacks .
sometimes yes, sometimes no. In both US iraq wars, the US had way fewer casualties than Iraq. Invading is harder than defending, but a country won't invade unless they think they are likely to succeed with acceptable losses.
first hand reports from friends who are fighting the war every day.
I'm sure the very lacking obituaries that Russia is actively fighting to suppress will give you a better picture.
They're trying to avoid extensive drafts in their power-base cities for fear of unrest. Plus that's their reserve if they need to supply a second front for any reason.
> How would you categorize Russia's manpower problem
As strained, but not as bad as Ukraine's.
Russia's population is over 140 million. That's 100 million more than Ukraine's pre-war population. Russia's territory isn't meaningfully compromised, their cities aren't in ruin, their industry is mostly intact. They haven't sustained something like 15-25% population loss from people fleeing the way Ukraine has.
North Koreans aren't in Russia because Russia is out of guys. Putin just wants to avoid wider scale conscription/mobilization if he can help it and will take other options first
That's why earlier stages of this war involved ex-convict Wagnerite units, mercenaries from the third world, local militias raised from the "people's republics" in Donetsk and Luhansk, and conscription when necessary from poorer ethnic minority regions far away from Moscow and St. Petersburg.
> North Koreans aren't in Russia because Russia is out of guys. Putin just wants to avoid wider scale conscription/mobilization if he can help it and will take other options first
This is correct and shockingly obvious given the initial invasion used mercenaries. It's a straightforward exchange with an ally that benefits Russia the most and is great PR for NK, internally and locally.
At this point in time would anyone bet against US troops going in and "peacekeeping" for Putin against Ukraine? It seems pretty clear that the US is aligned against the West now.
Almost everything pouring out of his mouth today is replaying what is in Russian state media sadly.
The US is not "aligned against the West". The US is simply breaking from the ideology it's had since WW2 that it's in the US' best interest to get involved in every international conflict in the world.
You'd think that the left would be ecstatic about that considering how much it's criticized US involvement in other countries conflicts, but here we are - it's the left that is trashing the US for not wanting to get involved.
> The US is simply breaking from the ideology it's had since WW2 that it's in the US' best interest to get involved in every international conflict in the world.
The publicized ideology, is not always the reality. The US has always been involved with every international conflict. The CIA was the formalization of the interest.
I mean that ideology is, practically speaking, what "the West" is.
But certainly in the UK it was a party of "the left" that invaded Iraq with the US. It was a party of "the left" that invaded Afghanistan with the US. And it was a party of "the left" that is now bolstering the military after a decade of decline by a party of "the right".
"The left" were fighting fascism across Europe in the last century, from the International Brigade in Spain to the Soviets against Hitler.
The actual problem The West has now is that the guarantor of military power has gone. Trump and Vance were literally shouting propaganda from Russian state media to Zelensky (look up starting WW3, or VIP tours) and making false equivalency between being invaded and defending your country.
Trump has carried out the biggest rug-pull in history and aligned the USA with Russia. Against The West.
> I mean that ideology is, practically speaking, what "the West" is.
This makes no sense. The current ideology is only 70 years old. The "West" has existed for centuries before that.
Maybe you're young and you think there are no options but the current path, but I can assure you there is.
The truth is that the US (or Europe) is not willing to go head to head with Russia. They have neither the public support or the willingness to take the economic hit.
So if they aren't willing to defeat Russia, what is the only possible outcome? A negotiated peace.
So rather than grinding up another few hundred thousand human lives in the war and end up in the same place a few years from now, why not just finish it now?
Because appeasing aggressors never works? I mean, we literally took the appeasement route when he annexed Crimea. A few years later and here we are. Guess what happens when we appease him now?
The term The West applies to those countries born out of European heritage which _assumed_ semi-direct lineage from the Graeco-Roman empires of Antiquity (notably the Late Antique split in the early church across Eastern/Western lines). Like all political terms it's in constant flux, but yes, today it largely means the superset of NATO + Five Eyes countries.
Vance's Munich speech and the Whitehoust confrontation yesterday confirms that the USA has turned its back on the west - you only have to see the reaction of world leaders to see that - outside of Orban, the only people congratulating Trump were Putin and Lavrov. Who could singlehandedly stop the war - right now - by pulling their troops out of a sovereign, democratic state.
Not sure what my age has to do with anything but I was bought up during the Cold War if that helps.
Who said anything about appeasing? Fighting for the best peace deal you can is not "appeasing".
NATO is never going to escalate with Russia to the point Ukraine gets all it's territory back - and Putin knows that. NATO isn't stupid - Ukraine isn't worth expanding the war beyond Ukraine into Eastern Europe. They have neither the financial resources nor the support back home. They are willing to sacrifice Ukrainian lives, but not their own grip on power.
So if we know how this all ends - Ukraine giving up territory in exchange for peace, then why not pursue that instead of throwing another million lives and hundred billion dollars into the chipper and getting the same deal in 3 years instead?
> Vance's Munich speech and the Whitehoust confrontation yesterday confirms that the USA has turned its back on the west
No, it means the US is turning it's back on the neoliberal geopolitical position that grinding down competing powers through proxy wars is always worth it in the end. George Kennan died long ago, and it's time to let his geopolitical strategy die too.
It's a position that only existed since WW2, and one that has gotten the US involved in dozens of wars since then, often at a greater cost than the benefit in the end (e.g. Vietnam, Iraq).
How is it not appeasing when "finding the best peace deal" equals "letting an agressor state keep a chip of neighboring state", even more so when this repeats every few years?
Read again what Putin's stated aims are. Hoping for a peace deal with a totalitarian, expansive state does not work. It didn't work when it was "just Crimea", it won't work when it's "just some towns they took by force".
It's utterly naive, given all his history, to think Putin will just acquiesce.
Even if your geopolitical assumptions are correct, Trump and Vance's behaviour yesterday - humiliating a war leader in front of the worlds media, using the rhetoric and tropes of the invaders he is facing was unbelievably disgusting.
Also, please don't forget what Putin's stated aims are - reconquest of Russian border back to pre 1930 limits (maybe you understand why Polish defence spending is at 5% GDP) and the breakup of the EU. These are his aims - he doesn't just want that little bit of Ukraine he has - parts of Poland, Finland, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia all are at stake.
Ukraine is _stalling_ the war right now. Russia is able to capture more moonscaped villages by forcing expendable (their words, not mine) manpower to assault Ukrainian positions.
Ukraine is slowly retreating, but at the rate that will require Russia _years_ to gain a meaningful amount of territory.
The military experts I listen to all more or less agree that the focus on territory is just wrong. It's a war of attrition unsustainable in the long run for both sides, the question is who runs out of resources first (or if there is some sort of ceasefire before that). Germany famously lost such a war a century ago without losing any territory!
For China, a balkanized nuclear Russia may be a greater threat than supplying them manpower (due to surplus men and civil unrest) and materiel. I would not expect Russia to run into the WW1 germany problem.
There's no evidence of a substantial number of Chinese nationals serving in the Russian military, rather then just a few notable examples. The largest foreign troop commitment by state-sanction was the North Koreans, which were about ~10,000 strong and have since been withdrawn (after heavy losses).
Yes, and the point I'm making is that (1) Chinese nationals have served, indicating that Beijing at least tacitly approves mercenary actions and (2) China can increase deployment if needed by either economic or prisoner release coercion.
This is a meatgrinder conflict. If China can reduce its dissident or potentially rebellious population while avoiding a collapse of Russia mirroring WW1 Germany, they may very well (and I would argue are likely) do so.
That doesn't follow: Ukraine has the international legion (probably about 3,500 people in country last I checked) and a number of Russian groups fighting on behalf of Ukraine.
The only thing Chinese nationals fighting for Russia tells us is that China is not expressly limiting freedom of movement to do so...but there has also been at least 1 American who tried to join Russia to fight Ukraine (and was tortured to death by the Russians on suspicion of being a spy for his trouble).
First, 3,500 is a drop in the bucket. Second, just because China hasn't yet mobilized doesn't mean they won't if they feel a line is crossed like they did in Korea.
With a country like China, everything is on the table
> (1) Chinese nationals have served, indicating that Beijing at least tacitly approves mercenary actions
I wouldn't assume a small number of Chinese nationals volunteering to fight for Russia means China approves of their actions. Several Australians ended up fighting for ISIS in Syria and Iraq, that doesn't mean the Australian government approves of Australians fighting for ISIS, it just means it failed in those cases to stop them – it didn't realise they planned to do that before they left the country, or they didn't decide to do it until after they were already living overseas.
And one difference, is obviously Australia and ISIS are sworn enemies, so when Australians volunteered to fight for ISIS, the Australian government could openly condemn their action. Whereas, China and Russia are allies, so even if China disapproves of its citizens volunteering to fight for Russia, it can't condemn them publicly because it would harm the alliance.
China isn't sending a "small number"; casualties alone have supposedly reached into the hundreds (see this account: https://x.com/whyyoutouzhele/ you will need to go back awhile) and recruiting is heavily concentrated among former PLA.
Make no mistake: if China wanted to shut this down it could.
> China isn't sending a "small number"; casualties alone have supposedly reached into the hundreds
I think the word "supposedly" is important here – I don't think we have any hard data on how many Chinese volunteers there are serving with Russia.
And I'd question how big a military contribution these Chinese volunteers are making. Russia has hundreds of thousands of troops fighting in this war, even a thousand Chinese volunteers would be less than 1%.
> Make no mistake: if China wanted to shut this down it could.
Even if the Chinese government is willing to "turn a blind eye" to this going on at a low volume, that doesn't mean they'd let it grow to a significantly higher volume.
It also isn't clear whether this is a deliberate initiative from the very top, or something that has grown organically bottom-up and the people at the top have decided to let it be for now rather than crack down on it.
Which military experts? If you listen to actually knowledgeable people like Kofman it's been known forever that 2024 would be (and as we now are seeing from Russia being pushed back) Russia's peak. Russia is out of equipment and is starting to get similar problems with manpower. In the meantime Europe's investments are starting to pay off and allow Ukraine to pull ahead in 2025.
Ukraine is sending troops over 26 or so years old now. They will need to dip into their prime-aged young population eventually, the 18-to-26-year-olds. That will be a hard moral choice they apparently want to avoid, but perhaps necessary.
As a graybeard with teenage kids, this is terribly disheartening... I would rather be cannon fodder than my sons. After all, I have already reproduced and I have taught hundreds of youngsters all what I knew. I would gladly accept that my contribution to mankind is already done and gone, before seeing one of my children go to war. Is youth so important for soldiers? Wouldn't it be better to send forty and fifty year olds to the front? Anything before 18-26 youngs? It makes no sense. Are they so much more competent than any random middle-age?
Ukraine has churned all their greybeards and middle age folks, and 18+ are the only ones not conscripted yet. (Hence Trump's comment that Ukraine is having manpower issues and has no strong cards left for negotiations)
It hasn't any strong cards only because the west (which is now Europe - the US is almost at Russias side now) is trickling the weapons supply. Open the taps!
What's the point of more recruits when the existing ones don't get enough training and adequate equipment? Ukraine needs weapons far more than it needs manpower.
All these 18 year old cohort - they dont exist in Ukraine anymore, a lot of them escaped Ukraine while they were minors before reaching 18, because this issue of conscripting 18+ has been discussed for quite a while.
If you look at the reports from Ukraine high schools - its all girls class, no boys
There are pros and cons. I live in Canada now, and one major downside is that, because technically I would be an international student, I cannot afford a university. The tuition fee for international students is through the roof. But, ultimately, leaving Ukraine was a correct decision, because otherwise I would have ended up fighting Russia. In summary, it sucks but could have been worse.
You are correct. But, ironically, unlike in Ukraine, in Canada and probably in the US, entry-level jobs (also known as internships) are reserved for undergraduate students. You could call this is another downside of leaving Ukraine.
At least in the US, you can just make something complicated enough to show some skill and get a real job. That's what I did, anyway. I used to work in a factory.
Yeah, that's what I think too. I have been working on a project[0] to do just that, would you mind commenting if my project is something that can be considered complicated enough? In your experience, were you not blocked by the fact that companies are looking for "years of professional experience"?
Yeah no worries, I was wondering why the threads didn't show up and found the bot profile where it said it's actually the first weekday of the month, so it's all good.
There are almost no boys left in senior classes of Ukrainian schools. This was reported by the publication "Strana.ua" on the Telegram channel with reference to blogger Alena Yakhno.
As the blogger said, the 17-year-old son of her friend studies in Kiev , but all his classmates have left. "Only girls are left in the class. There will be no moral. It's just a fact," she wrote.
The publication recalled that upon reaching the age of 18, young people from Ukraine are no longer allowed to go abroad. In addition, the report notes, information about Ukrainian schoolchildren aged 16-17 leaving Ukraine en masse has appeared before.
Earlier, the Verkhovna Rada reported on hundreds of thousands of schoolchildren who left the country before the start of the school year. According to MP Nina Yuzhina, about 300 thousand students, mostly high school students, left Ukraine in July and August. In addition, due to the departure of young people, 2,114 schools have been closed in Ukraine over the past four years.
You can count how many high school children there are in Ukraine. There is something like 4 millions now, so the loss of a couple hundred of students of both sexes does not make classes girls only.
People, families with kids, leave Ukraine, because living in a country during war is not nice, to say the least. The fear of mobilization is only one aspect of it.
I don't know if original claim is true or not in general, but lenta.ru in particular is a poor source of information, it's heavily skewed into Russian-government side.
The media operation Strana is mentioned as the source for the lenta.ru story.
Strana is sanctioned and banned by the Ukrainian government, though Ukraine government hands out a lot of media bans.
It's a bummer that just about every media outlet in Ukraine is either tightly linked to Russian propaganda, or on the other side its mostly super pro Ukrainian (formerly funded by USAID) outlets with ties to weird libertarian billionaires who want to turn Ukraine into free market paradise. Hardly any middle ground.
Just think about it logically, if you are a mother of 16 y.o kid, and USA says you must conscript 18+ y.o to receive any further aid - would you just sit and wait for your child to get drafted on his next birthday?
oh totally, I would leave immediately. I financially helped a family with teenage kids smuggle themselves out of Ukraine to a different country a few months into the recent invasion.
And that will cost Russia a great deal. This has turned into a war that heavily favors defenders. Both sides are dug in, with a wide no-mans-land between the front lines, where anyone who enters is likely to get killed by a drone.
Ukraine has been loosing a three-day-special operation for three years.
Russia's refinery's are getting hit and all that crude oil is worthless with a refinery. In the case of the campaign again Nazi Germany's refineries funny enough it's the allies who didn't think it as critical as the Nazis did https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oil_campaign_of_World_War_II#O...
Ukraine knows the future of warfare and will prosper if they survive this. They will be the ones with the technology and experience in future warfare, and the USA is throwing away a chance to partner with Ukraine and guarantee such a victory.
In 20, 15, or 7 years from now when terrorists are sending drones into medium-sized cities in Alabama to kill indiscriminately, it would have been better for the USA to have been on Ukraine's side.
>In 20, 15, or 7 years from now when terrorists are sending drones into medium-sized cities in Alabama to kill indiscriminately, it would have been better for the USA to have been on Ukraine's side.
Spot on. This is what Zelenskyy implied when he said "now you have an ocean but one day you'll know how it feels". But the dumb kakistocrat commander-in-chief took it personally.
By the way remember the New Jersey drone sightings that spooked the East Coast for a week? That was likely the government secretly testing defense deployement against a hypothetical drone swarms attack.
I have assumed the same about the gatwick airport shutdown caused by drones in the UK in 2018. Newspapers saying "No culprit ever found" says "results of military exercise are classified" to me...
The value of having a front-row seat to this, from a doctrine and R&D point of view, is staggeringly high. Anyone who's getting copied on the reports is going to be a full generation ahead of countries that aren't.
... that goes for Russia's partners, too. Meaning it's even more important for us.
Trump is the commander in chief. Top military leadership who disagree with him will be forced to retire, and replaced with loyalists, if they haven't been already.
I agree, no coup. On the other hand, if we the US keep changing alliances at the whim of what are essentially twitterheads, we could end up having ZERO allies.
Beau of the Fifth Column (Youtube channel for Justin King) would always emphasize (before he relinquished it all for his wife "Belle of the Ranch" to take over) that international relations are usually well-orchestrated, even between enemies, with speeches and releases using heavily coded language, to minimize the possibilities of conflict. Friends and enemies both would telegraph to some degree their intentions, their protestations, their agreements, and shifting policies ... very very carefully.
Trump, Vance, Musk ... have upended this all with their amateur hour antics. They are not serious people. They think they can rewrite the rules but they've bought us at least a decade of hurt and isolation on the international stage, and likely worse economic prospects for a while. Nobody will trust us, even if saner leadership comes round in a few years.
Betting on the wrong horse while Xi just has to stand aside to see the crown of superpower being handed to him with no effort, Russia on the road to implode in a fire sale, while China looks to sign lucrative trade agreements with the EU.
Brexit was shooting yourself in the foot, today was a gruesome display of diplomatic suicide on live television.
The EU could end up taking that crown if they handle this well.
Firstly of course, they need to be united, steadfast and decisive in their support for Ukraine until Russia collapses. They should be building new alliances, with India, South America, and any free countries in Africa and Asia. And maybe some unfree ones. Possibly even China, because let's face it, despite its many flaws, China is not the threat to Europe that Russia is. A wedge between China and Russia would weaken Russia and help the EU.
Then, after Russia collapses and the US has withdrawn from the world stage, it will be the EU that saved Ukraine, just like after WW2, the new super powers where the US and USSR that defeated Germany. And Ukraine has a lot to offer that the EU lacks.
The EU is incredibly powerful. Biggest common market in the world, half a billion people, 2nd largest military in the world if they put it all together. The EU just needs to learn to flex its muscles, to unite and assert itself, instead of hiding behind the US.
The ascent of Europe is the sort of outcome I might hope for — speaking as an American who believes in American values that my country no longer represents.
Speaking of religion and Europe ... while not in Latin America I spent a few years growing up here and there in Arizona, my parents being ministers in a pentecostal church. All the pentecostal and charismatic churches were in thrall of the Hal Lindsey book "Late Great Planet Earth" [0] and other prophetic books trying to map nations/geographies from the Book of Revelation / Apocalypse to the then-day international power structure. "Sister Drew", our local in-congregation prophecy expert, would relay the latest findings. From what I remember, the idea was that Russia and Europe were to fight it out, Europe being the seat of the Antichrist's power, and somehow the Vatican was embroiled in it too.
Europe was supposed to be the "late stage" of human civilization, from Daniel's Old Testament dream of the human-form statue. The head of gold was the pinnacle of civilization, Babylon. The silver chest and arms were Persia. The belly and thighs were the Greek Empire. The legs of iron were the Roman Empire, resurrected as the fractious European Common Market (now European Union) in the feet of "iron mixed with clay".
The USA was variously portrayed as the Great Wh*re of Babylon, or else had some heroic role of some kind in these End Times.
At some point, all nations would stop fighting each other and join together to turn on Israel. Israel would be doomed but for God's intervention. From Daniel's dream, a pebble would form from nothing, grow to be a mighty boulder, and smash the feet of iron and clay (Europe, and by proxy godless humanity) and the rest of human civilization in form of the statue would crumble. The mighty boulder being ... Jesus. Israel would be mostly destroyed but a rescued "remnant", faithful Christians would be raptured / taken to heaven, the World would End ... and eventually all humanity would be judged for eternal salvation or punishment.
Wacky, fringe stuff ... EXCEPT THAT THESE BELIEFS ARE SO RELEVANT TO OUR PRESENT POLITICAL SITUATION IN THE USA. Check out the book "The Violent Take It by Force: The Christian Movement That Is Threatening Our Democracy" by Matthew D Taylor [1]. In this book and various podcasts Taylor describes the origins, religious and political philosophy, and current political power of the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR). No NAR church / congregation will claim the moniker today, but it remains a perfect description of the structure, leadership, and influence of this movement. The Bebbington Quadrilaterial splits "evangelicals" in the USA (and internationally) into four groups based on measures along two axes ... the "denominational vs non-denominational", and "charistmatic vs non-charistmatic". I grew up in in the denominational charismatic square, where churches believe in and expect the miraculous, but also belong to a centralized denomination with standards and accountability. The NAR congregations fit in the non-denominational charistmatic square, have a very authoritarian leadership structure with "apostles and prophets" at the top of each organization, and with a forest of MLM trees of such organizations, with no accountability at all for the "apostles" (c.f. the Mike Bickle scandal, and so many others, where people got away with abuse for years). In any case, in 2015 Trump's "spiritual advisor" Paula White (in early 2025 now is head of the White House Faith Council) gathered many apostles in this NAR movement around Trump, to throw their weight behind his candidacy and make him an acceptable candidate for their brand of evangelicals, and to pull in low-information evangelicals of other stripes behind his candidacy. And hence ... a conversation today between Trump and Zelensky, and many other knock-on effects.
Note that the NAR proposes to take over the world through their Seven Mountains Mandate, to "Bring Heaven to Earth", and usher in the End of Time. Of course, Trump does not believe any of this, but the evangelical power base is extremely loyal to him.
>China is not the threat to Europe that Russia is. A wedge between China and Russia would weaken Russia and help the EU
It gets interesting when you realize that Russia is also a rival to China in Northeast Asia. A balkanized Russia, like the one the EU could have manifested had it took Russia warnings seriously and brought about decisive action after troops were invading Crimea. But no they lived in their "End of History" fantasy and that virtuous liberties will magically be spread if we just trade goods and ideas between spheres of influence.
Of course this reality will be bad for our allies in Asia (ie. Japan, SK, Taiwan). But maybe this time it'll wake up some in America from becoming isolationist again.
I see SK and Japan also as necessary allies for the EU. But if China decides to take Taiwan, I don't think there's anything the EU could possibly hope to do about it; Taiwan remains independent because the US guarantees their independence. If Trump were to withdraw that guarantee too, I don't think there's anything that can save Taiwan.
It sucks, but the EU has more urgent problems closer to home. All I can hope for is that Trump hates China enough that he'll continue to guarantee Taiwan's freedom. But I'm sure at some point he's going to ask them for some more material "thanks" too.
But yeah, the EU's relationship with China should not be the same as that with other allies. But I think there's room for some cooperation, and the EU might not object too loudly if China were to take outer Manchuria back, for example.
Honestly I don't think I can see China taking Taiwan militarily. They witnessed how the world isolated Russia economically after the aggression on Ukraine and especially since their economy relies on exports. They don't have much to win other than some geopolitical credit at the expense of their manufacturing and technology sector.
China is conducting a policy where they'll cripple Taiwan's will to seek independence from just sheer soft and economic power. They offer fantastic perks to Taiwanese from the oppurtinity to work visa free, access to credit/mortgage with no social credit screening and ability to invest with no usual red tape.
The Taiwanese are being told China is an aggressor but nowadays they see the opposite. Also if China invades it'll destroy every goodwill they had built to win over Taiwanese hearts and won't get control over TSMC supply chain market since the latter promised to torpefy their fabs before China gets its hand on them.
> 2nd largest military in the world if they put it all together
Military industrial capacity is Europe's main problem right now. I believe they're ramping up production, but it's going to take years. They may end up having to buy the arms from the US in the meantime if they want to aid Ukraine. If it gets to that, the question is whether they give China some business.
I'm not so sure that's a realistic option when there's US officials saying to allies they should buy less US equipment.[1] It doesn't inspire confidence.
> A British defence figure, who is not part of the government, was told privately by US officials that it should “recalibrate” its reliance on US equipment.
And then there's this.
> They said that a US administration could put restrictions on kit from the US and that if countries are “deemed not to be doing what you are told you will suddenly find out missiles won’t fire and planes won’t fly. You have got to be careful.”
When allies buy less US equipment, what happens to the US citizens employed in the defence industry?
Seriously, I'm wondering who is going to be a more dangerous geopolitical foe for Europe going forward, the US or China. The ascendant forces in the in the US are pro-Russia, and that's not likely to change in the near term. Unlike China, though, we haven't sold military hardware to Russia. Yet.
I'm not so sure China is a threat to Europe. They're as far away from each other as they can possibly be. Sure, Europe is upset about China's human rights record, and their cheap manufacturing circumventing EU rules, and maybe also the economic influence China is trying to gain over other countries (Africa, central Asia), but it's not a threat to Europe itself, which Russia clearly is, and the US could become, if Trump decides to join Russia.
If the US turns, Europe may have to ally with China.
EU is a lot looser union of sovereign nations than USA, where the states are federal. California or Texas do not have their separate foreign policies; France and Germany do.
I don't see "EU taking that crown" happening any time soon, sadly. With the ascent of (often Russia sponsored) far-right nationalist parties, this is even less likely.
Why are you acting as if China is a benign bystander in this? They literally sided with Russia in the very beginning of the war, including notifying Putin of intelligence the US shared with them in the months leading up to the war.
You also seem to be yet another person predicting Russia's "collapse", which is a prediction I've been hearing since a few years after Putin took control.
In an ideal world I'd agree with you, but the world is unfortunately very far removed from that. You don't have to agree with everything to look for common ground in other areas. Support the good, criticize the bad.
True. Well, I still don't disagree with the initial policy of opening trade with Russia. It's just that Europe should have realized much earlier that in Putin's hands, Russia was becoming more hostile again. And after they invaded Georgia and Ukraine in 2008 and 2014, they should have cut ties immediately, and not invest in more ties.
Though I suppose you could argue the same is true after China's expansion into the South China Sea. But even then, China isn't remotely as aggressive, expansionist or hostile as Russia is. And their government, although totalitarian and unfree, is at least competent. Although Xi's narcissism and vanity are definitely a bad sign.
Trump's approach is probably going to work partially in the short term. - The US is very powerful, a lot of countries are reliant on them, so bullying can be used to extract benefits. They got their plane thingy with Colombia, Mexico didn't react much to the preludes of military action against the cartels. The US could annex the Panama Canal and Greenland.
There's a reason why hawks like Bolton and Cheney are against it. It harms US interests in the mid-to-long-term. To me it seems like the Trump adminstration is a) trying to distract from their domestic agenda and b) isolate the US internationally and create new external foes to justify domestic changes.
China sided with Russia from the very beginning of the war, including notifying Putin as soon as the US revealed their intelligence in a meeting with Xi before the invasion. Interesting how quickly you forget this inconvenient detail in the narrative you've constructed in your head.
Oh is China going to guarantee Ukraine's security now?
At the end of the day, Zelensky had the most obvious proposition in the world -- allow American companies access to Ukrainian minerals. He kept asking for a security guarantee as if he needed anything more.
If he expected Trump or Vance to publicly announce they would go to war with nuclear-armed Russia over these mineral deals, then he's not fit to be president of any country.
The security implication was obvious... if Russia threatened American mining operations, the United States would obviously respond.
But the demand that Trump say he would go to war with Russia.. what purpose would that possibly serve? Anyone with two brain cells to rub together knows the implication.
So maybe he can now turn to China, but I'll tell you that China's propositions for Ukraine's rare earth minerals will likely have Ukraine losing a lot more sovereignty than the scenarios where America took them over instead of the one where Russia wins.
Colonize it while it remains nominally Russian, would be a pretty good move. "Sick Man of Europe"-style. "Oh we British are just, just, like, helping the Ottomans administer Egypt, we're good chaps like that"
Other regions are comparable, 2-3 million rubles ($20000-$30000) are available in several more regions. Then there's a federal one-time payment of 500000 rubles ($5000) and a monthly salary of $2000.
Not exactly to get enrolled, but in Moscow websites officially advertize 2300000 rub to sign, which is about $25000. Then monthly payment is 190000 rub so for first year it'll be about $50000 which is 5 to 10 times more than average salary (depending on the region). Initial bonus for enrollment is city-dependent but as far as I understand anyone can just travel to Moscow and sign in there.
I heard that volonteer numbers right now are pretty high so army became more selective - people expect that war will end soon and hope to get sign in bonus without spending much time on the battlefield, if any.
Most informed analysts say Russia has the opposite problem. They don't have any more meat for the grinder without tapping the middle and upper class of Russian citizens, which will have repercussions, potentially serious ones, for Putin.
Well, North Korea benefits from getting experience and field-testing radios and winter underwear. The drone environment is very good advertising for their goal of becoming a major arms dealer.
Yes, North Korea gains immediate benefit (money or material aid) and a theoretical delayed benefit (demonstration of mercenary abilities, and real world experience for their troops if they survive). Russia gains bodies to throw against bullets. If every North Korean soldier died but took several bullets for Russian soldiers, it's a win for Russia. They do not care about the North Korean soldiers or North Korea.
The regions Russia is taking from Ukraine have some value in terms of GDP. It's interesting that the Freudian slip US offering involved an additional minerals deal (as in, this is the main interest of the taking parties). Russia is not going to give back GDP, and that's probably behind the break in negotiations. Russia is not relinquishing any gains, and the US wants more resources, and there is no guarantee given to Ukraine regarding its remaining territorial integrity. They are trying to make Ukraine eat shit.
I follow a lot of Ukrainian commentary, it's hard for me to conclude Ukraine is doing well.
They're having to conscript younger and younger people every day.
No business is insane enough to invest in Ukraine at the moment.
Some companies are crazy enough to try to ship goods in and out of Odesa, but its significantly less than pre-war.
Every time the Ukrainian army tries to take back territory in the Donbas, the Russian army repels their forward strikes, and usually takes a few more feet of the Donbas in the process.
It's really hard to win a war of attrition against the largest country in the world.
The Russian army occupies some of the largest energy sources of Ukraine. I haven't investigated recently but I suspect Russia is still Ukraine's largest LNG provider.
Ukraine doesn't consume Russian LNG. As of January 2025, the LNG transitting Ukraine for Russia has stopped because Ukraine refused to renew the deal.
No, Ukraine is not in a position to reclaim significant ground. The state of the war is such that any offensive action is ruinously expensive, and while Russia is willing to pay that price, the fact that they're shipping North Koreans in to pay that cost rather than generally mobilize speaks volumes about the state they're in. Interest rates are at 21%; food inflation at 30%; unemployment at 2%, which indicates a severe labour shortage. They're destroying their own economy to grab just a few more feet before it unravels at home.
Meanwhile, Rheinmetall is launching joint ventures and building factories in Ukraine because they have the most warfighting experience of anyone right now and are leading the world in drone combat. Ukraine is still not conscripting anyone under 25, which is a large pool of recruits they've held in reserve. And after today, Europe is making a conspicuous show up increasing spending and standing behind Ukraine.
They can't kick Russia out, but they can certainly hold on longer than Russia with the ongoing support of Europe, and the way Zelensky was treated today has been a huge morale boost for standing firm.
Yes, plus Ukraine learnt a lesson when the GOP stalled aid and they ran low on supplies, so they have stockpiled and domestic production has increased. It's a war of attrition and so both sides are hoping to keep going until the other collapses. The US withdrawing support is a victory for Russian, but it won't end the war. What happens with sanctions might, but also without the US telling them what to do the gloves will be off Ukraine.
So much for stopping the war in 24hrs. Trump's plans were never going to work there, and both Russian and Ukraine were going to try and make it look like the failure was not their fault - guess Russian won that particular battle, maybe it was never even a contest.
This is not a popular analysis. Russia has ramped up their war machine significantly over the last 2 years and have been successfully grinding Ukraine down. They can and will continue to do this. They’ve reoriented their economy around sustained military production, and the tariffs issued against Russia by the US and EU have proven to be ineffective.
> Ukraine’s situation is better than many people realize
What makes you say that? I thought it was generally agreed that Ukraine has been on the back foot for a while now. People used to be quite optimistic about Ukraine recovering the occupied territories.
Ukraine isn't likely to recover much territory. But Russia will have a hard time taking more territory. At this point the war favors the defenders in either direction. Both sides are dug in and attackers get hammered by drones.
Russia was supposed to win easily right away. There is a huge size difference.
But if the little guy, even thought has been on back foot since the beginning, has lasted 10 rounds, and still hitting back. They are on the back foot. But now it starts looking like a win could happen. The underdog wins the crowd right? Now looks like US is the bully.
Current (by some of course) long-term analysis is that Ukraine is better commited to a long-term strategy of fiercely defending its rights, and it can grind Russia long term.
If you like Game Theory, is more as if Ukraine is much more prone to Total War than Russia possible will. Russia is spending their own GDP maintaining the war, Ukraining is "spending" its infrastructure but has foreign money being poured in.
That's why USA withdraw by Trump is so important to Russian interests.
There are two truths when it comes to Ukraine. The one quietly stated in dispassionate terms by actual military and geopolitical analysts which is that in the long run Ukraine loses in virtually every scenario, but it’s in everyone except Ukraine’s best interest to drag it out and for the West to weaken Russia via aid without the political fallout of actually putting boots on the ground.
Then there’s the “Ukraine will win as long as we keep sending aid” truth that the pubic needs to believe in order to accomplish that goal of weakening Russia since the alternative is Ukraine still loses but Russia doesn’t suffer for it.
I suspect someone misguidedly told Trump the first one, and his takeaway was that if Ukraine loses anyway, why should the American taxpayer be funding needless deaths.
This does not account for what can happen in Russia itself. There's this widespread belief that Russia is stable, no matter what.
If that were true, why would Putin take such extreme care for the elites in Moscow and St Petersburg? What is he afraid of? We don't need to know exactly what, but we can conclude he probably has a good reason.
Russia is not stable. The economy is creaking. Unsound, favourable loans are being made to corrupt companies who pocket as much cash as they dare while they deliver as little they can, Soviet style. Something is gonna give eventually, probably to the sound of drones over Moscow becoming the new normal.
Credit to Biden who set the tone. He was very fast and forceful in backing Ukraine even when the general assumption was that they had no chance. Europe was willing to step up since then and will have to carry them from now on.
He was pretty wishy washy and would never say he'd like Ukraine to win and get their land back. The UK generally led at the start sending missiles and tanks and the Biden was embarrassed into matching it.
If only that credit had any weight against his equally quick decision to fund a Zionist genocide against Palestine, and engage in administrative subterfuge, Doublespeak and Ministry of Truth type shit about the true nature of the conflict.
The insane AI-generated one he posted to his socials the other day outlining his vague plan to profit off the suffering of Palestinians by building a utopia resort? What a world we are living in.
It's a weird world that objecting to genocide makes you an antisemite now.
Don't support Netanyahu's weaponization of the word antisemite. It endangers Jews everywhere, and does not help Israel. It only helps Netanyahu silence his critics.
Some people cannot understand that a country, its people, and its government are all completely separate things. Other people pretend not to understand.
Regardless of which, the person you're replying to has decided to be on the wrong side of history. I will not be shamed into silently supporting genocide in the name of a made-believe invisible man in the sky.
“the US, in siding with Russia, may be betting on the wrong horse”
This is delusional. Russia would’ve bulldozed Ukraine without US support. What county is under US sanctions? What country is receiving US weapons? Which, to be sure, is the correct choice. And having public spars with Ukraine is not.
But the fact that someone just typed this out and posted it is just so delusional. The fact that people upvoted this is delusional.
On March 16, 2014, the President issued Executive Order
13661, which expanded the scope of the national emergency
declared in Executive Order 13660, and found that the actions
and policies of the Government of the Russian Federation with
respect to Ukraine undermine democratic processes and
institutions in Ukraine; threaten its peace, security,
stability, sovereignty, and territorial integrity; and
contribute to the misappropriation of its assets.
…Therefore… I [Trump]… am continuing… Execute Order 13660.
I don’t know why this pisses me off so much. Ostensibly we agree broadly. It’s just, HN really used to have such good nuanced and factual discussions, even outside tech. Now it’s all just raw anger.
There's a difference between "siding with Russia" and siding with negotiated peace.
Many people seem to think that the US, and to a lesser extent the EU, should fund this war indefinitely. However, the US clearly does not benefit from a direct war with Russia, and while we may gain from a proxy war, choosing not to fund it does not equate to “siding with Russia.”
Negotiated peace was what Russia and Ukraine had before, and Russia unilaterally broke it.
That is why the focus now is on security guarantees, which the U.S. is refusing so far. Without those, anything negotiated is a gift to Russia, specifically the gift of time to regroup and re-arm for another attack later on.
Lasting peace is not created by concessions, it is created when instigators believe they have more to lose than to gain from further violence.
It is an absurd position that the US should be on the hook to indefinitely pay for any war anywhere in the world forever, and if they attempt to negotiate peace while pulling out of that war that they are siding with the opposition.
The problem is not that the U.S. is trying to negotiate for peace, the problem is that the administration is doing a hilariously bad job of it by giving up all leverage right off the bat.
We don't have any leverage against Russia. America has no appetite to fight them directly. If Ukraine were more effective at hurting Russia where it counts, then we might have leverage but the last few years have shown that they are not capable of that.
US should be on the hook to indefinitely pay for a particular war that resulted out of a diplomatic agreement (Budapest memorandum) that effectively prevented Ukraine from defending itself by making it surrender its nukes in exchange for nebulous security guarantees that weren't honored by US.
I think it's a fine rule of thumb but what does Putin have to gain from negotiating with Zelenskyy who he is seen as a Western puppet orchestrated as legacy of US intel agency involvement? (Which we admitted is true…)
People in this thread are completely incapable of seeing any legitimacy in any Russian concerns about Ukraine.
Whether someone's concerns are legitimate is in the eye of the beholder, but actions can be directly observed. Unilateral violent invasion must not become a legitimate tactic again. It was the norm for centuries, and excluding it resulted in the fastest rise in global living standards in history--including in the U.S. and Russia.
Putin could have kicked back and enjoyed his dacha like other less powerful dictators do all over the world, but no, he had to write a "scientific" treatise about Ruski Mir and how the Ukraine isn't actually a thing. He wants a legacy.
Well, he got it and whatever happens in the war, Russia is cooked. It's never coming back from this.
It will either fracture from the war going badly, or it will become a vassal state of China, and ironically, perhaps the US, the way things are going with the White House these days.
The other powerful “dictators” get dragged through the streets or hanged for daring to enjoy an economic system outside the US dollar. Putin knows this and so should you.
> That is why the focus now is on security guarantees, which the U.S. is refusing so far.
This seems obvious to me, but is apparently not obvious to many here.... America (no country really) can guarantee Ukrainian security without risking WWIII, and frankly there's no reason to. At the end of the day, from a non-Ukrainian standpoint, it doesn't really matter who administers the land that today is Ukraine.
When the “negotiated peace” is “Russia gets everything they want, you give us every dime and your treasury, and we don’t promise to actually help you when Russia attacks again after we let them re-arm for as long as they like”…. That isn’t a peace deal, it’s virtually unconditional surrender.
Under what circumtances is the US allowed to pull out of a war they didn't start, which does not directly involve any US interests, in which we have already invested $110bn? Never? Not until we spend another $500bn we don't have?
No one is arguing that the US isn't allowed to pull out.
But "negotiating" a treaty with the other side and then claiming that that treaty is the final word on the war is atrocious. That's what's crazy. Not ending US involvement, but trying to say that Ukraine must stop fighting.
Now, I also think the US should keep supporting Ukraine, but that's a totally different topic.
This isn’t pulling out. It’s embarassing an ally on the world stage while acting like the spoiled toddler and Putin asset that he is. This is not normal. This isn’t even bad. This is outside politics and just flat out treasonous.
The US has sided with Russia against European and Western civilisation. Don’t understate what we are witnessing. The betrayal of civilisation is almost complete.
Yes, there's a difference, and what Trump is doing is clearly siding with Russia. His "negotiated peace" is neither negotiated nor peace. It's a surrender.
You don't have to support Ukraine indefinitely; only until Russia stops. Your options are to support Ukraine until Russia stops, or to surrender until Russia stops.
No. Not at all. There will come a point when Russia will stop the war because either Russia is completely exhausted and on the verge of collapse, or Putin is dead or removed from power. And chances are those two will go together.
Depends on who does the removing. It could go a lot of different ways, but even if it's someone from his own government who is hostile to the west, they're still likely to use it as an excuse to end the war.
It's mind blowing to me to see the left being the war mongers now. That used to be the mantle of the right, but hey, here we are.
The arguments I see for the US staying involved are the same hand wavy ones used in Vietnam - "better to fight them over in Asia then in America". It was a weak argument then, and it's a weak argument now.
The people that helped fan the flames of this war don't give one crap about Ukraine. What they care about is the neocon policy of "do anything to keep America's rival weak". So funding a war that Ukraine pays the price for works just fine.
The truth is that the war is going to end eventually and it's not going to be Russia capitulating. So rather than a hundred thousand more dead might as well find a solution.
I do not think you can compare this conflict with Vietnam. US army went into Vietnam, while Ukraine is fighting a US rival with their own military, but they do use US provided equipment.
General public in Europe didn't see US as actively involved, or at least didn't see it until the new administration said it would end the conflict. This is when Trump administration started getting into "talks with Russia" and offering Ukraine "mineral deals". While US might have tried to do that even before, it was not discussed openly by presidents.
This war is going to flame out eventually. Lessons learned in this one will be used for the next one, which is going to hurt even more.
> There's a difference between "siding with Russia" and siding with negotiated peace.
There is absolutely no difference, when the US is negotiating that peace only with Russia, without Ukraine in the room.
With Trump administration officials not able to name a single compromise they’ve asked from Russia.
If the “negotiated peace” is “I asked the country that invaded you what they want, and you must do everything they asked for”, that’s not negotiation.
I will never understand how people can be so quick to abandon independence nations, and are so willing to bow to dictators. You would cheer Chamberlain submitting to Hitler as he launches an invasion as a momentous day for peace. You would be wrong then, and you are wrong now.
Exactly... so what's the purpose of continuing the fight and killing Russian and Ukrainian men for no reason? This forum used to be a strong supporter of men's rights, but apparently these disappear once we dehumanize them via international relations. There's literally no reason for any individual Russian or Ukrainian man to die right now, since we all agree that no territory is being gained or lost.
Europe is happy to let others do the fighting and dying for them. They want Ukraine to fight the Russians so they don't have to. Sounds like a continent of cowards.
World needs to help out Ukraine because if Ukraine falls it shows that you should never give up your nuclear weapons for any agreement or treaty. They are just pieces of paper that guarantee nothing. This will just lead to more countries getting nukes which means higher likelihood of a nuclear war.
> World needs to help out Ukraine because if Ukraine falls it shows that you should never give up your nuclear weapons for any agreement or treaty.
This is, unfortunately, already the case. No country will ever fully trust such treaties again, and we are closer than ever to a new era of nuclear proliferation.
It is the rational choice for their own self interest, yes of course. It used to not be necessary for most countries in the world. But now there is no good alternative to having your own nukes if you don't want to be invaded by others.
I'm gonna get flak for this, but both Trump and Biden are heavily to blame for nuclear proliferation. Trump due to his actions against Iran in ripping up the nuclear deal just because he didn't like the person who negotiated it in combination with his decision to assassinate Soleimani. But Biden is just as much to blame due to his refusal to do anything of consequence when Russia broke the agreements of the Budapest Memorandum. We should have had boots on the ground when they invaded, but we waffled back and forth on selling them 50 year old weapons technology for months and now years. Unacceptable, and now the whole world knows that the major nuclear powers can't be trusted to come to anybody's aid.
I had to Wikipedia the memorandum to even know what it was, but wasn't Obama president in 2014 when Russia first breached it? Asking honestly, was that not a crucial failure but Biden's response (or lack of one) in 2022 was crucial?
Yes, I consider Obama to also be to blame somewhat. But in practice, the situation with the 2014 invasion was a lot more complex to respond to. Russia quite successfully obscured their involvement in the first couple of days...all signs pointed to Russia but they denied involvement and the little green men wore no Russian insignia, so it could have just as easily been framed as internal separatist activity, which was the Russian intent. It actually took a couple of weeks before it was crystal clear that Russia was behind everything. By then, Crimea was already occupied.
The war in Donbas was only a little bit more clear. Even though Russia's fingerprints were all over every action there, there was also no doubt that there was significant Ukrainian separatist activity, and even the most resolute of allies will hesitate to defend their allies from separatist activity.
With Biden, we saw the buildup, knew it was going to happen, and had been warning Ukraine that it was going to happen. We saw it for what it was on day one without any equivocation. We just did nothing about it.
Yes, Obama also bears a lot of the blame for this. If US reacted properly back in 2014 (or at any later point before 2022), the 2022 invasion wouldn't have happened.
True. Non-proliferation is dead, killed three years ago. Only when Ukraine gets Russia to the point of a Compiègne Forest railroad car end (remember how much of Germany had been occupied at that point?) there is hope for a future without widespread nuke availability.
The railroad car was used in 1918 and in 1940. In both cases Germany was unoccupied, in WW1 because the war was fought on French and on Flandern fields, in 1940 because it was the beginning of the war.
You're possibly thinking of the German surrender, first in Reims, then a day later again in Berlin.
> it shows that you should never give up your nuclear weapons for any agreement or treaty
This is something every related country already knows, think of Pakistan and North Korea. Are you expecting China and India to drop their nukes because of some nice treaty?
> World needs to help out Ukraine...
... to achieve peace ASAP, because thousands of lives are being lost.
This is exactly right. Current US allies should not trust the United States to stand with them at least for the next four years or so.
I would go further than that and say you can't trust the US for anything, ever. The United States will not keep long term commitments for more than four years at a time. If you're lucky, or unlucky depending on which side you're on, that cycle will last 8 years.
Not one person ever expected American blood to be spilled in Ukraine. Framing the opposing side with having these thoughts is arguing in bad faith. And what peace is there in letting a bully get away with the spoils? What's going to stop them from doing it again?
And yea the US didn't technically start the war, but if Ukraine didn't give up their nukes because of assurances by the US, then they wouldn't have been in this situation.
Because all the allies signed a treaty promising exactly that: we'll come and die for you. It's the whole point of an alliance! You don't consider someone an ally if you can't count on them to show up!
No the allies signed the treaty because they desperately needed Americas protection. They were looking for us to protect them, not for them to do anything for us. NATO was never a treaty of equals. It was America flexing its might and Europe having to concede. Europe has tried to play it off like they are "allies" but that is too strong a word as that implies the would actually be able to do something, which at the time they couldn't.
Also please note that Article 5 of the NATO treaty doesn't obligate the US to actually do anything. We can take any "Action It Deems Necessary". We are not obligated to send troops, money or material. There is no timeline for when we must take action, nor is there an automatic declaration of war. The whole thing is we can do what we want when we want.
Part of that treaty was they had spending requirements to meet as well. Yet that gets frequently forgotten by the parties who didn't meet those obligations. It is like Europe wants all the benefits of the treaty but don't feel compelled to keep up their end of the agreement.
Because they didn't keep their end of the agreement this means a greater burden would fall on America if we actually got lassoed into another European war. It seems the height of hypocrisy for Europe to demand America do the hard part in wartime when Europe couldn't even be bothered to do the easy part in peacetime.
First, 2% is a guideline, not a requirement. No one is required to spend 2% of GDP, which is an inherently fluctuating target anyway.
Second, European underspending has been by American design. Europe spent decades being told to rebuild their economies and states and not worry because the US nuclear umbrella protected them. This redounded to the US in terms of leading the world economy; it also gave the US tremendous influence in the EU.
In the 90s, Europeans talked about standing up an EU armed force. A small one, around 50,000 people, mainly to serve as an umbrella organization should EU forces come together for some mission, or to go to war as part of NATO. Clinton leaned on France and Germany to scuttle the idea. If Europeans became less dependent on the US, it meant less soft power for the US; less say in European affairs.
The secondary benefit of keeping everyone individually weak and collectively strong is that no European war was possible. The 80 years of peace in Europe following WW2 are the longest period of peace they've had in almost 400 years. Europe upping its defence spending directly threatened that and was actively discouraged until about a decade ago.
Europeans haven't been freeloading. They've wilfully subordinated themselves to the US security establishment for the collective benefit. To pretend otherwise is to be deeply ignorant of modern history.
This is a tough one as I agree with many of your points but not fully.
So here is my follow up. I don't believe it was Americas intention to keep Europe weak. That treaty was signed after WW2. Russian was at western Europe's door step and they were depleted from the war so they needed protection. They signed NATO treaty with America for that purpose. It was not a treaty of equals, it was America flexing its global power and Europe having to acquiesce. Over the years it has been retconned into an alliance of "allies" but really most of the "allies" were protectorates and not contributors.
I would counter that they have been freeloading. Europe absolutely willfully subordinated themselves for THEIR benefit. They have been getting national security for free for nearly 80 years. I am not ignorant of that. Yet I am no longer of the opinion that there is as much benefit to us as there once was. We have our own issues to attend to at home that we haven't had in the past. 100,000 Americans die every year from the drugs brought over by the cartels. We have 100,000's of illegals coming across our borders. We should prioritize our own defense for now and let Europe stand on its own. If Europe cant keep from having wars with each other than maybe the security the US was providing would be worth paying for.
Europe in total equals the US by numbers: population, GDP, military availability (though obviously not cohesiveness). It's not that the US wanted a weak Europe; they wanted weak individual states depending on each other and the US for collective security. No, it was never an alliance of equals; that's not the point. Collectively, NATO was incredibly strong, and what Europe offered was the battlefield. In the Cold War, the plans were that the Warsaw Pact forces would come streaming through the Fulda Gap and burst through NATO defences, crossing plains to the Rhine River and surging westwards across Europe. The NATO plan to handle this was to detonate nuclear land mines in the mountain passes, blocking them.
The NATO plan was to detonate nukes on German soil to take out the initial advance and block the second echelon of Soviet tank divisions (without Soviet nuclear weapons, tactical or otherwise, having been used). Germany OK'ed this plan. Upon detection of an imminent Soviet attack, special forces would, 12-24 hours in advance, emplace the nuclear mines (about the size of half a minivan) and prepare to detonate. NATO's warplans always anticipated first use of tactical nukes (because NATO numbers were always dwarfed by Warsaw Pact numbers) and the battlefield was always Europe. Every warplan always involved European allies taking the first blow and America responding.
Calling European states protectorates that begged for American protection really undersells the value of a relatively independent (western) Europe, both economically and militarily. Without Europe as the front line in a future war against the Warsaw Pact, America would either have to watch Europe be subjugated by the Soviet Union, or fight a war across the Atlantic without local cooperation (and the Pacific, where Japan/South Korea stood in for Europe). Europe offered intelligence co-operation and direct contact. Economically, Europe (and Japan) rebuilding quickly and participating in first world market economics was unbelievably beneficial to the US. If nothing else, the fact that the US dollar is the world's reserve currency is justification enough for US expenditures in the Cold War.
To go back to my original point, it was always mutually beneficial, and everyone knew it and was in agreement. Everyone was stronger together, and no one is in debt to anyone else.
If the cost/benefit calculus has changed, then that's just life: shit changes. All of the problems you mention are exclusive of America's (previous) commitment to NATO--American has more than enough money to attend to both. But the idea that Europe/the rest of NATO should suddenly be a defense subscriber to the US is just... America didn't bootstrap itself to the position it's in now. Its prior close workings with the free world have made all the difference, and for a while (and no longer) it seemed like everyone understood how it all worked.
I appreciate the thoughtful response it’s refreshing to have a real discussion rather than the usual knee-jerk reactions.
That said, I think you’ve actually made my point for me. You laid out how Europe is equal to the U.S. in GDP, population, and military availability, all of which just reinforces why it no longer makes sense for the U.S. to keep shouldering the majority of European defense.
If Europe is fully capable, then it should be fully responsible for its own security. That doesn’t mean alliances disappear, but it does mean the dynamic needs to shift. The U.S. has carried this burden for 80 years, and at some point, grown-up nations take full responsibility for their own defense.
I agree that NATO served its purpose mutually during the Cold War. But now that the geopolitical landscape has changed, so should the arrangement. The U.S. has pressing priorities at home, and if Europe is as strong and independent as you say, then it should have no problem stepping up.
If Europe wants full American protection, then maybe it’s time they start paying for it.
I think you're going to get your wish: the summit in London today is focussing exactly on "how does Europe proceed without depending on the US?" They're going to ramp up defense spending, and support of Ukraine, and France is already talking about lending its nuclear weapons to partner nations to establish broader deterrance. Between this and Trump's tariffs, the EU has been given a strong push towards independence, and is jumping on it.
Honestly, at this point I think NATO itself is over. Once the trust was broken, once Europe realized that they can't depend on the US, the alliance was a foreign policy option rather than a commitment. The loss of stability that implies scares me to death, though.
May I remind you that the last wars, which lasted multiple decades, were started by the US? Where you happily raped, tortured and murdered AND expected your allies to support you, which they did without throwing pathetic tantrums?
The US does nothing for free or out of goodwill, if you think this, you've been sniffing your own propaganda a bit too much and should try watching something other than Tucker Carlson, Fox or NewsMaxx.
I think our news cycles are very different. All I heard about from our allies in the wars was how they didn't want to be there and America should ramp them down. Also their contributions weren't exactly "overwhelming" aside from Canada and British they were more token then anything.
Line of "The US does nothing for free or out of goodwill" comes up all the time. Please tell me what country does? Then the next thing they do is go right into some form of name calling or denigration, just like you did.
Nothing in your response was about the main points of my comment. Which were firstly that America doesn't have to negotiate peace for/with Ukraine in a way that Ukraine really wants. Secondly because of how Americans feel they have been treated by Europeans over the last century a large portion of the population no longer views them as worthy allies, they feel more like fair weather supporters than allies tbh. So they feel it would be unwise to send our children to die for Europe's safety.
The last point is Europe has been neglecting its own commitments to NATO via its annual spending. So it feels like they are expecting free protection from the Americans which feels like a form of entitlement which leads back to the second point.
I get that these are contentious issues and controversial topics at times but trying to insult or insulate things about someone based on perceived political alignment is not what this site is about.
This has been par for the course for decades. They used to be on good terms with Saddam Hussein, Gaddafi, Iran after they couped Mossadegh. Heck, they even armed and trained Osama Bin Laden to fight the soviets in Afghanistan. It has always been a deadly gambit to ally yourself with the United States.
I'm not saying it's universally the case of course. For every Saddam there's a Pinochet, for every Gaddafi there's a Suharto. But the fact that the US can drop an ally just like that should not be a surprise to anyone.
Traditionally the US turned from ally to bully in a predictable manner though. Ally with the Soviet Union, expect hostility, even if your previous right-leaning government had been their best buddies. Invade another country the US also regarded as a regional ally and oil supplier and you might not last long.
The switch to verbally attacking Ukraine and the rest of Europe whilst fellating Putin is an altogether different one, and one much more damaging to US soft power than its past belligerence.
I'm curious where you see Libya fitting in this pattern.
Personally I'm more inclined to believe that the ally-turned-foe's invasion serves as a convenient excuse for the US to attack, rather than the root cause. One thing that at least Gadaffi and Saddam have in common is nationalizing their oil industry. This to me seems like a much more believable reason for US aggression.
Gadaffi was a nominal socialist who kicked the US military out, aligned himself with the Soviet Union, proposed pan-Arabist and pan-African alliances to exclude the west and was implicated in bombings of US targets, undermining US-allied causes overseas etc. And yes, he nationalized the oil industry early in his rule. Even if he briefly achieved some sort of rapprochement (mostly with the EU) when he'd run out of allies, he's pretty much the exemplar of how to piss off the US, and so them helping finish his regime off fits the pattern perfectly.
I don't know if I'd phrase it as the "power" to do whatever it wants.
Anyone can always do whatever they want. And the only way there aren't repercussions on some level are if you're some kind of god-like being sealed in the equivalent of closed terrarium.
Does the US have power? Sure. But the US could act disgracefully even if it didn't have power.
The framing I'd give this is that the US is trying to extort Ukraine without actually bringing anything to the table, and all it's going to accomplish is making the US itself less powerful, less reputable, the rest of the world more convinced that nuclear weapons need proliferate because otherwise invasions are on the table, and a litany of other things that will basically make the US weaker over time.
I would go further: this is the end of the US. The pieces haven't hit the ground yet, but they are falling. NATO cannot last when Europe doesn't trust the US. Nations cannot trust that trade agreements will last beyond the whims of the moment. Federal workers are being sacked indiscriminately. The executive branch has openly stated that they will not obey the rule of law if it is against them, even after packing the courts. What is left?
There is something left: the land, the people. But not the country, that is something new.
The future of NATO is secure. It just won't include the US. Whether that exclusion is done implicitly or explicitly remains to be seen. The US has put itself in the position where it has no allies and no peaceful trading partners. That's not going to work out well for them, regardless of how much military might they believe they have.
NATO is an alliance of 32 democracies and from time to time some of those will vote in unfortunate leaders. I guess the remainder will have to carry on. I doubt the US will remain this way after the next election.
They’re not though… it’s just that endless billions being sent for a war that Europe won’t proportionally help support has to end. How much more money and lives will be wasted in Ukraine?
The killing won't stop until Russia is firmly stopped. There is no peace without completely and permanently pacifying Russia. They will attack again and again until we render them unable to continue. The best time to do this is thirty years ago, the second best time is now.
Who is "we"? Are you a soldier in Ukraine? More death is not going to help and neither side will stop. The only chance to stop killing is an agreement.
More death wouldn't, but a solid established and supported promise of retaliation in case of aggression from either side would.
And "we" here means the democratic world - solidarity is the only way to deter bullies - if Russia knew that EU/US would retaliate in case of an attack on Ukraine, they wouldn't invade.
But of course if you yourself is a bully, you will do everything in your power to cause feuds. And here we are, oh well.
I know lots of Ukrainians. They all know that life under this sort of "agreement," which is actually Ukraine paying reparations for a war it didn't start, for zero security guarantees, was beyond moronic. It wasn't an agreement it was mere capitulation to Russia to continue genocide.
Actual real Ukrainians are fighting, and signing back up even after being injured.
Ukraine is on "death ground" and has nowhere to go except to fight to survive. Ukrainians know that. Russia knows that. I'm not sure that those that spout Russian propaganda know that, and for example I doubt you know any Ukrainians with questions like yours, but you sure do sound like the Russian propaganda lines that get trotted out to Americans.
I'm assuming that was sarcasm :) Since Trump and his followers seem to save that type of posturing for Canada. But I guess he's just trolling to own the libs, like a president does...
I believe the clip of the interview disproves that point. If money was the problem (or, more generally, a protracted investment in a conflict perceived as senseless) then a sobering talk would be the way - think of the speech that Biden gave when he announced that the US was withdrawing from Afghanistan for similar reasons, fully aware of what the likely consequences would be.
This interview, on the other hand, has the US VP talking on top of a head of state while chastising him for not being grateful enough while pressuring him to take a deal that would effectively surrender Ukraine to US and Russian interests. Whatever the objective of this meeting was, "a fair result for Ukraine and its dead" did not seem to be it.
Listen to JD Vance speak about Europe, and listen to the way he bullied Trump into increasing bullying in this meeting, and you'll never think that.
If Ukraine signed this deal they would lose so many more lives than with what Zelensky did. I can't imagine how cowardly and easily fooled you'd have to be to think that giving into Russia will make the genocide stop.
The original clips I saw made it look more like Zelensky was behaving unreasonably. Watching more of the context, it seemed more like things escalated.
Watching Trump and Vance and others posture and try to score political points while you could just see the depth of exhaustion and horrors witnessed in Zelensky's face… I don't even know how to feel about it all.
I found it deeply uncomfortable to watch, to be honest. Both Trump and Vance acted like playground bullies.
Maybe that's what a bunch of citizens want? Pretty depressing, if so. I will say that I'm reevaluating my countries alliances and (lack of) security capability.
It is interesting how the US's influence in the rest of the world is declining every day, and that it appears the main entity trying to tear it down as fast as possible is the US.
Forgive me if I'm mistaken, but I was under the impression this is what most of the world wanted? And if not the world, then most elites in the US?
I speak both from public and personal history: when American leadership signed its various trade treaties with China back in the 90s and earlier, opening itself up to the swift transfer of manufacturing to its one-time enemy, was American leadership not signaling its strong desire to diminish American power for the sake of peace?
And on a personal level: my hippie parents had often railed against American imperialism and voted for candidates they thought could stop it. What did they (and other similarly-minded folks) think would happen once America withdrew from the world stage? Do people who think the same way today believe America will grow stronger by pulling back?
Having been around since the late 60s, I can only say this attitude has been in the making for a long time. I can't point to college sit-ins or Nixon going to China or Carter turning over the Panama Canal or the US-China Relations Act (2000) or anything specific stating 'this is the definitive moment', but this desire for a weaker, more isolationist America is neither surprising nor accidental for those of us who've been watching it grow. It's ultimately what my parents and their contemporaries wanted. It's... dream fulfillment.
My thoughts on this is it appears the 2nd Trump administration is obviously better for everyone _outside_ of the US (with the exception of Ukraine, Syria, Palestinians), and is lowering outcomes for groups _inside_ the US.
I think the current administration's actions are backed by the desire to kick out all immigrants, build a fortress wall around the US, and I guess wait out the end times.
Us lefties often say the best way to lower immigration rates is make other countries a more desirable place to live. I'm not sure if this has ever been put into practice though.
Regarding China, the European and American financial relationship is the largest in the world. Chinese trade with Europe is tiny. Sounds like that is all about to change.
I'm assuming you're on platforms dominated by Americans and Westerners so you're not seeing it much, but I can assure large portions of the world are quite happy to see America's downfall in real-time.
Personally, I hope to see China fill the void America will leave behind; the world will be better for it.
I think a more likely outcome is nobody filling the hole America leaves behind, and the incentives of a multipolar world are much more brutal then that of a unipolar world, as a result I expect a rise of new nuclear armed states.
No not at all. The vast majority of Americans are uninterested in being world policemen when it means it's mainly American boys (and girls, but mostly boys, let's be real) dying in foreign wars.
The Chinese are not stupid enough to send their kids to die in war, and even if they were, they at least have an excess of young males.
I think the Trump family has been bought a lot harder by very wealthy Israel supporting Americans and the UAE. The Kushner stuff is well documented. There's checks moving around. Both parties on each end publicly announce huge real estate deals.
I can't point to anything concrete about Russia funding Trump.
Can you please inform me how the US bullied UK into mineral rights in WW2? We exported arms and equipment to them even before Lend-lease acts.
It would be true if you were to mention about our special flavor of freedom exportation during the cold war. However, this time Ukraine is a democratic nation being invaded by our biggest political rival, Russia.
In a political sense, well, that's much more debatable. The problem there is that because the US itself did not feel threatened, US aid came with a price tag: the impoverishment of Britain and the demolition of the trade barriers around the British Commonwealth. US aid was on a cash-only basis
until Britain had spent all its hard-currency reserves (both gold and negotiable securities). Then came the Lend-Lease agreement -- arguably the point where the US truly entered the war -- and its price tag was explicit, although unadvertised: the agreement itself contains a clause
stipulating the removal of the Commonwealth's trade barriers.
The UK paid the US all it's gold reserves. Next it stole of the UK people's gold to use that to buy weapons.
The US was not giving the UK when it exported, it was selling. Lend lease came in once the UK ran out of gold. So the US gave them credit: which the UK tool until 2006 to repay.
The US had about 60% of the world's wealth after ww2. With that, their industrial base and with their "democratic" missions in South America for resources I'm amazed how fast they managed to squander it to make the rich richer.
It's true. Also, the UK has never repaid its WW1 debt to the US.
The US joined WW1 when it became clear that the UK would not be able to repay its debt to JP Morgan and its clients if Germany won. Of course, that was not the only reason, but it was a huge factor. (Source: Adam Tooze, The Deluge)
(London had, bizarrely, decided to bankroll the Russian and French war efforts in addition to its own, so its debts were vast.)
FDR was opposed to imperialism, and so his terms for our meager involvement prior to direct entry into the war were pretty steep, as were his terms for the postwar order. Truman backed off on some of that though.
Stealing radar tech (go read how Raytheon got started), and blocking the UK from nuke development tech after British scientists helped thoroughly the Manhattan Project are the ways the US bullied the UK during WW2.
It also took the White House being set on fire to understand the sovereignty of the land across its northern border. And now there's all this Trump talk of trying to invade once again.
I saw on russian TV how they pretty much said "yea, trump may be an ally of ours now and do what we want but we must remember how they turned on ukraine and that they might turn on us"
Why are people acting as if there's nothing "different" going on here? Like this is all just driven by standard foreign policy choices, and the current US regime doesn't have some unique allegiance to Russia and its leader?
The US military was concerned about this scenario long before and raised concerns back in 2011. They predicted why someone like Trump would would come in power and question the purpose of NATO. But it was not taken seriously by NATO allies at that time. Obama even wanted European allies to be able to launch their own military missions with just US as a support role. The Libya interventions was supposed to be a test of that.
Yep. The warnings have existed for a long time, but most European states have continued to ignore the hallmarks.
Even Poland only started rearming after Kazynski's plane was shot down in Smolensk in 2010 (edit; not shot down), Romania only (started after Crimea and it's implications of a similar incident in neighboring Moldova in 2014, Turkiye began due interventions in Syria and Libya that lead to Turkish and Russian soldiers fighting against each other in 2012-15, and Netherlands after over a hundred of their citizens were shot down in an Air Malaysia Flight in 2015-16 (forgetting the exact date)
Trump is absolutely wrong in publicly abandoning our European allies, but this is something every administration since 2008 has been saying would eventually happen.
The failed UK-France intervention in Libya should have been the warning call (France and UK's air forces couldn't disable Libya's A2AD and ran out of precision muntions, forcing the Obama admin to intervene and spark the Benghazi crisis which helped bring Trump into the Oval Office in 2016). In fact, that incident probably further emboldened Russia as Libya's military apparatus was heavily Russian/Soviet in armament and strategy.
Uhm, that Polish plane wasn’t shot down. Don’t spread silly conspiracy theories.
Polish military spendings were rising steadily since long before the accident, but a significant increase happened after Russian full scale invasion on Ukraine.
Fair point about the Smolensk Incident - confused it with the Netherlands incident - but it was that incident that sparked Poland's fears about Russia again [0], and most of Poland's military buildup and modernization only began in the 2012-13 period after the partnership with South Korea kicked in [1][2]
Do yourself a favour and look up the origins of the stories Trump has been saying
- Zelensky a dictator
- Messing with WW3
- Not wearing a suit
- VIP tours of the front line
They're all Kremlin lines/tropes commonly found in state media.
And then TASS was allowed in to the Whitehouse and PA News aren't?
I saw a lot of people justifying Trump's moves because "the US shouldn't be spending so much money helping Ukraine in the war."
I understand that argument, but what about security guarantees? Zelensky has been simply asking for security guarantees so that Putin doesn't start another war in a few years (like he did in 2014 and 2022). Why can't Trump provide that? Why should we just trust Putin's word? Or is there something I'm missing here?
Trump can't provide that because any "security guarantee" from the US would essentially translate into "send armed troops", which is something that would run counter to his campaign stance.
Isn't there a middle ground possible? For example, a guarantee, in law, that the US and Europe send military equipment to Ukraine if there is another war in the future?
USA could guarantee a deployment to European NATO countries large enough for them to be able to move much of their forced into Ukraine.
And just guarantees on being able to buy armament would be useful.
If there had been any ounce of political will something would have been possible.
No one is going to believe any guarantees now anyway, so it's a moot point. The US no longer has the goodwill capital for agreements, only transactions.
A few years ago we kept making comparisons to Chamberlain appeasing to Hitler, inviting Hitler to keep expanding its territory at the expense of other sovereign nations in Europe, but at the same time made it very clear that Putin is no hitler and the comparison is too extreme.
Now it seems quite clear that the US under Trump is not willing to intervene in military fashion. For Russia, getting east-Ukraine in a year and waiting 3 years while ramping up its war economy to take the rest of Ukraine is a great outcome. For China, Taiwan is now a no-brainer as Trump declined to say whether he would intervene like Biden did. This is appeasement. Trump seems to want peace at any expense, he doesn't seem to recognize at all what the people of Ukraine have been willing to give their lives for, their country.
It's easy to have peace if you just surrender everything to a bully. Peace without justice is more like slavery. MLK said it right, there can't be peace without justice.
I suspect The Trump camp realise a peace deal acceptable to Ukraine isn’t viable. Trump having promised one would be easy means he needs an excuse.
Manufacturing a split with Zelensky gives them that excuse. Now they can turn off the tap of support to Ukraine, forcing them to capitulate, and blame Zelensky.
Meanwhile they can make a deal with Putin to split Ukraine between them. Putin gets East Ukraine, the USA gets the mineral wealth of West Ukraine. It’s win-win.
Most of the mineral wealth stuff is all in the Donbas, or a couple of kilometers from the front lines. I am unaware of much of anything like that in western Ukraine.
Historically most of the heavy industry, near the mineral deposits, has always been in eastern Ukraine. Agricultural stuff in western and central Ukraine. Putin would be perfectly happy w/ a Ukrainian only rump state centered around Lviv.
Make no mistake, this display was a disgrace, but... after the annexation of Crimea the EU (Germany) moved ahead with Nord Stream 2, we are culpable too, massively. Ironically there's a famous video of none other than Trump lambasting the Germans about it.
The US has been a bully since at least WW2. The US has been betraying "allies" for just as long.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine has been a godsend for US influence. Finland and Sweden joined NATO. The Russian military was exposed as a paper tiger. A huge portion of the Russian military's capability was destroyed without a single US military serviceman or asset being deployed. Russian energy exports to Europe (and the influence that gives them) have dropped to a mere fraction of what they were in 2020. Europe is now dependant on US LNG exports.
The second largest military in NATO is Turkey and Turkey is America's puppet. Turkey has been in direct military conflict with other NATO members (ie Greece) with the blessing of the US.
Ceding territory to Russia, which seems all but inevitable now, doesn't change the the security picture for Europe. Russia still can't occupy Ukraine. That was true before the invasion. It's still true now. They certainly can't roll into Poland let alone Germany and Western Europe.
The EU really has no interest in paying for their own security. Politically it's a nonstarter too with the right of far-right parties like National Front in France and AfD, AfD in Germany and Reform in the UK.
Lots of this is correct however Turkey isn't anyone's puppet, they're a wildcard if there ever was one. Lately they've been quite insistent that Crimea should not be ceded to Russia, for example. They're also certainly not going to tolerate a Russia/Iran axis in their neighborhood and they've been quite aggressive vs Russian forces that encroached their interests.
There's a world of difference between what Erdogan says and what he does. And you should only look at what he does.
For example, since October 7, Erdogan made lots of statements about how he was upset with the Israeli treatment of Palestinians. That was all for show. Something like 40% of Israel's energy comes from Azerbijan and transits through Turkey. Turkey could've cut that off. But they never would.
Likeise, Erdogan's family continued to trade with and make money from Israel.
Turkey buys a Russian anti-missile defense system [1] while selling Bayraktar drones to Ukraine and hosting US (technically NATO) nuclear weapons.
Turkey is consistently aligned with US foreign polciy with some minor exceptions that are really deviations tolerated because of Turkey's strategic importance and recognizing the need for Erdogan to maintain power.
Yes. Like sell a ton of drones to Ukraine, partner with Ukraine on producing drones, shooting down a Russian plane in Syria, conflict with Russian troops in Syria, etc...
They have been aligned with the US most of the time but they very clearly also have a mind of their own and that includes a lot of actions against Russia.
Must we endlessly fund a war that is in stalemate and will continue to savagely end the lives of military and civilian alike? Otherwise, we are a bully? Is it in our interest to continue to run up debt, send overseas ammunition and hardware? To what end? And for how long? I remember wondering the same during Iraq and Afghanistan. Is this really America's permanent responsibility, for any country in the world?
It's quite remarkable the change in America over a couple decades. In the 90s, the left was solidly pro-free-speech and anti-war. Anti-war sometimes to a fault, even. Maybe aside from some censorship effort of rap and Mortal Kombat, you could count on the left to defend free speech at nearly any cost.
Now, it is the left that seems interested in doubling down on wars, without any plan for escape, and of "reigning in" speech deemed by some as harmful.
I'm not here to say correct or incorrect. Pick your own ice cream flavor. My point is that it's striking how much the parties have flipped 180 degrees (on some issues).
This is a defensive war. This is the lesson we learned when the world did nothing to stop Hitler's initial aggression. This is the moment of truth. Doing nothing is easy, it's the default. We now know the possible consequences and we've made our mind to not let that happen again. Have we learned nothing?
And they way they are trying to bully Ukraine into a minerals agreement and rebuilding agreement to strip Ukraine of everything it has. Trump doesn't care about peace, he wants to make money
If the war ends, that is peace. Do you believe Ukraine will be better off financially by continuing the war, even if it is on America’s credit card? They will not flourish in the present state, however noble they believe the effort is. War is not fair.
I am not a country. Nor are countries sentient beings with intentions; they are abstract entities. “We” didn’t bully anyone — one or two specific people did.
> Must we endlessly fund a war that is in stalemate and will continue to savagely end the lives of military and civilian alike? Otherwise, we are a bully?
Ukraine has lost massive amounts of lives, territory, and foreign funding under his leadership; Zelensky effectively has zero negotiating power.
Where are the voices that simply want the war to end so people stop dying? It’s easy to say bully this and ally that from the comfort of your office while hundreds of thousands of people die in a strip of land most “supporters” couldn’t point out on a map. At this point there’s a collective ego tied to the outcome more than there is any care for the actual people involved.
What a dogshit poll. There were three options given:
1. Ukraine should continue fighting until it wins the war.
2. Ukraine should seek to negotiate an ending to the war as soon as possible.
3. Don't know/Refused.
"Ukraine should surrender unconditionally" and "Ukraine should negotiate permanent security guarantees" and "Ukraine should fight its way into a better negotiating position" are all in the same bucket. This is maliciously bad poll design.
This is not at all consistent with U.S. foreign policy. It is one regime, that clearly has different thoughts about our alliances. It's an anomaly or, more accurately, an aberration. And it's similar to what's happening here domestically as well.
> The EU is going to be thinking long and hard about the future of NATO now.
Thinking long and hard apparently is all the EU is capable of.
Trump's first term should have been more than enough to make the EU come to their senses. Now, we have tethered caps and the AI Act, but the EU still has no coherent vision or just even the slightest idea of how to move the continent forward instead of keeping it in the past.
The EU needs to get armed to the teeth and to pile up on nukes. The US cannot be trusted, half of the country is compromised and that's not something that will change any time soon, even after Trump goes to meet his creator.
There’s probably going to be a decade long build up for that to happen. European military industrial production could barely surge to the promised 1 million shells to Ukraine
France has nukes. But for nukes it doesn’t matter in practice if you have 10 or 1000. If you use one, it is one too many. It only matters that you have them.
Half the country isn't "compromised." We simply woke up to the fact that a continent of people that do nothing but mock and sneer at us refused to pay for their own defense, and we get nothing from it in return, other than having our exports tariffed at higher levels than EU exports to the US.
For the US, NATO is an obligation, of which the EU nations (with their lavish social spending and anemic defense spending) benefited from.
In 2014, the EU did NOTHING to help when Crimea was invaded. You continued to buy gas, and even bult new pipelines like Nordstream to continue to hand Putin money. I'm all for the EU to take on it's own protection and investing in militaries. World War II ended 80 years ago. Move on and grow up and pay for your own defense.
Ukraine is in this war partially (largely? primarily?) due to United States foreign policy in the years since the "end" of the Cold War. No surprise Trump screws them over and doesn't honor our geopolitical debts tho.
I wish more people would remember that Ukraine was once 3rd nuclear power in the world but agreed to give it all away in return for promise that US will defend it instead.
This is why Zelensky keep saying he doesn't want another paper.
It is not bullying to say that American monetary support means basically doing what the United States want you to do. This is basic human social interaction.
Heck, less than half of Western Europeans would fight to defend their own country[0]. In the UK, only a third of people surveyed would do so. That's less than those who believe that the US would come to their aid!
Irrelevant. This measures trust towards USA to send their people who are willing to fight implied by them joining the military, not willingness to fight amongst the general public.
We don't care. Approximately 0% of the American public believes the UK would help us if we were invaded, because we have eyes and have seen how absolutely degraded the European militaries have become, outside of a few outliers like Poland and Turkey.
I worked in the Pentagon for 10 years, and went over to the UK about twice a year for work at RAF Mildenhall, which, of course, is primarily filled with USAF planes and airmen.
European nations stopped caring about defending themselves, and turned NATO into a charity of which they are the recipients.
More recently (2016-2021), I would travel to London on a regular basis to work with a team based out of an office in Shoreditch. The sentiment of the average Londoner to the US military was fairly negative, typically accompanied by a face that looked like they had just smelled a fart.
My son is 18. I don't want him being drafted into any war on behalf of a demoralized population that doesn't want to fight for their own country. It's morally reprehensible to expect us to subsidize a society that has imprisons citizens for social media posts and fines our tech companies every chance they can get.
Brits and Europeans died for America's last two wars, on a percentage basis more Dutch and Canadian troops died than Americans. Nearly 500 British troops died for your war.
Next time America asks for assistance, whether it's troops or firefighters I hope the attitude is reflected back and it comes with a costs+ invoice due up front.
Our next war is going to be in the Indo-Pacific, and the Diego Garcia is already a de facto American run base, and now going to be part of Marutius due to French and Indian lobbying [0], and because the UK deal was set to expire in 2036.
I'd trust the French more than the Brits in an Indo-Pac conflict, because they have actual stakes due to French Polynesia and Mayotte.
And if we're honest, it doesn't make sense for the UK to fight a Pacific war anyhow. The UK has constantly stepped up to help Ukraine and remains a very strong buttress against Russia. It's best if the UK remains a lynchpin for European security.
America not honoring another country's article 5 after America itself was the only country to call article 5... this attitude will absolutely spur nuclear weapons programs in countries across the world.
> Approximately 0% of the American public believes the UK would help us if we were invaded
This is just silly nonsense.
In various polls the US and UK poll quite similarly, in that the percentage of people who believe their country should honour article 5 in case of an attack on a NATO ally, polls about 2x greater than the percentage of people who believe their country shouldn't.
So approximately 0% is nonsense.
But besides the fact that the beliefs of the US population isn't 0%, look at the reality: the UK went to Iraq and Afghanistan to fight alongside the US on foreign soil, while most of the world didn't and opposed those wars. What makes you think the UK won't fight alongside the US if it was under attack on its own territory? It makes no sense.
The US being invaded essentially means there is a world war. The idea that the UK would try to stay neutral instead of follow its treaty requirements with its greatest historical ally ever, and bow to its new ruler, is just silly.
As for the UK military's prowess, it is obviously not what it used to be, in relative terms. But to compare it unfavourably to Poland and Turkey? Neither could beat the UK, except on their home soil. And in the context of an invasion of the US, I'd rather have the UK as an ally, it actually has long-distance projectionist military power which is exceedingly rare outside of the US, Turkey or Poland don't have it.
I'm curious if there is any polling data on British willingness to help Canada should they face invasion from the U.S. Canada being a commonwealth country with their King as their head of state.
What if the trigger was the US annexing a NATO nation's territory? He's already made noises about Canada and Greenland (Denmark). That would be the ultimate farce.
Greenland is about the arctic. It's not some farce or meme. Look at an actual globe and when the ice melts that white stuff is going to be a navigable ocean between Canada Greenland and . . . Russia.
We tend to think of the world on a flat world Google map and Russia seems so far away, but when the pole melts Russia will be closer to north America and they will be wanting that area too.
No ice means it's easier to drill for natural resources. The US is preempting the melt and trying to get ahead in the race for the arctic. It's much more valuable than at first glance.
I laughed first too. I then felt that my laughter was due to not understanding it. "How bizarre, LOL". Then I felt like I was missing something big. Now I try to use these "bizarre jokes" as a sign to look deeper.
In a way (although this info isn't secret at all, just boring) we can use Trump's inability to have a filter to leak the advice that his advisors are giving him more than past statesmen would.
Yeah, we should ask USA to pay for the help we offered them and for our soldiers that died in those conflicts sinee the USaians really are into "deals" and paying for help.
You entered ww1 in 1917, almost at the end of the war after German submarines attacked American ships, if I remember correctly. So the US tried to stay out for quite some time.
You mean when Japan attacked USA and you were forced to enter the war? I do not remember USA attacking nazis because of morality, in you were forced by getting attacked. I remember USA doing business with nazis so the "help" was mustual you were fighting same enemy and my country Romania was in fact on the other side , we were sold to USSR in the end so you got your payment when you split the world with USSR
You implied the US entered WW2 to help out the European allies and thus they still owe you. But as the person you're responding to pointed out, you entered it of your own accord, pursuing your own interests.
So, no, we're not going to, in your own words, "compare them to WW1 and WW2 and see if we owe you any money".
Moreover, the US were paid back for any weapons or resources you supplied.
No, you're the one gaslighting. It was not a few NATO nations throwing some resources, although, obviously, you deliberately chose this language to gaslight...
In reality, it was NATO nations responding to the US invoking Article 5, the only time it's been invoked in NATO's history. And in contrast to righteously throwing around empty words about Americans hypothetically coming to die for someone, these nations actually sent their troops, and some of them literally died for you.
> I said bring receipts and we can compare
Again, what are you going to compare against? WW2? The US did not enter WW2 as a favour to the other allies, you entered the war in response to Pearl Harbor. Meanwhile Hitler was dreaming of New York in flames. So your troops went to Europe to protect your own country. Sure you were fighting alongside the UK's forces but they were helping you to protect the US as much as you were helping them defeat Nazi Germany.
> Europe has not been meeting is spending targets as specified by the treaty.
Yeah, because recognizing USD as the world's reserve currency is suddenly not enough.
> I say article 5 is a complete non starter and should be utterly disregarded
Don't remember a lot of US people saying this when it was being invoked in 2001. Maybe you were saying it back then?
That said, it's not surprising at all. What do you call taking advantage of a friend and abandoning them afterwards? Another Friday?
Yeah, I was wondering at what point Putin decides to roll the dice and put that to the test by rolling into Estonia, Lithuania or Latvia. He must be feeling his chances are pretty good right now.
yeah NATO got irrelevant and Putin certainly now wishes he would not have attacked Ukraine. Rolling into these 3 mini countries with his entire army from 2022 would have been a much easier task
Even if the US did nothing, rolling into NATO lands would put them up against the UK, Germany, France. Poland et al as well as Ukraine.
The worry is more that a ceasefire is called. Russia rearms and succeeds in taking over Ukraine and then a combined Ukraine and Russia attacks Europe with President Vance supporting Putin.
Is that dumb? These transport animals basically make themselves. Self-replicating, way cheaper than robots, easy to replace when they break down. Don't need sophisticated software, etc. Just some training and sensory deprivation.
I wish humans would not involve other species in their sadistic ways of killing and maiming each other, though. Donkeys, horses, ... all benefited from war mechanization. Dogs not so much so far. Dutch happily train dogs that are then sold to allies to be used to attack, threaten, maim, shit and piss on, sodomize, and kill defenseless people. Bizarre.
It isn't dumb so much as desperate. Their preference is to supply troops with trucks, but they have lost a huge number of trucks and use many of those remaining as troop transports on the front line which also speaks of desperation.
I don't think that we're this far gone yet, but is there a chance the US sides with Putin in this case? I think it would be risky, and I don't _think_ Trump's base would go for it, but it does feel like the long term goal is to try to sanitize the idea of a shift in the geopolitical order to ally America with Russia instead of with Europe.
trump and the republicans must really be stupid to trade NATO for russia, while leaving an opening for china to side with europe. If US ditches europe, india/SK/JP and the rest of asia will soon reciprocate.
All this so that US sides with a bankrupt cleptocracy and dictatorship. 1000iq move, I guess.
Unless Trump wants to start WW3 the US won't be able to do anything, and even if he did start WW3, Europe would be able to destroy those bases.
The whole point of them was to give the US influence while improving US security. Given Europe can't trust Trump will come to their aid, they won't give the US as much influence over Europe.
Have you ever wondered why the US is able to spend so much on its military? Ever wondered why the US keeps on printing the dollar that's not backed by any gold reserve and other nations still give you real things such as food, resources, goods in exchange for it?
Here's a hint! It's your military. To put it bluntly, European nations and other US allies pretend the dollar has actual value and the US in turn guarantees security and backs the world order based on the rule of law.
Looks like the US is looking to pull out of its end of the deal. That's fair enough, being the world's policeman is sure a heavy burden to carry. I just don't see many people recognizing the implications for the US economy.
Maybe this passes as insightful in some circles but it's completely untrue when you consider how much of his base is currently fuming about weak Epstein annoucement and Israel more generally.
I am trying to express in good faith, I have found the Left to be generally less effective in dealing with grassroots criticism (it's seen as too populist). Trump will flip on an issue due to pressure from the frog guys. The Left are more dogmatic from top intellectuals, don't really listen to the base. Huge issue in the last elxn. Fixable though imo.
Nah, they'd say it was god's will or some nonsense and pretend it's all right. A minority might even be completely fine with losses as long as their god emperor wins in the end and owns the libs.
Yes, he did everything he could to prevent it - being mocked mercilessly by the rightwing for suggesting Putin might do what he eventually did.
Biden did not do enough to kick Russia out, though. He should have given Ukraine everything they wanted, including a no-fly zone (and ideally Warthog support when Russia was stuck in the mud).
IMHO, they are already there. There's no spine in the Republican party to prevent bowing down to Putin, they have always been anti-Europe, and Putin is a big daddy that they actively court when they idolize Hungary's dictator and hold CPAC meetings and try to emulate Orban.
I think in this era of misinformation Trump+Elon can convince their falolowers that is the greatest idea to help Putin, and that Putin is the second greatest leader in the world history after Trump... you can still see USAians claiming USA paid more then Europe even if the lie was exposed days ago
"Glory", so not specifics around hypothetical land Putin aka Hitler 2.0 imagines he wants. There's no evidence for him saying anything besides … what he's literally says. This fantasy conjecture is weakening the international position on Ukraine, especially with such easy access to Russian translation tools where we can just expose this secret conspiracy of yours. He literally only talks about Ukraine, you can look into this yourself.
Or perhaps you mean "glory" in the sense of some kind of national pride and confidence in culture and nationality? I am not sure arguments against any nation seeking a sense of themselves are particularly compelling…
Just because the US changing its mind about Russia changes NATO's dynamic as a whole does not mean that the Baltic states are immediately in danger. Poland and Finland are both nearby NATO countries that have experienced Russia's thumb directly with their own military industrial base or are developing one that would absolutely step in if need be.
Reminder that Finland is really close to St. Petersburg, the 2nd largest city in Russia with some pretty big cultural and military importance. Putin's done some fantastically stupid stuff in regard to the 2022 Ukraine war, namely resuming it, but he's probably not that dumb.
You are right. I do hope Zelenksy noticed the sudden caveats he added a few days ago, too. Same thing - Trump wants many billions in resources, yet "can't" guarantee anything in return.
Russia immediately responded by saying it would happily share those resources. Of course.
Trump doesn't understand soft power, nor how much he has destroyed in such a short span. I have hope that a some future point we can repair these relationships, but they will never be like they were. So stupid. Such a waste.
History will record than once...An unsuspecting stand up comedian, who once recorded the voice of Paddington Bear in the Ukrainian dubbing of Paddington and Paddington 2...
Left his family, took on a uniform...And had to fight, at the same time, Putin and the President of the USA: https://youtu.be/4zwfukYhq-k?t=6
With Trump's fragile ego, there's a chance he will designate all humanitarian charitable organizations, and military-aid organizations, to whom USA citizens might want to donate, that have any ties to or otherwise benefit Ukraine, as terrorist organizations. I will be evaluating these ... if you have plans to assist, it may be better to do so sooner rather than later.
I bet this is all a part of Trump's strategy into pushing Europe into geopolitical irrelevance. And if it counts for anything, the Europeans did this to themselves by relying on the goodwill of America for their own security.
Europe can defend itself against Russia just fine. Maybe it will be a bit poorer, as it has to spend more money on defense, but it can do that. The bigger threat is that European countries start fighting each other again. That could happen in a few decades, if Eurosceptic parties become too popular.
On the other hand, Europe does not care about China. It has no interests in the Pacific. In the absence of mutually beneficial alliances with powers that oppose China, Europe would rather see China as a (somewhat unpleasant) trading partner than an adversary. If China is not a threat and the US is not an ally, it doesn't matter much which of them is the dominant power in the Pacific.
> On the other hand, Europe does not care about China. It has no interests in the Pacific. In the absence of mutually beneficial alliances with powers that oppose China, Europe would rather see China as a (somewhat unpleasant) trading partner than an adversary. If China is not a threat and the US is not an ally, it doesn't matter much which of them is the dominant power in the Pacific.
China keeps getting blockaded left and right when trying to establish shorter routes with the EU, and there's a reason for this. The EU and China both want to just live in peace and are natural trading partners — the main obstacle being distance, blockades, and unfriendly territories in between.
Russia started this war. The US abandoning their closest allies against their historical main antagonist results in losing the status of hegemon, and the economic and geostrategic benefits that entailed.
Russia is winning the cold war, 35 years after it "ended".
You don't get to pick and choose between benefits and costs. Like, over the long term you can, but blowing up your alliances at a press conference is not a strategy for long term geopolitical success.
Seems to me that the country Trump is pushing into geopolitical irrelevance is the United States of America. Thanks to him, we're making enemies of friends and allies, throwing away our influence on the world, throwing away any claim we had to being a model, and turning in on ourselves. Trump is MALA: Make America Little Again.
Europe hasn't been geopolitical relevant beyond it's own borders for a while now.
I mean think about it - it had to rely on US transportation just to participate in the Iraq War. How much of a threat can a country be if it can't even project force into that theatre?
US was always a bully Trump is doing overtly what US has been doing covertly using CIA etc for decades. Actually Trump is more honest than previous US administrations as those would have killed Zelensky and then blamed it on China or Russia if he was not willing to do what they want.
European Democracies should start a, new, NATO-like military Alliance on their own, but without Trump's America.
(and without the notorious US-made military equipment kill-switches)
And while we're at it, this time will be different:
Instead of the membership criteria being anti-soviet communism, as in NATO, it should be effective Liberal Democracy - and - Freedom from Exceptionalist Exemptions, namely from the International Rule of Law. So, to be part,
1. Compulsory International Criminal Court membership and compliance - hence no exceptionalistic US, and no exceptionalistic Israel.
2. No "Illiberal Democracies": say, for example, composite of a minimum 0.67 score on the WJP Rule of Law Index and others: therefore no Orbanic Hungary, and no illiberal others like it. Poland, Slovakia, Italy: time to make some hard choices if you want in.
3. Democratic backsliding removes you rights in the Alliance, and, can proportionally lead to outright expulsion.
Not one more new military equipment purchase from the US, (and dispreference for other non-qualifying nations procurement). Member nations should use their - substantial - industrial capacity to equip themselves with indigenous military materiel.
Hey, it would be actually great for the economy!
Initially European scope, but bridges to a broader global scope (or even a secondary sister-Alliance) with open-ended partnerships with Canada, Australia, New Zeland, Japan, South Korea, and yes: Taiwan.
US and/or Israel want to join, if a more Democratic future selves? Simple: fully join the ICC, and meet the Alliance's full criteria as every other member.
Same applies for prospective new members.
Sweden shows how principled positions can be maintained while building serious defense capabilities. Now multiply that model by Europe's combined industrial and technological base.
We just need the political will to execute - instead of just rolling over and wagging our tail to bullies.
Why a separate alliance? In 2015, only 5 nations meet the 2% funding requirement for NATO, with all previous US administrations asking for increases. That's concrete evidence of disinterest in the concept or intentional reliance on the US. Only recently, with threats of the US pulling out of NATO, have the numbers improved.
If the US scaled back the 2%, and was less involved, I would think Europe would be in a better position than a brand new alliance.
I understand your point about NATO's historical funding issues, but this isn't just about money - it's about aligning with shared democratic values and international accountability.
The 2% GDP threshold has indeed been a persistent issue, but European nations have substantially increased defense spending since 2022. The proposed alliance would be fundamentally different from NATO in two key ways:
1. It would prioritize democratic values and rule of law accountability (ICC membership) over simply being anti-Russia
2. It would develop true strategic autonomy through indigenous defense production
NATO remains structurally dominated by US interests and equipment with their potential "kill switches." Recent events demonstrate why European security can't be outsourced to powers with potentially divergent interests.
The existing industrial and technological capabilities across Europe are more than sufficient to create a credible deterrent force when properly coordinated. This isn't about creating something from scratch, but realigning existing resources toward greater sovereignty.
Democracy and rule of law aren't just ideals - they're strategic assets worth defending with our own means.
Ah... the league of 'liberal democracies' where blasphemy is still a prosecuted crime. So very liberal.
It's also insane that you place Japan in the realm of this alliance while Hungary is kicked out. Japan is significantly more ethno-nationalist than Hungary ever could be.
Interesting how you overlook Japan's strong judicial independence, press freedom, and regular peaceful transitions of power to focus on ethno-nationalism.
Meanwhile, Hungary systematically dismantles judicial independence, crushes media freedom, and rewrites electoral rules to entrench single-party rule - but sure, they're the real liberals here.
The proposed alliance isn't claiming perfect members - it's establishing clear, measurable standards through indices *like* WJP Rule of Law. If Japan doesn't meet the 0.67 threshold, they're out too. That's the whole point: consistent standards applied equally, not convenient exceptions.
But please, continue defending Orbán's "illiberal democracy" while nitpicking flaws in actual functioning democracies. That's definitely a coherent position.
In the same league as the UK and Germany. This is why I don't support unfettered American alignment with these countries. There is no major country as liberal as the United States.
"Please don't post insinuations about astroturfing, shilling, bots, brigading, foreign agents and the like. It degrades discussion and is usually mistaken. If you're worried about abuse, email hn@ycombinator.com and we'll look at the data."
I understand. I'm saying that that alliance is in real danger of shrinking before it even gets started, and at any point thereafter.
Seven countries now have far right parties in government, including Italy, France, and Germany. If they go the way of the U.S., any liberal alliance will be greatly diminished.
In 2025, Trump dumped Ukraine, sided with Putin and made a number of bully threats (including invasion) to its formal National Security partners. Security which - at least still today - is bound by literal treaty.
Should Europe just roll over and wag its tail?
What kind of partnership is this that one side wants to boss around its only-good-if-wimp partner?
Democracy isn't binary and doesn't start and end with elections. It is not democratic, for instance, for a president to subvert the powers of Congress (whose members also won their elections).
> The EU is going to be thinking long and hard about the future of NATO now.
European defense spending has, for decades now, suggested that they don't particularly care about NATO. Well, the Western European members at least. Those who used to live in the Warsaw Pact take it more seriously - see Poland, for example.
They also should have been thinking about the implications of buying so much gas from the Russians for the last 15 years. The invasion of Georgia should have been a trigger to move off of Russian exports permanently. Instead it just brought further dependence and a major pipeline project.
I despise Trump as much as anyone but strategic security shouldn't rest on one country never being in a position to elect an isolationist demagogue.
> European defense spending has, for decades now, suggested that they don't particularly care about NATO.
I'd argue the opposite: Western European countries' low defense spending was exactly because they they believed NATO (in particular the US) would intervene if needed. They don't believe this anymore now, hence will increase defense spending, hence making NATO less relevant. They will now be able to rely on the EU alone.
> I'd argue the opposite: Western European countries' low defense spending was exactly because they they believed NATO (in particular the US) would intervene if needed. They don't believe this anymore now, hence will increase defense spending, hence making NATO less relevant. They will now be able to rely on the EU alone.
They're increasing spending, but that takes years to translate to real results.
It's not particularly hard to pump out a few hundred thousand rifles, small arms ammo, and hand them to cannon fod... I mean... the fighting-age men of a country.
What is hard is developing a weapons industry that can act upon intelligence provided by spies planted in places like Russia, develop systems with indigenous technologies, and produce them at scale, all with the logistics to make them mean something on the battlefield. This was on full display during WWII, when some more advanced weapons came out of Germany too late and in too small of numbers to give the Nazis a chance to avoid the ass kicking they so richly deserved.
That takes decades to develop. Europeans, with the exception of the UK and maybe France, have let that fruit rot on the vine since 1991. Putin wouldn't have made this gamble if he didn't think this.
I mean all you need to do is look at South Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan, many South American countries, the list goes on and on.
America is like a fickle woman. When she pays attentions to you it feels wonderful, but when she changes her mind it's like you never existed in the first place.
Zelensky had to know that going in. The writing was on the wall.
Frankly, the EU is only able to "think long and hard" but never to actually do anything. They have no warfighters anymore and it will take years for the member states of the EU to rebuild anything resembling military capability, if the EU even allows it. Brussels is the equivalent to the Deep State in the US but with official status, instead of being a shadow government. The only leverage EU member states have vis a vis the US is as trading partners and as vassal states for Pax Americana. If the EU wants to move away from the US, good luck. The member states of the EU are soon going to realize they are "a peninsula at the tip of Eurasia" and their best interests lie in close ties to the US.
Ukraine is in a bind, and it is sad when a buffer state is put through the meat grinder in a proxy war between two great powers. But here we are. The upside is that the Ukrainians who weren't killed in the conflict will be, along with Poland and Lithuania, the only "European" states with anything resembling a capable military. I doubt the EU members want Ukraine as a full member of NATO. Too risky. There are some proposals on the table for a more complicated peace without conceding full neutrality of Ukraine to Russia.
I don't think many people understand the nature of this conflict. They merely see "Russian aggression" but have little comprehension of great power competition and the events leading up to the hot part of this war. I feel for the Ukrainians but I wonder if any of the Ukraine boosters would shed a drop of their own blood for Ukraine. If the US demands that the Europeans take a larger role in the security of Europe, we will see if the European NATO members are up to the task. The US needs to pivot its resources to China in the coming decade. The war with Russia has been very costly and strengthened the bonds between Russia and China (and Iran and North Korea). The Europeans should take a great role in policing their own neighborhood, but I don't believe the EU, as currently constructed, is the governance vehicle capable of leading a unified Europe. The member states are, quite understandably, not happy to give up their sovereignty and culture. Participation in a common market has been a disaster for the working class of Western Europe (unless you think cheaper products is the only measure of a country's vitality). The EU experiment might be at an inflection point. They can remain in this bureaucratic quagmire, or reassert the spirit of Wesphalian sovereignty, or await the arrival of a new Charlemagne to unite a strong Europe under sovereign leadership capable of meeting the challenges of the 21st century. My money is on the decline of the EU into irrelevance and a return to the Westphalian spirit. There is no political will centered in Brussels capable of leading this ragtag assemblage of diverse states and peoples. The border problems persist. The result will be more populist revolts and ascendant "right wing" parties advocating "blood and soil" nationalism. If that's the future, then the western european states will only be supported militarily via bilateral treaties with the US or under the umbrella of a NATO dominated by the US. The latter is just the norm for the post-WWII "New World Order" so it will feel familiar. With luck, the collapse of the EU will allow EU member states to reassert control over their own borders and laws. If that happens, they should abandon this resentment of the US and be grateful they were saved from the managed decline of their central government in Brussels.
I don't think America would/should shed blood for Ukraine nor Europe for that matter. We have bigger issues at the moment, like illegal immigrants, drug cartels, corruption, and China's stated ambitions in the Pacific.
Ukraine is a buffer state to constrain Russia's westward ambitions. Think of it as an unfortunate flat road connecting Asia and Europe, ideal for military movement (especially Russian tank warfare). It is seen as a linchpin or "heartland" of Eurasia. Unfortunately, there is no strategic option to let Russia dominate it while maintaining US global hegemony. Whether that's "right" or not, it's the consensus opinion in the American foreign policy apparatus. The hope is that it can be Europe's responsibility and the US can "pivot to China."
I am well aware of Ukraine's geography and its consequences for Europe. You all have been fighting over that area quite viciously for the last 1000 years.
Question and I ask this honestly. What if Americans no longer care about global hegemony or the fate of Europe? As an American I am tired of the continual idea that we have to care about what happens in Europe and if anything bad happens there it is egg on our face. What about egg on Europe's face? They choose not to spend money on their defense and keep their end of the NATO agreement. I have no appetite to keep up our end of the NATO treaty in wartime if the other parties couldn't keep up their end in peacetime.
This was a book written by a British about continental Europe. I don't think it holds much value to America. It definitely would impact Europe, Britain, the ME, and North Africa. But honestly it will not have much of an impact on America in terms of our security. There will be impacts to global markets but none that would destroy or really hammer ours. This was written from the view point of European power, which hasn't existed since the end of WW2.
It is the consensus view of the foreign establishment. You can argue for an isolationist foreign policy. We do have a "big beautiful ocean" separating us from the problems of the world. But global powers have a way of competing with each other on a global scale. I'm partial to arguments against global empire because the metropole tends to become just another territory to administer (a kind of home colony). You can see this especially in Britain today. The problems of immigration and border controls at home are hard to separate from foreign policy. Look at a country with extreme border controls like North Korea and see they still need allies to survive. Hence North Korean soldiers dying on the battlefields of Ukraine.
If you want to argue for a renewed commitment to the Monroe Doctrine, I'm with you. Heck, I'm even there for Manifest Destiny (Canada as the 51st state, as Benjamin Franklin would have had it). But the downsides of a multipolar world are legitimate. Ideally we can maintain our global dominance without oppressing/degrading our own and allied populations.
I get what you’re saying, and I appreciate the thoughtful take. It's enjoyable to engage in an actual discussion about this instead of the usual knee-jerk reactions so thank you!
But here’s the thing. Great powers compete globally, but the real question isn’t whether America competes. It’s how, where, and at what cost. If we’re keeping influence by stretching ourselves too thin, ignoring our own problems, and paying Europe’s defense bill forever, then we’re setting ourselves up for failure just like Britain did.
Ukraine matters to Europe, not really to us. Losing Ukraine isn’t a crisis for America, but losing focus on our own borders, economy, and the Pacific definitely is.
I get that multipolarity has risks, but so does trying to be everywhere all the time. If European security is that important, then Europe should handle it. If they won’t, that’s on them.
If we don’t start prioritizing where America actually needs to be strong, we’re going to wake up one day and realize we’ve spent decades managing other people’s problems while letting our own pile up.
I agree with your take. We are stretched too thin and our "allies" have become frenemies. We need to fix our domestic problems or we won't have a country worth preserving. Certainly, at this rate we won't be strong enough to compete with a rising China.
I only point out the foreign policy consensus inherited from the Cold War is still operational among Atlanticists and other Ukraine war hawks. Stripping away the hysteria, we can accept there will be a cost to Russian dominance of Ukraine, if allowed. I expect the foreign policy establishment in State, CIA, and DoD will continue to try to torpedo Trump. But the China hawks are ascendant at the moment. The recent debacle with Zelensky at the WH is maybe the nail in the coffin for overt "Ukraine uber Alles" war hawks. (They say Personnel is policy. Remember that key architects and actors of Atlanticist policy have personal ties to Ukraine. Nuland is second generation Ukrainian-American. The Vindmanns are Ukrainian nationals. Personally, I would not be surprised if Ukraine saboteurs were implicated in the Trump assassination attempt in Butler. They feel, perhaps correctly, that Trump is an existential threat. Doesn't necessarily mean their problems should be our problems.)
I tend to agree that Russia, China, and Iran are our global competitors, that India and Brazil are dark horses, and that transnational Islam (supported by our foreign adversaries) is another wild card. Abandoning the liberal pieties of Pax Americana and retrenching along nationalist sovereignty lines appears to be the way forward with regard to the very real domestic problems you mention. Unconstrained international labor migration is a failure for domestic populations and needs to be largely reversed. Border security and foreign influence need to be addressed. These are civilizational problems as old as civilization itself. The pendulum is swinging back. Some people get it.
I also appreciate the occasional encounter with sensible HN readers who eschew the vitriolic rhetoric and try to argue objectively. Looking at your other recent comments I see you are in a similar boat as I am on HN. Good luck!
The US just fought a 20 year war and shed quite a bit of blood and treasure. It also appears the US military has been "in country" in Ukraine under special non-uniformed deployments (read "on loan officially as mercenaries"). When was the last war fought by a Western European "power"? Europe fights, if at all, wearing blue helmets, or sometimes fighting "from the rear" behind US military might.
1. The US has shed blood for far less serious reasons. Less than 5 years ago we were "shedding blood" for opium farms in the middle east.
2. As it stands today, the US comes out on top. They paid a measly sum to throw Russia in the meat grinder and it will take decades until Russia is threat to the US again.
3. Our military hawks now get to focus on China. EU still has to worry about Russia
> Frankly, the EU is only able to "think long and hard" but never to actually do anything. They have no warfighters anymore and it will take years for the member states of the EU to rebuild anything resembling military capability, if the EU even allows it.
What are you on about? EU countries + UK have over a million professional military personnel.
> Brussels is the equivalent to the Deep State in the US but with official status, instead of being a shadow government.
The EU parliament has members elected from each country in the EU, there's no deep state conspiracy there.
> The member states of the EU are soon going to realize they are "a peninsula at the tip of Eurasia" and their best interests lie in close ties to the US.
This is the complete opposite of what's actually going on, EU countries are realizing we need a stronger EU and we need to fend for ourselves and will be moving away from US ties.
"Professional military personnel" are not warfighters. How many of those "personnel" (did you mean "troops") have been deployed in a non UN peacekeeping capacity or as troop liasons? Very few. Meanwhile, the US just concluded a 20 year adventure in Afghanistan and Iraq. And has been waving a "big stick" standing behind little brothers in other conflicts. Ukraine's military (what's left of it) is actually battle-hardened and could probably turn around and beat Europe if Russia let up and they were so inclined (I jest, but maybe not).
The "deep state" is not a "conspiracy". It's a form of parallel government. Nothing unique about that in history. (The Roman Catholic Church should be familiar to all Europeans.) The comparison is to point out that there are two "sovereignties" in play (member states and EU) making laws. And when you have two, you have none.
You weren’t alone in Iraq and Afghanistan. Also, fighting against talibans and Iraqi rebels is a bit different compared to the war in Ukraine so I’m not so sure your US troops are more “warfighters” than the European troops.
How many non-US combat troops do you think were involved in Iraq and Afghanistan? How many troops do you think European NATO members will commit to a hot war in Ukraine? I agree that the Ukrainians are battle-hardened in a way few other countries are now (besides Russia of course). Ukrainian soldiers also have valuable experience in drone warfare and will have much to teach the US and its allies about 21st century conflict. US military is going to have to modernize some of its personnel and capabilities for new technology, but at this moment, I'd pit the US military against any other in the world. And it's not close.
But for how long will you be able to have the strongest and most modern military in the world if you start losing money because of trade wars and/or other countries stop buying US weapons and so on? I believe it won’t be good for your economy, or ours, if we stop being friends and allies.
This is why Europe must remilitarize and police its own neighborhood on behalf of western security. Probably not going to happen under the EU, which has no ability to assert muscular sovereign leadership. There is no unified Europe at the moment. Better for Europeans to ditch the EU and double down on NATO as a military alliance of sovereign states.
Russia has 1.5 million active military personnel. So you're basically saying that the entire EU+UK is militarily smaller than a country (Russia) that has a GDP less than Texas.
EU+UK aren't conscripting at this time and also have much better training and equipment than Russia, so the comparison isn't apples to apples, I was just saying that we do in fact have "warfighters".
EU+UK don't/can't/won't "conscript". They will have a volunteer military (or possibly deals with mercenary armies, or foreign recruits in exchange for citizenship) unless and until something catastrophic happens. If it comes conscription, it will have been a unconscionable failure of leadership.
Literally not the definition of a dictatorship. Elections alone do not guarantee a government not run by a dictator. Not having elections during wartime doesn't mean a dictator is in charge. There is still a parliament.
> edit: not sure by which part of the world this is downvoted ;)
It's downvoted because of this:
> Well most of the nations of the world didn't do anything for Ukraine, or supported Russia one way or the other.
Most of the world supports Ukraine or at least is not pro Russia, as you can see in UN votes. In latest vote, USA voted like Russia, North Korea and Israel, China abstained.
Most countries can't afford funding a war on this magnitude even if they wanted to. And this war still squarely concerns solely the West, which the US is a part of, even if Trump overestimates the size of that pond.
I'm sorry, I don't care who you are or what the history between your country and the US is, you don't come and be disrespectful like that and get away with it.
All he had to do was was smile and wave, but Zelensky made it into a dick measuring contest which he was always going to lose.
He is a terrible leader and this is just more proof of it.
They increased their defense spending because of Russia invading Ukraine in 2014 and 2022. It didn't have anything to do with US bullying. The biden administration certainly wasn't going around bullying Europe between 2021 and 2024.
Trumps talks of NATO problems go back to his last term. Foreign leaders showed fear of reduced US cooperation then [1], some directly attributing increased spending to that [2]. It was very widely reported back then, with similar fervor.
It was as if they invited him to the Whitehouse to set him up for a lecture and scolding. They had no intention of anything other than humiliating him in front of the world. It's shameful what our administration has done.
it was 100% the purpose, but it looks like it worked out badly. They keep underestimating Zelenski but he was certainly prepared for this confrontation. I mean, I just can't imagine anybody staying that cool in front of such provocations.
He did one mistake though, when he asked "Can I speak/say something?" to Trump, and Trump said no. This is lesson learnt for the future (for myself too in terms of public speaking).
But overall, he did rather well, considering the shit-show it was.
I still can't believe Trump publicly tries to humiliate an ally like this, and at the same time calls Biden "the stupid President".
Stupid or not, perhaps he is, but not to stay in public like that. It shows Trump doesn't respect the function of the US President and shits on the vote of the citizens.
I don't think I'd consider that a mistake. Not that it matters to everyone but it's one more asshole thing to know Trump did, which was only publicized because Zelenskyy respectfully asked for his turn to speak. Other leaders are likely to have taken note of that: Trump isn't even pretending that you're equals.
To some common folk, it will make Zelenskyy look weak but also consider this exact thread in which people say his calm demeanor makes him look strong. I'd wager Zelenskyy is interested in impressing the latter folk and not interested in impressing the former.
Yup, I’d wager that given how the meeting had gone thus far, he made the strategic decision to specifically do this. He knew that this would be spun in whatever way Trump wanted, so it was better to win another point with the group that is smart enough to look past the talking points that Trump is going to push onto the media.
> Other leaders are likely to have taken note of that: Trump isn't even pretending that you're equals.
They’re not equals and to pretend otherwise is delusional. One is the leader of the most powerful country on earth. The other is broke and soon to be defenseless.
I love Zelensky and I think he's a hero, but I don't think he did well at all. People think he did well because they love him, but objectively I think he made quite a few mistakes besides the one you mention.
The first one is getting emotional in the first place. His team and Ukraine's intelligence services should have spent weeks interrogating and trying to provoke him in order to desensitize him to this kind of shit. Trump, Vance and Musk are primarily trolls and they should be dealt with as such.
He should not have interrupted Vance answering him either. That was fatal.
He needed to stay calm and slow. He did better than any of us could ever have done, but it wasn't quite enough for this situation. He could have looked a lot stronger and I think we need everything we can possibly get in the situation we're all in right now.
Given the situation, he did stay calm and slow. He did an excellent job trying to keep the cadence measured.
But Trump jumped in angry at the implication that one day Putin will come for the US. That is when Trump stated his machine gun speech … millions will die, world war 3.
This was a shameful day for America. Period. Full stop.
When Trump jumps in like that, it's a real fear he has. Trump is really for real scared of the Russians. Why? Well, one can muster a couple of hypotheses.
He’s not scared of the Russians. He’s scared of the voters thinking they should be scared of the Russians. When Zelenskyy said the Russians will come for America, Trump was angry because he knew it was going to scare voters and lose him support.
Based on the livestream of the incident, I personally think the issue was the lack of a Ukrainian-English translator.
Vance was absolutely trying to score domestic political points by undermining Zelenskyy, but Zelenskyy was unable to communicate or respond in the manner he wanted to, and definetly committed some obvious Russian L1 / English L2 mistakes (Zelenskyy's first language is Russian and this can be seen by his "costume" statement, because the direct translation for suit across the CIS is костюм/costume [0][1][2][3] because of French influence), and he inadvertently insinuated that Trump wasn't doing enough even though he was trying to join Vance in dunking on the previous admin.
This is why the Japan and India meetings with Trump had English translators despite Ishiba and Modi having a similar level of English fluency to Zelenskyy.
may not have been a mistake - I think Z was trying to maintain the high ground and force Trump to act poorly (by saying no); bad optics for Trump (unless you're MAGA)
It is definitely going to become a meme, the way he sat there like a scolded kid while Trump said "No. You've talked a lot today. Look, you're not winning this. You're not gonna win this"
Felt like watching your friend get scolded by his parents when they find a cigarette in his backpack
> Trump doesn’t respect the function of the US President
Probably why people voted for him.
> shits on the vote of the citizens.
yes 4 years ago. But now… can’t really say we didn’t know what we were voting for. I didn’t vote for him, but most of my fellow Americans did, and we gotta live with that, and hope we learn.
- an American citizen who wasn't able to vote in multiple presidential elections due to nonsense like being unregistered without notification in a state with an early registration deadline
I don’t think it was some elaborate ruse… he is a trained actor but his frustration seemed very real. And maybe he shouldn’t have shown it but I do think he was simply reacting to what was unfolding in front of him.
IMO he’s damned if he does and damned if he doesn’t. Maybe he could have been more professional and statesmanlike but I don’t think it would have earned him a thing. The US strategy seems locked in at this point and it’s a pro-Russia one. He could have really flexed the “deal with a heckler” muscles but the risk is far too great.
European leaders are queuing up to restate their support for Ukraine after this and I think that’s probably the best he could have gotten from it anyway.
> They keep underestimating Zelenski but he was certainly prepared for this confrontation.
The Trump-gang seems to underestimate everyone and everything. I still don't know whether they mean all this excessive behavior for real, or if this is an elusive ploy to divert from something else. Trumps seems to operate by selling big to gain small, but I can't really understand yet what his real long-term goal seems.
But at this point it seems other politicians around the world have got an understanding of him and his behavior and started playing along. I'm curious if Zelenskiy did the same, he certainly gained more from this than if he had been avoided it from the beginning.
The long-term goal is to fix themselves and their family at the top of the social hierarchy just in time before biotech bros discover immortality, thus saving their place permanently in the newly ossified social order. This is the last chance fix it before the true end of history, or some bullshit like that.
That felt really gross to watch. I don't know what else to say that's more high-level thinking and adds to the conversation. A straight up "mean girls" moment.
I'm 61. I never in my life thought we could be in this situation. As the old saying goes, "Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me." We elected Trump again knowing exactly who he is.
I'm not disappointed in Trump; he remains exactly who I thought he was even before running in 2015. I'm disappointed in how many of my fellow citizens applaud his buffoonery, ignorance, and malice. While Trump himself is not competent, he has surrounded himself with people who can actually do the damage.
To conservatives who are about to say I'm a snowflake liberal, I ask you this: if Biden had invited George Soros to run wild through the government and ignore the laws, demanded a $800B reduction in the military budget and reallocated it to distribute to those in poverty, commanded schools to hire only gay people, fire anyone who didn't declare loyalty to Biden, and had minions collecting all your data for whatever purposes, and threatened to wipe out Israel unless they gave over their country to the Palestinians, what would you have done?
I can't even construct a proper analogy because those goals above are just a parody of what the left wants, whereas Trump/Musk are actually doing that about actual right wing wishes.
How to the ground work was laid leading up to trump getting into office deserves a documentary. He just had to say some memetic/populist words that had been unadressed/supressed/agitated for years leading up
I'm 29 and i voted for trump. I'd like to share my perspective for you to gleam alittle insight into my generation and why we voted for trump.
if Biden had invited George Soros to run wild through the government and ignore the laws, demanded a $800B reduction in the military budget and reallocated it to distribute to those in poverty,
- This sounds awesome. He's got a plan, he executed. If we didn't piss off our allies, we could probably ride on our military spending lorals from decades past. It would probably completely irradicate poverty, if he got the whole 'left' side of silicon valley to start building super cheap sky scrapers for the homeless. it'd be a pretty cool golden age. But here lies the issue... He inacted radical change towards some end, and hired some of the smartest minds in the world to help him enact his policys.
commanded schools to hire only gay people,
-..... Hmmmmm, Sounds like we'd have a complete population collapse in about a single generation. I'm a normal dude, i've had gay friends, trans friends, w/e. But do i disagree with them on that issue? Do i think this should be taught in school at all? no... so yeah, i'd be pretty pissed and i'd homeschool my kid forsure.
fire anyone who didn't declare loyalty to Biden,
Well.... Yeah, i mean, that's how a cabinet works, right? The people voted for the president, so who are you to defy the people? get in line or get out.
and had minions collecting all your data for whatever purposes,
- Well... They hopefully used the data to irradicate the military budget.
and threatened to wipe out Israel unless they gave over their country to the Palestinians, what would you have done?
at 61, i'm suprised in your inability to see the world as... real... with real violence. People seem to forget that a couple generations ago the entire world was imperialistic with a large percentage of the human population as slaves. We are those same people, our evolution didn't change in 250 years. Only with a complete monopoly on violence can you ensure peace between neighbors. This war has been going on for too long and will never end if a complete monopoly of violence is not secured. So honestly, if he came in and ended the war, i don't really care how he'd do it. Pick a side is a side as any. but like... hamas is literally a terrorist organization funded by iran so....
Thank you for your detailed and considered reply. I'm going to push back, but please understand it is my way of understanding your position better. I am not attempting to change your mind.
Having a plan and executing on it is not intrinsically good if the plan itself is corrupt. It is telling that Project 2025 was disavowed by Trump before the election due to its many unpopular goals, but obviously that was a ruse and than plan is being carried out. That doesn't fit your description of it is commendable to carry out that plan.
Many of these plans are just based on pretext. P2025 isn't going to reduce the debt -- the money saved by cutting social services will be rerouted to the military and bankroll tax cuts that are clearly advantageous to the rich. Recall in Trump's first term there was the case of megacorps using accounting tricks (like "the double irish") to avoid paying taxes that were otherwise legally due. Trump gave away an immediate trillion dollars via that amnesty and reduced rates going forward for trillions more. If the real goal was debt reduction, we'd be reverting those tax giveaways and restoring the capital gains tax to a higher level.
"Hmmmmm, Sounds like we'd have a complete population collapse". I agree, as would just about everyone, that such a policy would be bad. But that doesn't address my point: should Biden/Soros be allowed to ignore the laws to do it?
"i mean, that's how a cabinet works" Nobody is upset that Trump is replacing political appointees. The problem is that he is turning apolitical positions into political positions. Should the IRS be staffed with political appointees? The DOJ? The FBI? By claiming for years that he is the victim of a politicalization of the DOJ, it is the pretext for actually politicizing the DOJ.
"hopefully they used the data to irridicate the military budget." First, the military budget is set to increase. Second, why offer him the benefit of the doubt? It is OK he is violating laws just in case he is doing it for good? Half of Trump's former inner circle, lifelong Republicans, refused to endorse him, many expressly saying he is manifestly unfit. The data is that Trump is transactional and is motivated only by self interest.
What would I have done about Gaza? Yes, it is a Gordian knot of conflicting principles. But again, that isn't my point. Biden didn't ask for the cleansing of Israel, unlike Trump who has called for a cleansing of Palestine. Is this playing out like you expected when you voted for Trump? Your response seems to indicate you have bought into the cartoonish version that the right pushes of the conflict: looking only at the violence done to Israel without acknowledging the violence done by Israel. To disclose my position, of course, I don't want bombs falling on the heads of Israelis and Israel has the right to defend itself. Yes, Hamas is a terrorist organization. Is your problem that they should behave more honorably? We can help that by giving them billions of dollars annually and giving them some nukes. Sarcasm aside, it is like people complaining about Iraq using IEDs; of course I don't want to see US soldiers blown up, but to complain about them resorting to primitive tricks while we occupy and bomb the crap out of their country is rich.
< the money saved by cutting social services will be rerouted to the military and bankroll tax cuts that are clearly advantageous to the rich.
Biden campaigned on ending those tax cuts. He did not end the tax cuts. These are not new, and these are from trumps first term.
>Second, why offer him the benefit of the doubt? It is OK he is violating laws just in case he is doing it for good?
Can you tell me what laws he violated? have you actually seen the doge website? They are using FPDS-NG which is all public information... They are all vetted and passed a background check.
Finally, on Palestine... Yes, they elected an internationally known criminal organization, which is designated as a terrorist organization by the department of state to run their country. They then murdered a bunch of people at a music festival to give israel all the ammunition it needs. Now it's crying foul because Sharīʿah turns out to be a very evil way to govern yourself. Again, not saying israel is blameless in the last 100 years of fucked up shit that they have done to eachother, but you keep poking a bigger bear, doesn't matter who was wrong, that's not how war works.
How do I know what Trump's administration is going to do in the future? Project 2025 laid it all out. Secondly, a President doesn't directly control the budget -- that is the job of congress. There are some things directly in the purview of the president, but everything else has to be done the "the bully pulpit" via negotiating with congress. So, no Biden could not unilaterally change the law -- he failed to get congress to do it.
Trump is operating on the novel legal theory of the unitary executive -- that the executive branch really has all the power and the other two are subordinate and operate at the will of the President. I don't understand how people can listen to Trump assert this and the the next moment Trump is railing about how Obama broke the law by spying on Trump's campaign. If they really believe "if the president does it, then it is legal" then how could Obama have broken the law.
We aren't entirely sure what he is up to, but clearly allowing unfettered access to Musk's minions, none of whom have clearance, to hover up all data and install who knows what software on the computers of every department is not legal. Clearly, demanding George to "find 11,780 votes" is not legal. Illegally taking top secret documents, lying about having them, actively moving them when the Feds came to collect them, all illegal. Clearly, keeping cooking books and keeping two sets of books in his personal business are not legal. He has taken in tens of millions, possibly billions, despite the emoluments clause (the open extortion of media companies in the first case, the pump and dump trump crypto coin, the suspect investments from Qatar and others into Kusher's failing real estate deals).
Humiliating people does appear to be a common theme with the administration, one just has to look at the photo they put out after winning with RFK and the McDonald's takeout on airforce one. Also all the women jockeying for various positions getting plastic surgery, looking like an army of botox'd stepford wives. I'm no armchair psychoanalyst so I can't tell you what it means. Just that it's very.. apparent and intentional.
I think it was disgusting what Trump and Vance did, but I don't believe for a second that everyone will view it that way. The 40% that voted for them will view this as an ass whooping Trump/Vance gave Zelensky. They're all in on the grift, there's no reason this will turn them off.
Now, if SS or Medicaid is gutted... that will be the turning point for this admin.
> Now, if SS or Medicaid is gutted... that will be the turning point for this admin.
They are in the process of being gutted ... but Trump, Musk and the right wing media will spin it as being Biden's fault, and those same people will accept it as gospel truth.
Indirectly, yes. They're trying to make the administration of SS and Medicaid fail. Do they have the balls to make a frontal assault? We'll see.
Either way, it's going to be interesting to see them blame any problems on Biden.
I wonder if Trump got Elon in to do the axing just so he could blame him if his base turns on him. Remember the first cabinet meeting? He made a joke about firing Elon. To me, that was a reminder to everyone who is in charge. Also, Elon didn't even have a chair at the table. What a power play.
I’m in that 40% and I think today was fantastic. It lets people see what these things are really like.
Zelensky came to the USA to sign an already agreed-to minerals deal that would have (eventually) paid back the billions of dollars they’ve received. There were no additional security guarantees. No further agreements. This was back pay. And it was agreed to before he left Ukraine.
He reneged, got called out for demanding further security guarantees, thought he could bluff them into agreeing to more, and summarily got his ass handed to him on live TV. Trump is not the one that tried to change the deal.
The real moment of the day was when Trump asked him point blank if he even wants a ceasefire. And he couldn’t say yes.
You can’t end a war diplomatically if there’s no will to stop fighting and accept peace. For lack of a better term, Ukraine is in a shit position. Billions more dollars will not change that, it will just cost more blood.
If people think the situation and accepting the current positions is bad now, just wait to see how bad it will be when the USA weapons spigot gets turned off.
Considering America signed the Budapest Memorandum pledging to assure security in Ukraine in exchange for Ukraine to hand over its nuclear weapons to Russia... all this is going to do is spur countries no longer reliably protected by the US to develop their own nuclear weapons.
I think the risk of nuclear war in the future just went up.
If I steal half your house, kill one of your children, and then ask for a cease fire, while I still get your kitchen and living room - what are your thoughts?
Would you be mad if you gave up your guns and your neighbor promised to protect you and then he said, unless you give me your back yard, I'm not helping, I know we had an agreement, but oh well, good luck on your own?
Why would you want to enter another agreement with this neighbor when he's already opportunistically screwing you over on existing agreement?
The tertiary definition of "diplomatic" is "employing tact and conciliation especially in situations of stress". That means acting calmly and rationally in the types of insane situations that you're describing.
Nobody is saying Zelensky and Ukraine should be happy with where they've ended up. War is terrible and the desire for revenge or retribution will never subside. Diplomacy is putting aside that raw emotion to get the best deal you can, working with the situation that you have.
For them to come to USA to sign an agreement, renege, demand more, and create a spectacle in front of the cameras, is incredibly non-diplomatic. You can see it on the face of the Ukrainian ambassador: https://www.newsweek.com/photo-ukrainian-ambassador-amid-tru...
That minerals deal was going to be the first step toward peace. But Zelensky royally fucked it up. And the only way to fix it is going to be for him to come groveling back or step down so someone else can do the groveling. And that's not a desire of mine, that's the reality of the situation. Their country is broke and will run out of ammo in six months without further assistance. As Trump said during the call, he has no cards to play.
> That minerals deal was going to be the first step toward peace.
No, it was the first step toward conceding everything to Russia, also conceding to an outrageously overzealous US (for reasons unclear to anyone outside the Trump bubble), with a guaranteed future war with zero protections.
If they wanted to give Russia everything they wanted, they could've done that years ago, and not given up minerals to the US.
Diplomacy has been tried multiple times before, even with security guarantees from the usa. Still Putin invaded. There can not be lasting peace without actual guarantees (for which use is not even a trustworthy party anymore). Because Putin will rebuild and invade again as he did after the last time.
This is what Zelensky tried to explain to Vance before the discussion blew up.
> The real moment of the day was when Trump asked him point blank if he even wants a ceasefire. And he couldn’t say yes.
The reason why he didn't answer is because the answer is meaningless. Putin won't respect a cease fire. And if you think he would, you are completely clueless about the history of that region and what has already transpired. The "guarantee" that Putin gave that he would not invade if Ukraine gave back their nukes. That promise was ignored in 2014 when he took Crimea.
As for the rest of your reply: I assume you are discussing this in good faith and you're not trolling. If the US withdraws support and Ukraine falls to Russia, what do you think will happen after that? Is the rest of Europe (east and west) safe from further incursions?
Some people only care about simple stuff. You know like partying or having fun? US Government being a shit show? War stuff happening halfway across the planet? Some people don't care about that. They don't care if the government they are in is a democracy or a dictatorship. Some people just want to smoke weed everyday, play video games, fish, travel, spend time with family, or get laid... If the current government (whatever shape or form it is) isn't preventing them from doing what it is they want to do, then they don't really care. And reality is, there's a lot of such folks who's pursuits are rather unaffected by the current state of affairs, even if they're large amounts who are. You might think that they should care, and reasonably so, but fact is, some won't until it actually is (too late).
> But will the American people see what the rest of the world sees, or will they continue supporting Trump and Vance?
Attributed to (the half-American) Winston Churchill: "The American people can be counted on to do the right thing — after they've exhausted all other possibilities."
It is consistently misattributed to Churchill and misquoted to be about Americans. The quote is actually from Abba Eban, and what he said was, "History teaches us that men and nations behave wisely once they have exhausted all other alternatives."
I honestly don't think there's anything Trump could do to lose the support of his MAGA base. There have been so many times when I've said "surely they'll see what he is now" only to be mistaken. It's truly a cult.
Trump and MAGA people are really 'till death do us part.....
The people that suffered the most from the first Trump administration are the white republicans: they died because they did not want to be vaccinated against COVID nor wear masks. In 2024 white republicans voted for Trump even though they were personally hurt by Trump's COVID advice.
One of my friends is a Trump supporter who almost died of COVID (he got intubated!!). His wife also got COVID. Never you mind: both of them voted for Trump in 2024.
Right, short of his actions resulting in them being fired, losing medicare or other direct impact, there is no way they will change course, they are too deep in to the grift.
That assumes that Trump, Musk and the right wing media won't spin that as Biden's fault, and that Trump is "working on something better". They will, and they will believe him.
It 100% looks like they were planning to force a confrontation. Notice how all the escalation is them, they start escalating over basically nothing, and they keep trying to crank up the temperature while Zelenskyy's keeping things nice and even. This didn't happen the last couple times world leaders made far more confrontational statements in a similar setting, but also Vance wasn't there to provide emotional support those times and, well, there are some common sayings about the actual nature of a bully.
I think Zelenskyy didn't give them the sound-bites or vibe they were looking for, but they're claiming some kind of victory (WTF) on social media anyway. Meanwhile all they managed to do was look some combination of stupid, childish, and traitorous, while he came out looking incredibly restrained, and overall more-articulate than them despite the handicap of speaking in English rather than his native tongue.
Sounds like when Jon Stewart went on Crossfire and destroyed Tucker Carlson who had attempted to escalate and get angry. And Jon was like "this is theater."
First he wanted to hold Stewart to journalistic standards as a comedian that Carlson was not meeting as an actual journalist and got utterly destroyed in response. He then called for an emergency commercial break, and after the break tried to bait Stewart for not being funny in their interview, despite being completely responsible for the topic. Got utterly destroyed again, and their show got cancelled.
If the past 20 years have taught us anything, including Carlson's history since that segment, it's that this kind of "destroyed" (see also: "destroyed" on Twitter) is not a remotely useful kind of "destroyed", no matter how plain and thorough the destruction.
Tucker got so destroyed that he went onto make 10s of millions a year at Fox, for years, and now he gets to interview fascist skull measurers all day on Twitter.
I disagree that it looked like a planned confrontation and that all the escalation is on Trump and Vance
Vance made a comment about the US' goal to be diplomatic.
Zelensky speaks up and says he wants to ask Vance something. He then goes on to talk about how Putin annexed Crimea and that between 2014 - 2022 Putin was murdering Ukrainian citizens and ignoring cease fires. He mentioned that nobody did anything to stop Putin, implying that Trump didn't do anything during his first term in office. Then Zelensky ends with something along the lines of "so what do you mean diplomacy" to Vance.
Even if Zelensky's statements were correct, that was not a wise course of action to attempt to call out the President and VP while you're in the Oval office. The meeting erupts from there.
Regardless of how you feel about the current administration, it is a fact that Ukraine has been dependent on the US' aid. I don't know what Zelensky expected to gain from those statements.
What would Ukraine gain from a deal where they give up their natural resources in exchange for a pinky promise between an invading dictator and his 'wanna-be dictator' friend to allow Ukraine to remain an independent country?
What did the USA gain by giving billions of dollars of aid to Ukraine?
My understanding is that the mineral deal is back pay. And if the development is going to be done by American firms, then of course there’s a security alignment for the USA.
The dumb move of the day was on the part of Zelensky thinking he could somehow expand things at the last moment or on live TV.
We destroyed half of Russia’s military without shedding American lives. We defended the principle that people should govern themselves and not be dominated by force.
If other large powers stop being afraid of the US, and if allies can't trust the US, then the US will lose its status and the losses from that are probably a lot more than the billions given to Ukraine.
His point, which he made very clearly, was not criticism of the US; it was distrust that Putin would honor a ceasefire. Zelensky explained that diplomacy is not enough, asking what diplomacy alone will accomplish with someone who doesn't honor their deals.
Vance took it in a really weird direction, first pushing "the kind of diplomacy that is going to save your country", then accusing Zelensky of not saying thank you (despite him having said thank you several times that very meeting?).
The reporters reiterated Zelensky's point, asking what Trump would do if Putin breaks the deal, and Trump just shoots down the possibility, saying he doesn't think it would happen and the possibility isn't worth considering. "What if a bomb drops on your head right now". His only justification being that Trump is president and Putin wouldn't do that to Trump.
Zelensky needs guarantees or the ceasefire isn't worth it to him, so it's fair for him to push back on the lack of guarantees even at the risk of annoying Vance. But they snapped back at him in a very unreasonable way.
I agree that Zelensky's main point was definitely that Putin can't be trusted.
But, he also highlighted a couple of times that that no one did anything to stop Putin which implies that the US didn't do anything. Which could be taken as criticism. Also, ending his statements with "So what do you mean diplomacy" is clearly a snarky response.
The fact is Zelensky has no leverage. He was given aid from the US, apparently as a grant. The US has no obligation to help Ukraine. My understanding is that the aid was given to Ukraine in the hopes that it would weaken Russia. That gamble doesn't appear to be working.
If he didn't like the terms of the deal, it should have been discussed in private, before coming to the US. Instead, he chose to push back in a public forum. So I don't feel the response he got was unwarranted.
An analogy that comes to mind is helping out a friend that just lost their job. You give them money and a place to stay and over time the friend starts to feel entitled to your generosity. Eventually, you get tired of it and give them a deadline to find their own place. Then during dinner with a group of friends, they complain to the table that you only gave them 3 months left to stay instead of 6...
I got carried away with the analogy and of course it doesn't capture the gravity of the situation in Ukraine, but I feel like it captures the core sentiment.
That's not really true. His leverage is that it's also in the interests of the US to maintain norms in which territorial conquest is not rewarded. "Crime doesn't pay". He also attempted to convince the US of this but was brushed off.
Looking at it as a one-off situation in which the US doesn't have any interest results in it not being a one-off situation, because if Ukraine loses then everyone starts itching to take land from their neighbours. And everyone else starts arming themselves with nukes, having seen what Ukraine got for giving them up. That's the path to World War 3. And the US might realize then, with regret, that it was easier to plug the dam when the crack was small.
Trump doesn't understand this. He made it clear that he doesn't see it as an iterated game, just a one-off. Or perhaps he's the one who wants to establish norms of taking over neighbours with force?
As for an analogy, a better example is that your friend's house is being broken into by a notorious gang of criminals threatening the neighborhood, and his children have been picked off one by one, and he's knocking at your door screaming "I'll hold them off if you can pass me some more ammo!", and you're haggling him down for his furniture.
When the USSR invaded Afghanistan, the US was happy to send the Taliban weapons. That wasn't for love or charity. It was American self-interest. So is this.
I suppose its arguable that it wasn't the most diplomatic thing to say in the moment. But I can't fault the guy for pointing out the undiplomatic behavior while his country is being squeezed by Russia and US (wrt mineral rights). How frustrating it must be to hear "have you tried diplomacy?" in the context of an invading force.
Oh wow, makes sense that the video was clipped. The first video I clicked had the entire segment so I guess I got lucky.
I can understand his frustration as well. But, he's a leader at war and lives of his men depend on his actions. The moment is much much bigger than him.
It was an absolutely fair question. Trump and Vance are saying let’s solve it with diplomacy. Zelenskyy provides facts confirming the impossibility of doing diplomacy in good faith. Agreements don’t have any value when history shows the other party not respecting the agreements. So, “what kind of diplomacy you mean?” is a fair question.
Vance’s answer “I mean the kind of diplomacy that would save your country” is a meaningless bullshit sentence.
He's trying to make the point that they can't talk peace without material guarantees of security from their allies as part of the deal, which guarantees are absent from the White House's agreement, because they just had an agreement without such guarantees shit all over by Putin, so it's, you know, kinda pointless to do that again. It's making concessions on paper for no guarantee of peace, with an adversary that's already broken a similar agreement, leading to this very conflict. Why make concessions with no guarantee of security in return, when there's zero reason to believe Russia will keep their word? He actually manages to get most of that explanation out, in between interruptions and non sequitur digs from the other two.
The difference between this and the more confrontational corrections of Trump's bullshit in similar situations recently, by Macron and Trudeau, is stark. Trump and Vance were primed to pounce.
Remember that Z has to answer to the people of Ukraine. People who have been dying in defense of their borders -- and a volunteer army, not conscripts, mind you.
He wanted/needed American aid, but there was no way he could just go in there and kiss the ring, while being slandered as the aggressor and letting Putin off the hook. There's no way that would fly for his people back home -- remember that they are as much of an audience as the Americans.
His best outcome was peace with security guarantees (not on offer from the White House—who knows what might have happened if anyone else had been invited to these patently absurd two-party talks, to maybe sweeten the deal for Ukraine? Christ, how ridiculous).
Failing that, this is a pretty good outcome, in the scheme of things. He outed Trump as a committed Russian ally, not behind closed doors, but on international television so nobody (who matters in this context, I mean world leaders, not Trump voters) can ignore it. He may have just kicked over the final leg holding up the American-centered security apparatus, in such a shocking and spectacular fashion that others will be compelled to form a new one without us, which is something they absolutely need if they're going to keep fighting and the US is withdrawing support. They need other countries not to follow America's lead.
Yeah it might actually get Europe to take matters into their own hands (which Trump would see as a win for the US but which is long term very much a loss for the US). It also might push the EU more towards China. In fact if I were China right now I’d start making overtures to Europe.
> did the us held elections while world war 2 was happening?
> Elections were held on November 7, 1944, during the final stages of World War II. President Franklin D. Roosevelt was easily re-elected to an unprecedented fourth term, and the Democratic Party retained their majorities in both chambers of Congress.
Their course of action was bullshit. "Sure, diplomacy has failed you the last four times, and we've interfered plenty. So why not try it a fifth time?"
They expected Zelensky to be Charlie Brown kicking the football.
We have no fucking right to the "mineral rights" in Ukraine.
Zelensky used to be a stand-up comedian. He has plenty of experience thinking on his feet in front of a tough audience of drunks and fools.
I'm wondering what all the people in the US military and government who swore to protect the US from "all enemies, foreign and domestic" are thinking now.
I disagree. If you watch the entire 50-minute video [1], everything was going very smoothly until the final question. If Trump and Vance had intended to provoke Zelenski, why would they have spent the first ~40 minutes chatting with him amicably and only become heated in response to one specific remark he made at the end?
Even worse with Kaja Kallas, she flew into US and Rubio cancelled the meeting. Not sure if she was supposed to meet Trump or not but that's still a case of US bullying its allies all the while sucking up to Putin.
The spat started when Vance made a point addressed to the US media (not Zelensky), and Zelensky interjected to confront Vance for his statement.
Up until that point there had been 40 minutes of cordial discussion. I don't think it was intended that the talks would break down and the deal would fall through.
Richard Hanania believes that we should repeal large portions of the Civil Rights Act and has previously posted extreme racial hatred on white supremacist websites.
But frankly in today's world where we've got people making serious decisions in government who are avowed segregationists I think it is rather important to mention when people oppose the Civil Rights Act when considering their opinion on political news.
Hanania's opinions here are not one weird quirk. They are central to the modern GOP's project.
I am sorry, but this is stupid. You brought an argument on the basis that it comes from a neutral source. Turns out, it was not a neutral source. What do you do: hide the source.
Edit to clarify what I mean: You could have written that you are of the same opinion, independent of who that is. But instead you hide it, as if you had come to that conclusion totally on your own.
I was not leaning on the credibility of this person in any way except to say that it changed his mind on this one specific issue.
When a reply mentioned unrelated past statements from the same person, it was clear that they wanted to tar the statement by association rather than discuss it substantively.
And I think that you should be immensely skeptical of what somebody like Hanania is trying to do to your mind and beliefs.
I believe that mentioning that he is a virulent racist who is actively seeking a much more brutal and unjust world is critical to the substance of his other political writing. These are not unrelated statements.
I initially saw just the latter part of the meeting where the conflict happens and it seemed like a premeditated thing, but after finding a video that shows the meeting from the beginning[1], I agree that it comes across differently.
It seems like they were having a pretty good meeting, right up until Vance decides to interject his stupid talking points, and then the exchange between Vance and Zelensky gets Trump to launch into his bizarre grievance tirade. It's like dementia was in full-self-driving mode and had no brakes.
Maybe Vance got what he wanted out of this meeting, but I could plausibly believe that Trump wasn't planning for it to blow up like this -- he just didn't have the level of self-control or self-awareness to stop himself. Which isn't exactly a good look either.
What did Vance say addressed to the media that Zelensky shouldn't have responded to? I've watched the video a few times and I don't really get what you're talking about
In the full video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BhquAWlke2o), at 38:15 you can see the press ask a question that Trump (and then Vance) are responding to, directly prior to where your video begins.
Trump and Vance are directing their answers at the reporter. Vance's reply does not criticize Zelensky at all.
Then Zelensky interjects to directly confront Vance about his answer. That was the moment when it became argumentative.
Don't get me wrong, I understand the righteous fury that Zelensky feels. His country was invaded. But I think it was a blunder to pick a fight over Vance's answer.
JD basically said "why don't we try diplomacy?" and Zelensky rightfully pointed out that they have already tried for multiple years, including a full ceasefire agreement in 2019 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minsk_agreements). Then Russia invaded Ukraine and tried to takeover the whole country. Either Vance has no idea what he's talking about or he wanted to provoke Zelensky.
Also, Vance's claim that Trump is the first one to actually engage in diplomacy is pretty wild, considering that Trump called Zelensky a dictator and essentially succumbs to all of Putin's demands, going so far as to side with Russia in the UN.
I didn't say that it was inaccurate or invalid per se, only that he made the decision to pick a fight on live TV in what was previously a cordial conversation, and this (to me) strongly refutes the idea that Trump and Vance intentionally set this up to humiliate Zelensky.
I see that. However, it seems weird to broadcast this whole negotiation/talk/hour itself. Even the parts before that weren't really insightful or well formatted. It seems unprofessional and embarrassing for the US to do it in this way, even without the eventual climax.
We should broadcast everything all branches of government do all the time, across thousands of channels so that the people can watch it all and make their own decisions on everything. Now that's transparency.
What tripped my spider sense is these two comments from Trump:
TRUMP: "But you see, I think it’s good for the American people to see what’s going on. I think it’s very important. That’s why I kept this going so long."
TRUMP: "All right, I think we’ve seen enough. What do you think? This is going to be great television."
I just watched Trump greet Zelensky entering the Whitehouse with words like "and he even got all dressed up", foreshadowing Tulsi Gabbard's journalist boyfriend asking Z why he doesn't wear a suit.
It was definitely a planned media ambush intended to undermine support for Z and Ukraine.
I've watched the whole video and Vance was asked a question about diplomacy in the Ukraine war, the idea that Zelensky doesn't get to respond to that while he's sitting in the room seems absurd. Why have him there if he can't give his opinion on diplomacy in Ukraine?
If he was asked a question on American politics I would tend to agree but this is Americans here espousing their views on Ukrainian politics and then expecting to not hear the Ukrainian side to it.
Zelensky is negotiating continued American support for Ukraine. He can respond to whatever he wants, but if he's picking a fight publicly with the administration's position in a delicate multi-party negotiation, that can end up impacting his ability to get the support he needs.
His point that Russia has not abided by previous agreements is well-taken. Clearly any future cease fire will need better enforcement provisions. But this is putting the cart before the horse: the deal that should have been signed today was not a cease fire, it was a mineral rights agreement. If and when a cease fire is on the table that Zelensky feels will be unenforceable, then he can criticize its provisions.
I don't really view Zelensky here as picking a fight. He was not really belligerent, if I was him I would've been livid at the things they were saying for the exact reasons Zelensky pointed out (and that's if ignoring how they were lecturing on diplomacy when they've spent the last couple months undermining his negotiation positions). I will admit it was a mistake for him to talk in this way but not because there's anything inherently wrong about it, just that Trump loves having his ass kissed and does not handle disagreement in a calm manner. It all seems more embarrassing for Trump and Vance than anything else
I am okay letting Ukraine make their own decisions about their people and their land and willing to help them fight for their country. If someone invaded the US I would definitely fight before I gave it up so I don't begrudge someone wanting to keep their country (I'm always a bit surprised at Americans who expect them to want to give up. Where I grew up a lot of people owned guns and fantasized about fighting the good fight, whether against foreign tyranny or domestic. I've even seen people with a "Give me liberty or give me death" signs up in their house).
All that being said though it doesn't change anything about how the meeting went down. I've been lucky enough where I've literally never worked at a place where that would've been acceptable behavior, I've seen people talked to for less. To do that then double down more later was pretty embarrassing. Zelensky pushing back on their view on diplomacy in Ukraine didn't seem like a particular insult to me to make the meltdown make sense.
as sorta an aside: I was especially confused about them getting mad at Zelensky for telling them how to feel but as a native English speaker saying "you're going to feel it" means more you're going to feel the effects not you're going to feel a specific emotion (like after a hard workout at the gym if someone told me "you're going to feel it tomorrow" it would then be really weird for me to interpret that as them telling me how to feel emotionally). Trump responding he was going to feel strong was surreal and confusing to me. Especially with Zelensky as a non-native speaker it was weird to see Trump be the one struggling more with language. I can sorta understand agreeing with Trump politically but I just don't see how that was an acceptable or even normal way to react.
Anyway, that's a long post. I've watched the whole video and watching it just makes me feel like I've been taking crazy pills so I've thought about it a lot today.
Edit: and I forgot the whole thanking thing. Zelensky famously has thanked the US for aid and it seems like something they should know (even I was aware of it and confused while watching the video). But then Vance just pivoted to being mad about something else. Like people are talking about this like it's a policy dispute but I feel like I just watched some someone's villain arc on "The Bachelor", they seemed like reality TV characters.
> I am okay letting Ukraine make their own decisions about their people and their land
Sure. They can do what they want and so can we. We don’t owe them anything. And honestly, in a way we’re just enablers at this point. We’re enabling them to fight on and enabling them to pointless throw away more lives.
You're contradicting yourself. To maximize that peace and protection of human lives you need real security guarantees, otherwise there will just be a small break before the conquering starts again.
I've watched it. I disagree. Zelensky calmly and reasonably asked JD Vance a question regarding his answer to the reporter. It was all fine until Vance started with the "frankly I think it's very disrespectful" line. HE decided to escalate. What Zelensky asked was reasonable and pretty in character for him. They know he's uncompromising with dealing with Putin. The _diplomatic_ position is to understand both sides and mediate, not to try to get one of the sides to bow down to their aggressor.
watched it once, this is what I saw (Vance suddenly antagonizing Zelensky as if to entrap a known hothead), and then followed by the two sly comments from Trump "that’s why I kept this going so long" and "this is going to be great television"
This guy is a probably a Russian bot. He talks like Ukraine was 2 minutes away from a victory and Zelenskyy just needed to stfu for 30 more seconds to get it.
I think they did, but they didn’t expect Zelensky to punch back. He’s more of a fighter than either of them will ever be. Trump is the classic bully where all you need to do is push back. Then he folds.
Zelensky has nothing to lose at this point. If he takes the deal Trump proposed Ukraine will be paying the US and Russia for having been invaded in 2014 and again in 2022. And let’s not ignore the fact it was the US was propping up the politicians suggesting joining NATO and not renewing the lease on Sevastopol in 2015.
That is the real disgrace. This was a setup from day 1. A win-win to degrade Russia either way at Ukraine's expense.
I wish Zelensky made those points instead. "The US voted to open a NATO path for us, The US asked not to renew the base, and the US refused to negotiate with Russia when tanks were on our boarder. And now you want to walk away?"
Because after bribing Trump with the ability to brag that he won the USA 500B of minerals, they will be able to march in without any US interference...
Are you asking people to read the mind of Putin? Or speculate? It seems reasonable to believe that at the very least Putin wants the territory he attempted to take when he first invaded, Kyiv et.al.
Because both Ukraine and Russia have changed? Ukraine is war torn, deeply in debt, and no longer provides the strategic benefit to Russia it might’ve in ‘22. Russia’s economy and populace needs to recover from being war-oriented.
They have their land bridge to Crimea now, and if I had to speculate, they’d be happy with a neutered neighbor that can’t join NATO, essentially a populated DMZ. I can’t see what benefit in wanting to take Ukraine on again after the dragged out meat grinder it was this time around.
> Ukraine is war torn, deeply in debt, and no longer provides the strategic benefit to Russia it might’ve in ‘22.
Expanded access to the Black Sea and natural gas/minerals were and still are very important to Russia. Aside from these, a total victory would allow Putin to cement himself as a conqueror in Russian history books.
I'd suggest the US, because they propped up the Ukrainian politicians who started saying it out loud they would join NATO (a big No-No since the fall of the URSS) and not renew the lease on Sevastopol (Russia's only naval base that operates throughout the year), but I'd settle with Russia, because, after all, they were first to cross the border with tanks.
I think Europe will see this as a clear sign that Trump just attacked one of their own. I would not be surprised if the EU nations soon call a conclave to discuss establishing a new compact for self defense (and economic interest) that EXCLUDES the US. If this does come to pass, then yes, Trump and all of America will have lost.
This bright shining revelation of just how ugly and stupid Trumpism truly is (and America, by proxy) may realign world powers for decades, to our great loss.
That is an entirely different claim than "trump folds" if anyone pushes back, which doesnt seem at all accurate to me. If anything, he digs in his heels.
The only things that seem to sway him is the sentiment of his voters and the economy.
Bully or not, I think the entire schoolyard theory that bullies fold when pushed back is bunk, cartoon logic. Did Russia give up and go home when Ukraine pushed back?
It sure is awesome having a president where whenever they say anything that's obviously false, it's a toss-up whether it's dishonesty, senility, or just plain ignorance.
As sarcastic as this is and scary at the same time, when you’re right you’re right. Accountability is such a vapid concept in American discourse it is snipping the last vestiges of social contract between leaders and, well, those they claim to lead. Fear and loathing for what may come.
IMO it’s not a toss up, it’s just dishonesty. After a certain point we have to call a spade a spade.
Hell, even Trump supporters know it. Half the reason I’ve heard for that vote is that they know, and are relying on, Trump lying about various things.
Why vote for someone you know to be a liar? Not sure, but I did learn that non-Trump supporters generally take him much more at his word than Trump supporters.
Also fun, one reason can become another. Remember the sharpie-modified hurricane map? That could start as ignorance - he didn't have specific information on a threat to Alabama, but inferred it from a misjudgment of the information he did have. It could also be senility - he was given good information but he is unable to accurately or reliably retrieve it.
And then it became dishonesty when in the face of plenty of evidence to his being incorrect, he chooses to go on national TV and show a map modified with a marker, insisting he was right all along and no, it is the meteorologists who are wrong.
IMO, taking personal shots or in this case escorting Zelensky out because he pushed back is folding. That's not strength, it's petulant child energy who didn't get their way. You saw the same thing in the debates over crowd size.
Only American MAGA supporters saw Zelensky being humiliated.
Anybody else saw Vance and Trump humiliating themselves. Showing the intellectual and emotional capacity of a middle schooler to the world while a man whose people are suffering occupation and mass casualties and deals with death every day just looks stunned.
To anybody with critical thinking skills it feels like Trump & Vance are talking about a TV show or video game. Completely disconnected from reality. Horrifying and shocking level of narcissistic immaturity.
They 100% set him up. A new block in the wall of proving that Trump is a Russian asset or dupe. I don't see how any other conclusion can be drawn by anyone paying attention. He consistently kisses up to Putin with little love messages via Fox news and other outlets, while doing his best to alienate the rest of the world. It would be different if he just washed his hands of the whole situation, however he always looks up to Putin and refuses to call him a dictator, I reckon because he was told that he would regret it if he ever did from his Russian contacts.
this seems like a misread. we get something out of sending resources to Ukraine. it's a decently-leveraged way to keep Russia, a would-be superpower, down for the next decade or so, to keep bleeding her without bleeding our own young men.
we do not have enough of an interest to go send young Americans to die. to deploy boots-on-the-ground forces for what amounts to a minor territorial war in a country with limited strategic importance beyond being a buffer state. smells too strongly of vietnam and korea.
to those who disagree with this, alright that's a fair position to hold. what number of young Americans is it appropriate for us to sacrifice to hold the donetsk and luhansk oblasts? how many of our children should we send to die? which number is reasonable and which is too great? if you don't believe there's a limit, and we should risk any number of Americans and potential nuclear exchange, why?
the minerals deal was actually a pretty fair offer the way it was worked out. then zelensky decided to, at the eleventh hour, push for a full security deal which isn't tenable from where we stand. this wasn't what had been discussed with Rubio; it was a bait-and-switch pressure tactic. zelensky was trying to either squeeze out that guarantee or humiliate the admin with failure coming from what otherwise would have been successful.
i think the constant lionization of zelensky has gone to his head. he feels confident in disrespecting nations who have invested significant resources in the war by refusing to so much as dress for the occasion, expecting the sort of standing ovation the prior administration and european leaders gave him. i can respect someone who's fighting for causes i generally support, as can most of my countrymen, but zelensky is no holy warrior and we have no moral duty to offer unlimited resources and manpower. we have aligned interests, but if not for that, there are more than enough domestic US issues that we otherwise would not (nor should we) send the sort of resources we have. similar thing with Israel: we have strongly overlapping interests but she needs to mind her place and toe the line if she wants our support.
> we do not have enough of an interest to go send young Americans to die.
This is a straw man: nobody asked you to.
> the minerals deal was actually a pretty fair offer the way it was worked out
There was nothing fair in that mineral deal: the US would get resources and Ukraine was getting... nothing. No security guarantees, no military support, nothing. Trump said it himself: he wanted it to get back what the US spent helping Ukraine so far.
it's not a straw man. the security guarantees zelensky requested and used to hold up the deal extend to that.
US state dep't lawyers have generally understood "security assurance" to mean that we won't violate someone's territorial integrity, while "security guarantee" implies the use of military force to defend the security of a nation and her territorial integrity. unless and until we have a fully-autonomous military, this does, in fact, necessitate putting American servicemen at risk of death. this is why i think your analysis is a misread of the situation; i haven't seen media report this distinction well and it's hard to keep track of which treaty terms are vague sympathies with a general direction of action and which promise specific actions.
it was, in fact, a fair deal. the minerals deal was to ensure we got some sort of repayment for all the aid we've already sent and to make us a bit more comfortable with the additional aid they still want. since we are already well into the twelve figures w.r.t. aid to Ukraine it seems pretty reasonable. but i don't particularly think a minerals deal is worth sending young men to die halfway across the world in a border war over land the size of west virginia.
the saudi king was in his own cultural formalwear. the pope did the same. if zelensky wanted to dress down and call it "cultural formalwear", he should have tried an adidas tracksuit. what he did was simple disrespect. it's not the end of the world but i think he owes us more than this "great value steve jobs" routine. i dress better than that for a normal workplace.
"parroting russian talking points" isn't a good response or critique. i don't read RT or alt-right twitter. i agree we have some interest in keeping russia contained and it's generally a good move to put resources behind that. i do not think there's this odd moral obligation to do whatever it takes and back ukraine to the hilt. this is sort of a "heartbreaking, the worst person you know just made a good point" situation.
Given Ukraine has now been invaded multiple times by Russia it seems entirely right and reasonable for it to ask for guarantees, and not an imposition if the other nation was truly an Ally, in the formal definition of the word, no?
it seems like a huge imposition to ask someone to kick off a great power war that would likely leave millions of her children dead, yes. that's true in any case, but especially when one's entire geopolitical relevance is as a border state. not all alliances are or must be "we will do literally anything possible to protect your territorial integrity". it probably wouldn't make sense for us to make such an alliance since our territorial integrity hasn't been threatened in substance since the war of 1812. and because such an alliance would be a charity program where we give away young American lives to enable one political entity, rather than another, to govern scraps of low-value land an ocean and a continent away.
the whole "sending ukraine materiel is going to cause WWIII" thing is sort of bs russian propaganda. the idea that direct American military intervention isn't risking that is very much not.
again, how many Americans do you think it's appropriate for their own government to sign up to die for this cause? i think the number is zero. if you think it's higher, i'd very much like to understand why and how many you think is a reasonable number. i understand it'd be a ballpark figure, not a bright line, but i'd like at least an order of magnitude grasp of what people think is appropriate and why they think so.
By your own admission a defensive security guarantee will "kick off a great power war..." which is a way of saying Russia can't be trusted to keep the peace, no? Not that I disagree but I'm not sure it's as strong an argument against Ukraine's request as you think it is. It may have even been part of Neville Chamberlain's notes on the subject.
the chamberlain/weimar comparison is inaccurate for this case. germany was an ascendant power; russia is a crippled one. the war was actually a great investment because it's decimated russia's military population and stores of materiel and cut her off from the world enough to severely damage her economy. it will take substantial time for her to rebuild.
you can make a "what about czechoslovakia/poland/nazis" argument about heavy intervention in what would otherwise be any proxy war. you say czechoslovakia, i say vietnam, i say korea, i say the middle east.
the American interest in this war isn't so much "we love the ukraine" as "this is an effective way to cripple russia for the next decade by proxy". by doing so, we avoid that situation in a much smarter way than chamberlain. and because russia wasn't in that great of a spot to start with, a protracted war of attrition is really bad for her.
are you suggesting we should begin a war against russia, historically a massively losing proposition, over a couple oblasts of the ukraine? again, how many americans should we send off to die? how much should we weaken our resources for a much more concerning conflict with china?
> it's not a straw man. the security guarantees zelensky requested and used to hold up the deal extend to that.
It does not. Europe has been willing to send troops on the ground. The guarantee from the US could be in the form of equipment, air interdiction, etc. Note the the US already had guaranteed Ukraine sovereignty when it gave up its nukes. So no new treaty should even be necessary if the US only stuck to its words.
> it was, in fact, a fair deal. the minerals deal was to ensure we got some sort of repayment for all the aid we've already sent
No repayment was expected when the aid was given, otherwise it would have been given as loans.
Do you ask for repayment 2 years after giving people gifts? I would hate to be at your Christmas gathering.
> to make us a bit more comfortable with the additional aid
That's not how treaties work. You put, IN WRITING, something you agree to do and the other sides does too.
If Ukraine commits to give something while the US "feels good" about maybe doing something (or not, who knows?), that's not fair.
> what he did was simple disrespect
Musk holds conferences in the oval office in T-shirt and MAGA cap while his child scolds the president. Nobody stepped in to ask where was his suit, and certainly not the president.
a security guarantee necessitates a response adequate to maintain territorial integrity. i.e. in the current scenario we'd be obligated to send troops to stop the war of attrition and reverse the russian advance (which has continued since last year, if slowly.) that is precisely what zelensky wants. unfortunately for him, i don't value the ukraine enough to condemn my friends to go bleed out in an eastern european border state.
no repayment was demanded when the aid was given, true. however, the US changes leadership, and therefore policy, on a semi-regular basis. the condition of future aid is that past and future aid should be repaid to some extent, in some manner, at some point. rather than demanding cash or structuring a loan, the US proposed to find something else that would benefit both sides. implying that hundreds of billions of dollars in U.S. taxpayer dollars, at a time when boomer welfare is already bleeding the country dry, is equivalent to a Christmas gift is ridiculous. i think it was De Gaulle who said countries don't have friends, they have interests; foreign aid is a strategic tool and that alone, because the U.S. federal government is not a charitable organization.
you say "that's not how treaties work"; I say undeveloped nations have a long, long history of taking and later failing to repay loans from America or proxy organizations such as the IMF. if you're suggesting we restructure this as a loan, that seems like a monumentally poor investment, not to mention draining cash from a nation trying to rebuild is a similarly poor idea.
where did i say i approved of Musk's actions? i believe trump complemented zelensky's outfit today. i don't really care about what trump thinks of zelensky, musk, or anyone else's choice of presentation. i am not donald trump. i am saying i think it is disrespectful, doubly so given that he came calling with his hand out, again.
The point of the security guarantee is to ensure peace after a ceasefire. It doesn't make any sense to suggest US troops will be responsible for stopping the war or reversing territorial gains, because it will have already stopped. Some stasis of of the front lines, and possibly a DMZ would be a prerequisite.
But more likely, US troops won't be directly on the front lines even after a peace. It adds too much risk of either (super)power escalating in the event of casualties.
i don't believe the ukraine has shown willingness to accept anything less than a status quo ante bellum resolution. i don't really blame her for this - in her position, i'd push for everything back plus the crimea to boot - but that puts us in a very precarious position were we to guarantee her security.
the way i see this, it's fine if ukraine loses a little territory. since putin is an evil dictator and all, he can't especially afford to look weak, and anything less would back him into a corner. however, doing so is a risky move so we should hold off on that for another year or two until russia is truly crippled. ensure an economic depression and depletion of materiel that takes a decade to dig out of. by doing so, we also give the ukraine stronger security in fact, rather than merely on paper.
might be worth bargaining with the crimea: renounce claims to it in exchange for russia returning territory from the current war. realistically russia has wanted that spot at various points for hundreds of years as warm-water ports are too important for her.
i get that the point is to ensure peace after a ceasefire, but, as zelinsky said, russia has broken ceasefires before. we should not sign something like that simply on the assumption that it will make war too costly for russia. we should do so if and only if we're willing to engage in a shooting war/great-power conflict with russia over a couple oblasts. i don't think we're really willing to do that.
Yes this was my first thought. But then I understood that it's most probably the fact that the administration wasn't interested in the outcome of the conversation. My hypotesis is that Trump is living each day as unique, disconnected from the others, in a selfish way. So he didn't care about the consequences of this meeting for Zelenskyy and in general everything else.
It makes sense from His worldview. Ukraine are the weaker ones, the natural losers. He doesn't help losers. There is no further thought or consideration. That territory was always Russia's to take when they were ready.
I think it’s worse: Trump et al want to install a neofeudal system of society whereas Ukraine is fighting for the Westen Democracy kind of system. It’s clear that Trump wants to establish that as a futile endeavor
Nah, they just care about money is all. They look at Ukraine and they don't see a profit to be made, so they demand payment or the withdrawal of aid. Greed plain and simple.
"Weaker" is a function of not just your own strength, but that of your allies. Russia wants Ukraine as a way to hit at Europe.
Ukraine and its allies are a match for Russia and its. Perhaps more so, since Ukraine's allies have limited its use of force. With the US out, Ukraine may be able to exert much more force.
Which is to say Trump's judgment of who is weak is deeply compromised by his belief in single strongmen. This will not go well for him.
Ukraine is limited in its use of American weapons. It can't strike well in Russian territory. The US wanted to keep the conflict from escalating beyond Ukraine's borders.
Europe has similar concerns, but if Ukraine loses American support, they may not be able to afford that. They might gamble on direct strikes on Moscow, or at least make it clear that they can.
Which might end life as we know it. Or it might force Russia to the bargaining table directly with Ukraine. Who knows? Let's find out!
It was a 40 minute long conversation and everything was fine until the last 5 minutes when Zelensky got mad about Vance talking about using diplomacy with Russia.
You can't have diplomacy with Russia, they don't respect any agreements, EU tried to partner up with them on trade as a "diplomatic" route, hoping that cash flowing both ways would be enough to keep Russia happy, but their ambitions go beyond a peaceful coexistence.
What Zelensky got mad about is that all previous diplomatic agreements with Russia have been broken by Russia when convenient. Even the Budapest Memorandum, where the US pledged security to Ukraine in exchange for them giving their nukes to Russia, is no longer honored. How can Ukraine trust that any deal made by Trump is going to be honored once Russia rebuilds its military if the US won't offer any assurances of peace?
I watched the entire press conference with Zelensky. There was 40 minutes of discussion up to the argument. Most people saw at most the last ten minutes. The whole video gives the proper context.
When I first watched the argument without the proper context, I thought it was possible that Trump and Vance ambushed Zelensky or were even trying to humiliate him. That's not what happened.
You had 40 minutes of calm conversation. Vance made a point that didn't attack Zelensky and wasn't even addressed to him, and Zelensky clearly started the argument.
In the first 40 minutes, Zelensky kept trying to go beyond what was negotiated in the deal. When Trump was asked a question, it was always "we'll see." Zelensky made blanket assertions that there would be no negotiating with Putin, and that Russia would pay for the war. When Trump said that it was a tragedy that people on both sides were dying, Zelensky interjected that the Russians were the invaders.
For his part, Trump made clear that the US would continue delivering military aid. All Zelensky had to do was remain calm for a few more minutes and they would've signed a deal.
The argument started when Trump pointed out that it would be hard to make a deal if you talk about Putin the way Zelensky does. Vance interjects to make the reasonable point that Biden called Putin names and that didn't get us anywhere.
The Zelensky/Trump dynamic was calm and stable. It was when Vance spoke that Zelensky started to interrogate him. Throughout the press conference to that point, everyone was making their arguments directly to the audience. Zelensky decided to challenge Vance and ask him hostile questions. He went back to his point that Putin never sticks to ceasefires, once again implying that negotiations are pointless. Why on earth would you do this? Then came the fight we all saw.
Zelensky was minutes away from being home free, and he would have had the deal and new commitments from the Trump administration. The point Vance made was directed against Biden and the media, taking them to task for speaking in moralistic terms. This offended Zelensky, and that began the argument.
I've been a fan of Zelensky up to this point, but this showed so much incompetence, if not emotional instability, that I don't see how he recovers from this. The relationship with the administration is broken. Ukraine should probably go with new leadership at this point.
the way I read what you wrote, it seems like you think Zelensky's argument is bad and purely emotionally motivated, but the fact that Putin/Russia has broken agreements and ceasefires is a very valid concern, isn't it?
if the conference had ended without argument but behind the scenes Trump/Vance were setting up negotiations that go against Ukraine's interest, that would not have been a "win" for Zelensky other than in terms of a contest of popularity - but only the popularity among westerners who have no real personal stake in the conflict. it's Ukrainians and Russians who are dying on the front lines.
Like you, I watched the full hour. I had the same analysis.
There are no winners from an exchange like this. Trump and Vance come across as bullies. Zelenskyy comes across as needlessly argumentative. Trump and Zelenskyy both come across as quick to anger. Not a good look for any of them.
Maybe Zelensky had a very thin path out after Vance's provocations, but even the language accents are partly to blame for miscommunication/crosstalk, so maybe for Zelensky it was a Kobayashi Maru situation.
I wish Zelensky had asked Trump if he wanted his feet kissed there and now because I feel like everyone could see that is what Trump wants at the very least.
They invited him to the White House to finally sign the rare earth minerals agreement, which he had said he'd sign and then renegged two times prior[0]. This was the third attempt by the US to get it signed. During the meeting, he indicated that he would sign the agreement but then not agree to a cease fire, which was the whole point of putting it in place. Naturally, this was a deal breaker for the administration and the meeting ended.
So, watching the video as a brit with a number if Ukrainian friends and colleagues, my first reaction is that this is the Trump Whitehouse looking for a cheap win.
However, I think their calculation here speaks to the difficulty of the current situation.
Putting aside the morality, sovereign integrity, and such: the situation appears to be entering/in a stalemate. The Ukrainian forces have done well to proactively take and hold Russian territory, and have held the line pretty well. However, there does not seem to be a play here that will conclusively end Russian occupation presently. The best case seems to be waiting out the supply of Russian troops, but the Ukrainian army doesn't have an endless supply of volunteers in this regard (I've worked with a few who have).
So the question has to be asked: how does this end decisively if neither side can win outright? And how much support is required to maintain the status quo?
I hate to say it, but I think they will likely have to lose territory. I think they could argue for greater security architecture (i.e. part of NATO but no nukes) to prevent repeat. But otherwise I can appreciate why the current administration is where its at.
There is precisely one solution, which is western troops on the ground in Ukraine.
Yes that’s terrifying, no it won’t lead to world war three.
Any other solution leads to widespread war across the globe.
As I’m fairly confident the west won’t put troops on the ground to fight russia, you can test my hypothesis by watching china start making moves on Taiwan in the short term, and then further wars breaking out over the next few years. I’ll go with several African countries, the Middle East (Jordan, Iran, Syria, Iraq), turkey, and once the Ukraine situation has settled multiple Eastern European countries. Worst case you’ll see the baltics invaded by Russia, I think there’s a good chance of that. Finland an outside bet.
I may be wrong, but I did anticipate the coup in turkey, Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and the election of trump.
Enjoy your life whilst you can. Conscription is coming. There will be a lot of western troop deployments. These are the good old days.
The west feels asleep at the wheel, and the next generations (including mine) have been so heavily insubordinated and worn down economically and spiritually that their capacity for envisioning a positive new future and policy seems minimal. Land grabs are back on the menu. The next generation of leaders has grown up on tiktok.
A young friend I know is a political "golden child" on the fast track to le4dership but only 3 years ago was talking about manosphere people and shoving tiktoks down my throat. I can't possibly communicate to you strongly enough how broken and emotionally stunted this coming generation is due to social media.
Happy I'm in tasmania, aus, learning to be a self sufficient young person. I'm living through the mistakes of the weak willed generations that came before me.
We have 5-10 years of bad enough normalcy left. The world, and us, the people in it, and our "common values" are going to be unrecognisable in 20 years.
I can't understand how we got so weak and unintelligent. Social media played a big role, and the elimination of anything except self aggrandisement in the popular culture, and the stupid labelling of anything a little nerdier as autistic or adhd or yada yada shows a society detaching itself from and losing patience for structured intelligence. Russia is behind a lot of this, and they place both sides. They bolster and distort transgender and autism communities etc as cultural weapons as much as they do conservative and libertarian ones. Their aim is to destroy the idea of the "normal" rational base.
To say russia is dumb, or slow moving is infantile. This is a calculating machine of evil which never rests and preys on the weakness and innocence of the west. I'm sure their propaganda divisions have their own cities at this point.
Read putins people and listen to londongrad s1 to understand just how hollow "western democratic institutions" are. Listen to WEF sexual escorts talk about how there's two camps of people who attend, one that believes climate change is going to end everyone, and the other that believes it almost will, and how the attendees gloat "tax the rich" as a joke as a running joke at bars. Read about how the ex IPCC head says there's a chance for 5°c warming. The world and the system you know is gone.
Funny, we were talking about where you should live to escape the attention of the superpowers and Tassie came up. A beautiful place.
I think we got here through the foolish release of unfettered capitalism after being spoilt by peace in the western for so long. Thatcher/Reagan decided there was no such thing as society, and then went about making it so.
This created the anger and resentment amongst people left behind by the actions of so many corporations. Essentially, neoliberalism.
The second major part of the problem has been social media (although arguably just another consequence of corporate greed), which has enabled the harnessing of that anger. It has also created complete polarisation, as exemplified by the AGI is here we are all going to die / AI is a complete con split (to give a HN example).
The solution, as always, is for the rich and the powerful (including, say, academics and civil servants) to change their ways. But once institutions are failed and governments and companies are corrupt, that is very hard (impossible?) to do.
> I think they could argue for greater security architecture (i.e. part of NATO but no nukes) to prevent repeat. But otherwise I can appreciate why the current administration is where its at.
The current administration is redundantly clear that it won't allow Ukraine to join NATO to avoid antagonize Russia.
Yeah, I think they'll fold on that point, too, but the main stumbling block for Ukraine is that Russian guarantees mean little in a post-2021 invasion context given they made the same overtures after 2014.
The idea of the entire country becoming a DMZ just smacks of Putin lining up the next play and a Russian-leaning leader put in Zelenskis place.
Now EU, sans USA, needs UA, because EU is militarily weak.
If UA falls, EU will fall also; it cannot stop Vladimir, and this before considering the massiive impact of drones, which only RU and UA know how to operate effectively.
EU+UA is enough to keep UA up and this protects EU.
All in all, EU will keep UA up, however it is done, and in the end it will require EU military involvement. Maybe we get there sooner now, rather than later.
I think the capability to retake lost UA terrain belongs to USA and massive military buildup in UA.
EU military in UA keeps UA up just fine, but doesn't retake terrain - not enough military force for that.
Ends up with cease-fire, and UA not in NATO, as USA/HU/SK will prevent it, but probably security guarantees and troops on ground from rest of EU.
Everyone then settles down to the next cold war (and RU economy post-war spends a while in strong recession, taking immediate pressure off).
Problem is, Vladimir effectively subverts Western elections through social media.
How do you have free and fair elections with that going on?
Many characterize Putin's current position as taking as much territory as possible, while staying in the game long enough for US political climate to change. So I'd posit back, how would Putin's posture change if the US right was as aligned as the left on supporting Ukraine as long as it took? I suspect he would have taken a deal long ago.
Trump wants it to look as though he is the one making the deal happen, but the reality is he's the only reason it has not happened already. IMHO.
I agree with your point about Putin waiting for the WH administration to change. Were the president hawkish on Russia, however, I still doubt Putin would back down.
Putin needs to be seen to win at home to play to his core base. Biden wouldn't let him, Trump will, but to Putin that means:
1. Control of annexed territory.
2. No Ukrainian nukes.
3. No NATO/EU membership for Ukraine.
4. Zelenski removed and puppet/anti-democratic leader installed.
What we're hearing post-meeting is Trump laying the groundwork for point 4 and taking a firm position on 1.
I think what we have in Trump is a quintessentially weak leader. weak in a sense that he is easily led.
Whoever speaks the most authoritatively with him last is who gets to set his direction.
Vance set the stage in that session, and Trump ran onto the stage and tried to make sure he was in the spotlight the whole time.
Putin's aim is the complete destruction of Ukraine as a nation and the removal of the current democratically elected administration. Until that he can be only stopped with force.
> I hate to say it, but I think they will likely have to lose territory. I
I don't think it's territory what Putin wants. Even without its current territories, if Ukraine turns out to be successful and recover in the next 10 years, what will this mean to the Russian population? A total and absolute surrender of Ukraine is the end goal. No EU, no NATO, just another vassal-president and things go on like they were before 2022, but this time with half-destroyed country.
This war should have never started, I actually agree with Trump on this. But for that to happen, NATO should have entered Ukraine the first week after Putin did. And to those in Europe that argue against it, I would only say - are we better off now?
That was a shameful display and a stain on our republic. Is it possible our nation is bankrupt (and we haven't been told) and these theatrics and all this talk about deals is in fact about settling debts?
One thing that is certain that such reckless behavior by the US executive will increase geopolitical instability. Nuclear proliferation is very much in the cards. And you can be certain the event was viewed with horror in Asian capitals where the notion of 'face' is a matter of cultural sensitivity. I wouldn't be surprised if Japan decides to go nuclear post-haste.
The good & the bad is that Japan could go nuclear very very fast because everything to make it is there, and given their (sometimes funny) "this aircraft carrier is actually a helicopter carrier for self-defense" kinda stance on defense, I wouldn't be surprised if half of the effort have already been secretly done.
The other good/bad is that the population is very, very, very against any nuclear weapon armament and even holding an army, even Shinzo Abe could only do an "reintrepertation of article 9" because he was aware of this. Public opinion might change with Trump + Taiwan/Korea incident though.
I’m sure you might’ve felt the same, but people are visibly (online and in person) are becoming more aware of how dependence on US might not be the most beneficial thing to do for the country in a long run. Locals really don’t like very in-your-face bullies.
I really don’t think you’re going to have a republic very much longer, so it probably doesn’t matter reputation wise.
I’m not sure what will happen, but I think the idea of a free and fair election for the next president is laughable at this point. Perhaps Americans haven’t realised this yet, I don’t know.
I normally avoid commenting on politics entirely but I feel compelled to comment here. I'm sure anyone who's ever been bullied in their life will feel exactly what's happening in that video clip. Two big kids, confident in their position and backing each other up, gang up on the outsider. Did they ever really want to make a deal at all? Absolutely infuriating and saddening to watch.
Yes it was out right bullying after being challenged. Vance quickly devolved to “don’t question us, say thank you”. I showed and discussed with my kids as example of textbook bullying
With such basic and seemingly silly, toxic tactics that they can get away with because of the power position they hold. Zelensky came there jet lagged, alone, while not being able to use his native language.
I'm not making an observation about whether he should have used another language, but just that this was one of the reasons why he was at a huge disadvantage in terms of being able to deal with the blatant bullying.
What I'm saying is that language mattered little. If Zelensky was an anglophone from the UK, he was going to get shafted just the same (as it all looks like he walked straight into a trap there).
This comes across as highly dismissive. The man can speak three languages very competently. That's two more than Vance and three more than Trump. Obviously language matters, but for Ukrainians democracy and sovereignty matter more.
I repeat: language obviously matters, and it's one of many factors Trump/Vance exploited to create an intimidating atmosphere. But it's not such an overwhelming factor that it would make Zelensky turn to Russia.
Long list of reasons he is a bad target. A negotiating genius would have known that, which is why even Trump supporters were caught by surprise.
- Only between inauguration and this meeting did Trump even have positive approval. I think it’s uncontentious that Zelenskyy will forever poll higher.
- Around Trump there’s a force field to encourage him that he’s right. The awkward moment Tuesday was when Trump admitted his own numbers on aid given to Ukraine are spongy and faith-based, compared to Macron’s which were turgid, useful, virile, actually bankable.
- Zelenskyy arrived to talk about his thing (being a fighter) and the world saw an ambush by an investment banker and a one-time TV show character. Proving Trump’s at a disadvantage when the other guy is a fighter.
This last one seems the most damaging. Republican politicians had to come out and proclaim Trump is still tough and the biggest problem is that Zelenskyy doesn’t performatively respect that.
The thing for me is, fighting someone in a weaker position than you - even if you win - doesn't really make you look strong. Everyone knows you could beat that guy in a fight already. It just makes you look cruel.
Trump and Vance were saying things like "you're being disrespectful", and "you haven't said 'thank you'"--this level of argument is completely unproductive; it's what you would expect to hear from parents of dysfunctional families, not from world leaders.
And it betrays a total lack of care for substance. Zelensky has delivered public speeches in the US, while wearing a suit if that matters saying thanks to the US for their support. He just said it to the whole country, and while Biden was president. Trump doesn't care if the US gets credit, he wants to steal that credit personally, despite literally having been impeached for trying to extort Zelensky.
It's amazing levels of personal pettiness and ego. That's before you get to them inviting a Russian state news person to watch and then claiming they "snuck in" as if someone can just bumble into a meeting of world leaders.
Trump didn't demand credit or thanks from Zelensky. Vance did.
And Vance was literally just dropping hints to back down in front of the media and to present himself as grateful, because he saw the important talks about to be derailed before they even began:
> Vance: Have you said thank you once?
> Zelenskyy: A lot of times.
> Vance: No, in this meeting, this entire meeting? Offer some words of appreciation for the United States of America and the president who’s trying to save your country.
(And the entire heated conversation in general)
IMO, the language barrier really screwed Zelensky over.
> [Zelensky not wearing a suit]
Trump's attitude is that how you dress to an event is a sign of respect for the people you meet. Many disagree with this attitude, but if that's how someone you're going to meet thinks, then you adjust to it. Like not showing up in gym clothes to a job interview.
The thing is... That even if Zelensky did have the perfect dress code, perfect niceties, the whole thing was a setup with trying to pressure Zelensky into a bad deal. And if Zelensky was not to accept it the goal was to humiliate and embarrass him publically. So Vance and Trump would have gone for any other possible targets they can find, or alternatively invent some. So they kept provoking Zelensky whole time and even before when Trump called Zelensky a dictator, which is far more disrespectful than anything Zelensky has done. Even through that, it's crazy the patience Zelensky had.
> the whole thing was a setup with trying to pressure Zelensky into a bad deal.
The deal was quite good. It basically coupled the rebuilding of Ukraine (and ownership shares resulting from it) to a fund, rather than the government itself.
If Russia had then taken over Ukraine, they'd have to expropriate the fund to gain any benefits, but that'd also mean expropriating the minority ownership of the US.
> Trump called Zelensky a dictator, which is far more disrespectful than anything Zelensky has done.
Sure, but he is, and that's a huge issue for any negotiations going forward. Ukrainian martial law only delays parliamentary elections, not presidential ones.
If Zelensky doesn't either get a democratic mandate or recognized as an official negotiator by the Verkhovna Rada, any agreements made with him can later just be rejected by Ukraine.
The deal was awful and Ukraine would get nothing but delayed destruction. he isn't a fool. Rebuilding is useless with security to not have it torn down in 5 years when Russia recovers.
>Sure, but he is
Oh, so we're not going to have a productive conversation, then.
>"PACE President Tiny Kox: It is up to the Government, Parliament and the people of Ukraine to decide when and how to conduct elections"
Pretty much every country has martial law rules. So disagree or not, to call someone a dictator while defending against a war is outright malicious in my mind.
Not sure how to delete my previous comment but the claim that martial law extends only the power of the parliament is wrong. I've clearly relied on a bad source of information.
There is a strong argument that the Ukrainian President looses a lot of powers when his term ends under martial law, but negotiating international treaties is not one of them.
The Ukrainian constitution doesn't explicitly allow for the President to remain in office under martial law, but it does not allow for pretty much any elections and doesn't provide for a transfer of power as it does under other circumstances.
It also requires the office of the President to not be vacated.
.
So, the transfer of power that would occur under an irregular vacancy from the President to the Prime Minister likely occurs to the President himself if his term ends under martial law?
Kinda, but the US made clear that at this point they will only back Zelensky in the negotiations.
Without Russia and Ukraine agreeing on how to end this war, split the spoils and salvage the little that's left, outside parties will hardly be willing to commit to enforcing the peace.
Ideally a solution can be found that wont make Ukraine (or Russia) dependent on the mood of an outside party, but if that's realistic is questionable at best.
I think the phases of negotiations could look about like this:
1. Cease and freeze the conflict
1. a) Build a framework for rebuilding Ukraine and Russia
2. A third party establishes with both sides the format of the upcoming negotiations.
3. Both sides find partners backing them, establish their minimum positions and ways to compromise on them without giving up on them (e.g. if territory can't be regained, shared management and dual citizenship for the people living there might be possible)
(4.) The neutral third party, together with the partner countries of both sides establishes sanctions for violations during the negotiations.
5. Very messy negotiations on the outcome of the war
6. Even messier negotiations on a security framework between the two countries
7. Mudslinging contest on security framework involving all relevant parties
8. Sign peace deal.
9. Try to toss aside Ukraine, get reminded what you agreed to in 1. a), regret ever having agreed to that extortion racket
> 1. a) Build a framework for rebuilding Ukraine and Russia
What do you mean rebuilding Russia?
> The neutral third party, together with the partner countries of both sides establishes sanctions for violations during the negotiations.
Sanctions so far have done nothing to deter Russia.
The problem with negotiations is that Russia would never come to a peace agreement which legitimately had potential influence on them not being able to invade again. Because their goal is to invade again, after the peace deal.
Either you overpower them and show effectively that you have overpowered them, or they keep coming.
The only peace deal Russia would accept is if:
a) It just allows them to invade again as soon as possible.
b) It tells them not to invade again, but the consequences are meaningless so they'll invade again and nothing happens, and the same thing repeats again.
There's a fundamental misunderstanding of what Russia is. To simplify this, you need to think of it as a bot playing Civilization that is programmed to maximize its territory gains, while at the same time have some sort of uncensored LLM spewing random justifications for why they are invading, and influence on other countries to have them approve of those invasions.
Russia has taken quite a bit of damage, too (although it's tiny compared to Ukraine).
But most importantly: No matter who ends up responsible for the costs in each of the cases, both countries need a clear way to full recovery.
Otherwise you're just going to end up with an East-West Germany situation at best or an Mexico-US situation (cartels, crime, human trafficking, smuggling) at worst.
> Sanctions so far have done nothing to deter Russia.
Because the price the sanctions imposed were lower than the price not continuing would have.
If the price is simply staying at the table and keep talking, even minor sanctions would get the job done.
> Russia would never come to a peace agreement which legitimately had potential influence on them not being able to invade again. Because their goal is to invade again, after the peace deal.
I honestly dont understand why so many people hinge their entire position on this.
Russia has been warning about the situation we've got right now since at least 2002 and VERY explicitly since at least 2007.
Why do so many people keep ignoring everything Russia has talked about for decades (CFE treaty, NATO expansion, OSCE format failure, ongoing military escalation and lack of security guarantees) and just jump straight to:
Putin likes land and Putin wants to rebuild the USSR.
There isn't even the slightest sliver of evidence for this, infact quite the opposite:
- Putin could have easily kept Georgia in 2008
- The nations east of the Caspian Sea are infinitely easier to integrate into Russia, but no such efforts were undertaken
- Belarus could have been integrated into Russia much more easily, too
- There were plenty of very pro-Russian governments in Ukraine, Putin could have utilized to tie Ukraine politically much more closely to Russia with the intent of taking over in the future
> Either you overpower them and show effectively that you have overpowered them, or they keep coming.
Just the bloody opposite. The Russian mindset puts the security of the nation first. If you attempt to overpower them, they will keep escalating until either side becomes incapable of fighting.
Which is an incredibly dangerous course to take against a nation that is sitting on the Soviet nuclear stockpile.
And yes, the nukes work. All (except NK and Israel?) nuclear nations keep regular inspecting each other's nuclear arsenals for proper maintenance and functionality. And nukes are VERY simple weapons. The by far most complicated component being the conventional explosive chain involved and nobody questions Russia's capabilities on that part.
> while at the same time have some sort of uncensored LLM spewing random justifications for why they are invading
Agreed, except for the "uncensored" part. It's heavily censored, just in a very ... unconventional way.
It's hard to imagine who came up with these talking points:
- Satanist necromancers raising the Nazis from their graves
- Supersoldiers being bred in secret laboratories
- Caveman drawings having been found depicting Ukraine and Russia as one country with Moscow as its capital
.
On the other hand, everything said since the 2022 invasion is hardly to be taken seriously, since all official diplomatic dialog broke down.
Nothing Putin is saying can be taken seriously or at face value. I am from a country neighboring Russia. In fact, if Ukraine was to fall, we would be one of the next targets. We all here understand who and what Putin is. We used to be under the USSR and thankully we were able to restore our independence. Putin's rhetoric constantly contradicts with itself. He wants to build a legacy. He wants to be the largest power in the World. He wants territory. Russia is the reason why our country has mandatory military service, which I attended as well. Year of my life. All we want is to be indendent and live our own peaceful life. Unfortunately we haven't been blessed geographically. The past for us is enough evidence of what Russia is. It is very hard to see Russian propaganda making its way to US in such strides, it is hard to see people believing this type of thing.
Dictators only understand strength. It won't go to nukes, this is also Russian propaganda and Putin threatens nukes weekly, everyone knows he is bsing.
It is clear, Putin has something over Trump or Trump just has some twisted strategy here that I can't make sense of. There was never going to be a deal that would work out well for Ukraine.
Now Europe must do without support of US. Democracy in US has unfortunatly been compromised and failed.
Or showing up to a cabinet meeting in a graphic t shirt and ball cap?
Get a grip. Trump has no stable “attitude” toward anything whatsoever except whatever he thinks accrues him more power and wealth, full stop.
He’s a well known germaphobe who will let a child wipe snot on his work desk if it means getting a little closer to whatever God King status he’s dreamt about since his mother abandoned him and his father psychologically abused him.
… I don’t think anyone on “Ukraine’s side” here thinks it’s actually relevant whether Zelensky wore a suit or not. It is right-wing Twitter that’s acting like it’s such a huge disrespect and affront to America.
Your point is that Trump cares about decorum. My point is that Trump cares about power, and he would seize on whatever little thing he could to try to gain more power over our wartime ally. The suit is obviously a red herring.
You think when bullies make fun of a kid’s shoes they actually care about fashion? Duh: no.
When someone calls out a bully for making fun of someone’s shoes, is it because they give a fuck about their fashion choices? Duh: no.
Trump demanding that Zelenskyy dress the way Trump would prefer is what a narcissist does. "Oh, he must be wearing that just to upset me."
No you self-important tool, he's wearing that because his nation is at war with Russia. Zelenskyy wears military clothes to every meeting, with every leader, not just you.
This, coming from: the one who openly calls opponents insulting names and openly proposes annexing other countries like a drivelling, senile elder; and the other, who toured Europe like a witless yokel scolding EU leaders for not being democracies...
This is the US losing its credibility and the confidence of its allies at a time when the US depends on these alliances.
It's something the US patriotic wing cares about a lot.
It doesn't take much to satisfy their need (basically just nice words about the US), but they'll absolutely burn bridges if they come to the conclusion that you're unwilling to show the US this courtesy.
Trump very obviously being part of this wing, is one of the reasons that gave his campaign for the first term such a huge boost. People were convinced that he wouldn't betray the US, like they were betrayed by nearly every politician before (but maybe Bill Clinton, although, in hindsight, he absolutely screwed over Europe by continuing the Russian shock therapy and not supporting Russia in updating the CFE treaty).
Vance is somewhat part of this wing, too, but to a much lesser degree than Trump. E.g. he acknowledged in his speech at the MUC SecConf, that the US made what he considers to be past mistakes, but Trump pretty much never acknowledges what he blames on Biden and Obama to have ever been official US policy (even if he doesn't outright deny it).
.
Hence when Zelensky suggested the US will "feel it", too, in a slightly threatening way (due to the language barrier, I guess), Trump literally blew a fuse. You could see his head changing color in real time. I'm surprised he had the patience left to toss out the media semi-politely.
IMO, Zelensky should have picked up on Vance's hints to present himself grateful and stop trying to get commitments from the US infront of the media. Next time he should negotiate in his native language and bring a very capable translator, because picking up on such nuances is anything but easy if you're quite inexperienced in a language.
.
Trump is not really vindictive, despite his talking points (see him refusing to retaliate on Iran for shooting down that $150M drone, him not going after H. Clinton at all once in office, selecting Vance as his Vice, meeting with Scarborough and Brzezinski, ...).
So Zelensky got a good chance to set things straight, but Trump has also made clear that how the US progresses from here is up to Ukraine making the next move.
Knowing Trump a bit, he will push ahead with talks with Russia and keep increasing pressure on Ukraine until Zelensky agrees to a ceasefire and joins the table by making talks with Russia legal again.
.
Also Zelensky should take that "minerals deal". Despite being sold as such, it doesn't give any minerals to the US, but establishes an Ukrainian semi-sovereign fund with the focus of rebuilding Ukraine, financed through the Ukrainian government's revenue from natural resources and financial injections by the US.
Over time it'll also turn into a fully sovereign fund for Ukraine (unless the US keeps pumping absurd amounts of money into it) and Ukraine can withdraw money from it if they need it elsewhere.
> Also Zelensky should take that "minerals deal". Despite being sold as such, it doesn't give any minerals to the US, but establishes an Ukrainian semi-sovereign fund with the focus of rebuilding Ukraine, financed through the Ukrainian government's revenue from natural resources and financial injections by the US.
Issue is about not having any security guarantees. Problem with dictatorships is that they won't ever stop. The deal is beneficial for Russia. Russia will see it as a win which will encourage them to do the same thing every few years on repeat. Territory is one of the few limited resources in the World. Dictators desperately crave for it. Any economical damage they think is temporary and they see it as an investment. They certainly don't feel economy being bad. But they will feel powerful, but gaining territory. Only deal Zelensky should sign is one which will ensure that Russia doesn't invade Ukraine or any other countries again. Any other deal is a fake peace. Everyone around Russia and who has experience with Russia knows this. E.g. ex soviet countries.
I think the whole thing was a setup, and while Zelensky made mistakes, even with perfect behaviour, it was bound to go in this direction since the deal presented was not something Zelensky or a person with democratic values should accept, and Trump's goal was to humiliate him into submission from the get go.
Consider how much provocation Trump and Vance had done before that, calling Zelensky a dictator, the patience the man had is already amazing to last so long. But they would've kept provoking him until he says something which they can escalate on to humiliation.
> Any economical damage they think is temporary and they see it as an investment.
That's kinda what the deal is about, tho:
1. Ukraine gets rebuild, the US and Ukraine own huge portions of Ukraine's new industry through the fund
2. The fund gets richer and richer with Ukraine slowly taking over management, the US retaining a minority portion
3. Russia attacks Ukraine, captures all of it
4. Nearly all remaining industry and rights to natural ressources are retained by the fund, managed by Ukraine's exile government
5. Russia wants to expropriate the fund to cut off the funding available to the exile government
6. Russia realizes they'd have to expropriate the US government, starts sweating
7. Russia wakes up and decides not to proceed with step 3. to 6., because the downsides of taking over a country (insurgency, tons of explosives everywhere, new huge portions of population on expensive welfare and healthcare, ...) aren't worth it without any of the upsides.
> Issue is about not having any security guarantees.
Because they're not even negotiated yet. The "minerals deal" is something the US and Ukraine can negotiate right now, so it's on the table.
For all the other stuff Russia and Ukraine need to come to the same table, which Ukraine is very reluctant to do.
Trump only tried to get Ukraine to agree to a bare minimum ceasefire, to stop the killing.
> Russia realizes they'd have to expropriate the US government, starts sweating
Not sure what you mean by that? Russia would just nationalize the assets. What would US do about it, if they are not willing to do anything so far? The ownership in this fund would just be nice to have, not make it worth going for Russia then any more than now. And in any case Russia could just make an offer to share the minerals themselves, which they already did. It wouldn't make a difference to US.
> Russia wakes up and decides not to proceed with step 3. to 6., because the downsides of taking over a country (insurgency, tons of explosives everywhere, new huge portions of population on expensive welfare and healthcare, ...) aren't worth it without any of the upsides.
Historically Russia has repeatedly demonstrated willingness to harm their economy in return for gaining more territory.
This deal is worthless in terms of deterring Russia, if Russia is not deterred currently, this deal is not going to make a difference.
The most important thing to Ukraine is - how can we make sure that Russia doesn't invade us again. Everything else is worthless for Ukraine, for the West, and for Democracy.
> Russia would just nationalize the assets. What would US do about it, if they are not willing to do anything so far?
I do not know what keeps governments from doing this, tbh.
But up until now Russia has done so exclusively in a retaliatory manner.
Or them paying their debts to the clearing houses, despite US citizens having been forbidden from accepting their money.
Same with the EU not outright taking over Russia's currency reserves, but taxing them at 100%.
There's something that prevents governments from screwing around on this, even if I do not quite understand what it is.
And the US gov is probably quite high up on the list of entities not to mess with.
> And in any case Russia could just make an offer to share the minerals themselves, which they already did.
Sure, but it's not about the minerals at all. The relation between minerals and this deal is about the same like the relation of a pineapple tree to pizza.
> Historically Russia has repeatedly demonstrated willingness to harm their economy in return for gaining more territory.
Or for no reason whatsoever. But it's not really fair to compare the Communists or the Tsarist Empire to modern Russia.
> The most important thing to Ukraine is - how can we make sure that Russia doesn't invade us again. Everything else is worthless for Ukraine, for the West, and for Democracy.
Ukraine needs to work on this with Russia.
Russia has made clear that they want security guarantees themselves, so a universal solution might be viable. The problem being, that Russia doesn't feel threatened by Ukraine, but those backing it.
Something that isn't seemingly being commented widely on either is that Vance started hitting Zelenskyy with bursts of multiple questions and as soon as he started answering the first there were immediate challenges and redirections.
English isn't Zelenskyy's first language. Imagine how tough this must have been.
At that point the questions weren't questions anymore - they were statements that were left unchallenged.
Yeah but that doesn’t rule him out in the struggle for succession. Because the VP can’t be primaried in 2026, he’s at the disadvantage that he won’t know if Musk will fund him; he’ll have to fundraise as the conventional pick.
> Something that isn't seemingly being commented widely on either is that Vance started hitting Zelenskyy with bursts of multiple questions and as soon as he started answering the first there were immediate challenges and redirections.
It's a (shitty) debate tactic called "gish galloping." It's not exclusively used by people on the right, but there are some very popular online personalities on the right who use it. Ben Shapiro is easily the most infamous for using it, but Jordan Peterson and Trump himself use it too.
It's more than that. Some people in the audience started harassing Zelensky as well for not wearing a suit. It's just sad how the US has given up on diplomacy thinking that the worldstage is a businness as usual
They never wanted a deal. If they wanted one it would have been negotiated and done before Zelensky stepped on American soil.
I don't want to fall into the conspiracy trap, but I can't help thinking this was planned on advance. Especially considering how couch man acted. Trump was wandering around aimlessly until Vance took command.
America did used to have real diplomacy, in the sense that there was an active dialogue between diplomats in America and their counterparts abroad. During the unipolar moment, they gave that up. That's beyond dangerous and frankly suicidal.
When I look back at it, Dugin was right back in November:
"So we have won. That is decisive. The world will be never ever like before. Globalists have lost their final combat. The future is finally open. I am really happy."
Dugin wasn’t exaggerating when he said, “We have won.”
Today’s White House display is exactly what he meant. A decade ago, the GOP would’ve never echoed Russian talking points. Now, they’re openly aligning with them.
This isn’t just isolationism—it’s the dismantling of U.S. hegemony from within.
I've been turning my attention to cold war and post-cold war Russia, their espionage, writing and interviews from various defectors, and generally trying to understand if talk of Russian influence is overblown.
It seemed very conspiratorial on its surface. I'm now fairly convinced that the Russians have been refining their espionage for generations, the USA is likely full of agents in all places of society.
Somewhat frighteningly, they anticipated the need to subvert any notions of this occurring, and very explicitly set out on a campaign to destroy trust and truth in US society such that when people began claiming Russia was infiltrating the country, it would just sound like conspiratorial nonsense. You can find plenty of references to this type of initiative going back 50 years at least.
The idea, ultimately, is to get the USA to destroy itself, as you mentioned. The dismantling of democracy in particular is a major accomplishment. Once that trust is eroded, every American's most immediate enemy is another American. Who cares about Russians when you've got neighbours like these, right?
It's hard not to see what's happening as a major victory for Russia. Did they actually orchestrate it? How much? I have no idea. Maybe only slightly, maybe a lot. Regardless, they're celebrating today.
They (Russia) have lost big time, because their goal was total annexation of the country in a couple of weeks. Now they got a unified Europe and Ukraine which is much stronger. Finland in NATO, and other things not to their liking. Not to mention a bunch of young and old people going back from front and causing chaos.
It is funny how they switched their narrative from “we are fighting US and NATO” to “US will do business with us and the war is with Ukraine”.
Finland and Sweden in NATO is a huge setback, but they'll probably get Crimea, Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhia, plus a guarantee against Ukraine joining NATO. This is not a great outcome for Russia, but it's certainly better than a NATO Ukraine and a second Euromaidan in Red Square next year, which was probably the alternative on offer.
Also, it seems likely that Russia will get the dismantlement of NATO as part of the outcome of the war, and that would be a great outcome for them. Will Sweden and Finland remain in a mutual defense pact with France, Germany, and the UK after NATO ends? It's up in the air. But in any case invading Russia from Sweden is vastly less feasible than invading Russia from Ukraine.
I think by 'we' Dugin meant 'anti-globalists', not Russia. There are pro-globalists in Russia and anti-globalists outside of Russia, so one doesn't equal the other.
He wants to defund U.S. support for Ukraine, but isn't can't directly own his decision like an adult, and so has to stage this baloney conflict of a press conference.
Weakness. Trump looked like the weakest negotiator I’ve ever seen in this exchange. He looks so powerless. He’s taking his frustration out on Zelenski since Musk has completely taken over his role in the US.
They are also weak. And they've learned that aggression compensates for weakness, but in reality weakness is what leads to the aggression.
His supporters believe in many lies because they've been brainwashed. Things will continue to degrade until an counter agent is developed for this insanity.
On Twitter, it's common to find populist-right commentators say things like:
1. Supporting Ukraine against Russia is risking WW3
2. Zelensky is always asking for more, more more and is SO disrespectful to the generous United States. And he doesn't even show up in a suit when meeting the president. How disgraceful. etc. etc.
These points were both touched upon by the Trump/Vance tag team and that's no coincidence.
My respect for Zelensky, the only decent politician in that room. Ukraine is lucky to have him in a time like this.
You don't have to ask this sort of question. He literally says it in the discussion. He wanted to show the world Zelensky's attitude. And he was successful in doing so
Trump failed to make the deal, they tried to get resources for a minimum of involvement, and the deal didn't go through because Zelensky is adamant in wanting to protect Ukrainian integrity.
From Trump's perspective this puts him in a good light. He is attempting to negotiate rationally and Zelensky is irrationally spending Ukrainian lives to hold on to an ideal.
Of course Europe and many Americans believe in that ideal and would support Ukraine, but that's not Trump's political platform. His motivation is to end the war, and the easiest way to end the war is to yield to Putin's demands. Making Zelensky look unreasonable is a critical part of that.
It's not an idea. It's the law. Everyone agreed to it.
Aggressive war is proscribed in the UN Charter. Starting a war to expand borders or subjugate people is untenable. The right to conquest is obsolete.
Returning to that time is absolutely what the Trump regime is asserting on behalf of Americans. And Americans should be vary wary of returning to a time prior to the two world wars as if the lessons learned should now be dismissed or unlearned. We do this and we guarantee there will be one or more world wars again. More wars of conquest, again. More wars of aggression, again. A return to might makes right. Not law.
A republic is an empire of laws, not men. We follow Trumpism, and we return to an entirely familiar and more chaotic world than what we have had.
Not one fucking square meter of Ukraine should go to Russia. There already is a negotiation and a treaty that said the very goddamn thing that's happening would not happen. So why trust untrustworthy liars by giving them land, with a piece of paper that means less than nothing?
You know what is "holding onto an ideal"? Negotiation with Russia.
I agree with your rant, but it's not relevant to this thread. GP asked a question about how Trump's behavior could be explained and I explained it. If you can't understand someone's behavior and you think everything they do is dumb or evil, you've shut your brain off and the world will keep catching you off guard.
The only recent historical comparison I can think of -- and it's a weak one compared to today's meeting -- was when Obama firmly reiterated to Netanyahu his insistence on the 1967 lines as the basis for a two state solution, and Netanyahu in front of the cameras forcefully rejecting that to Obama's face: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l28xJitnP78
Maybe, but Trump's base is actually tiny, only about 22% of the US voters. This will strongly alienate the other 78% of Americans, not to mention 100% of America's allies. And America's enemies now see how grossly inept he actually is at negotiation, revealing that only physical threats will register with him. NOT a good development for America.
An insanely counterproductive ploy, but typical of Trump's 'gangsterism rules' philosophy of leadership.
>This will strongly alienate the other 78% of Americans
It will strongly alienate the subsection of the other 78% of Americans who learn of it and care. I suspect that's nowhere near 100% of them, and I'd be shocked if it was over 30%
Absolutely heartbreaking. How many of the people arguing have seen any footage of the atrocities committed by Russia.
It is sobering to see women and children shelled in their homes and hospitals. 20 Days in Mariupol is free to watch on Youtube (Won the Academy Award for Best Documentary last year):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvAyykRvPBo
The video in reference you've provided does not show video evidence of your claims.
I do agree the west, politics, and complex history between nations are obviously at play as to how the war came about, but that does not negate the atrocities committed by Russia.
George Washington's farewell address (1796) - on Europe:
The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith. Here let us stop. Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none; or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies, the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics, or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities.
Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. If we remain one people under an efficient government, the period is not far off when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel.
Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor or caprice?
To say the same thing as everyone else, but in a different way: let's say Washington turned out to be some form of benevolent vampire, and was able to live through all of America's lifetime from 1776 to today; do you think he would be commenting on his social media platform of choice quoting his younger self, or do you think his position on this matter would have changed?
Washington's opinion might well have changed and, as noted in other comments, an armada of nuclear ICBMs does negate the distance that he referenced.
Regardless of the hypothetical, isn't it clear that Trump IS meddling and not following Washington's injunction? (Also applies to Israel/Gaza.)
In family and community (and internet) dynamics, meddling in other people's quarrels often leads to blowback. (Yes, I'm aware of the irony of making this comment on HN.) Is it really any different on the global stage?
My genuine question: What are the best criteria for deciding when getting involved is better than remaining on the sidelines? Do those criteria apply at both hyper-local and global scales, or this there a phase transition in applicability?
I wouldn't really view "avoiding foreign entanglements" as meaning "let's insult our guest unless they slobber at my feet like a groveling and servile mendicant."
That said, I think Washington's advice should be considered as defined by a pre-globalization economy, and travel times substantially greater by orders of magnitude when compared to ICBMs. Imperfect analogy, but in some ways Europe was further away from the US then than the Moon is today.
Keeping Russia in check through a European alliance, and China in check through the Japanese alliance, is central to protecting US economic interests.
This is choosing to be involved, for your own best interest, exactly as Washington described.
Also, in 1796, the USA was distant to Russia and China.
This is no longer the case; all possess through the nuclear weapon the power to strike upon each other devastating blows.
Given the existence of nuclear weapons, the goal is now is to avoid major war completely, between any nuclear power.
A major nuclear exchange will lead to devastating environmental consequences, no matter whom is involved.
Finally when Washington wrote that, no one imagined the possibility of any one power conquering the whole of Europe, or of China rising to great power. The USA cannot withstand Russia, Europe, and China, combined.
It's preposterous to frame the whole thing about being isolationism or not. As if it's just a matter of "walking away" from Ukraine and letting them sort it out.
In fact the US under Trump doesn't intend on doing that. It's not content to let Ukraine fight it out with Europes support. It's actively trying to force Ukraine down a path of American & Russian choosing, and trying to take Ukraine's resources in the process.
Trump is trying to carve up Ukraine along with Russia. That's not isolationism.
This is not isolationism and walking away from Europe to leave it to its own devices, even if that's how some on the American right are trying to receive it. It's actually imperialism. And imperialism in coordination with another imperialist power.
In any case, it's not possible to post-facto have some sort of isolation here. Any withdrawal of American power is just its replacement by some other. Which America in turn will be enraged by, and the next round of the cycle will be explicit imposition of American power in some fashion by military means.
Because that's the only thing that will keep $$ flowing.
Why do right wing American isolationists somehow imagine they're running some sort of charity for the world that somehow Europe and others are "ungrateful" for? American military intervention exists for nakedly avaricious reasons. It is for maintaining the supremacy of American capitalism, and enriching American businessmen and to some degree some of the American people.
> Why do right wing American isolationists somehow imagine they're running some sort of charity for the world that somehow Europe and others are "ungrateful" for?
They imagine this because American interventionists routinely tell them that this is so, and American interventionists say this because it's the only politically viable justification. If you convinced everyone who believes in the fundamental goodness of US military intervention that it's really about Lockheed's profit margins, isolationism would have a bipartisan supermajority.
I would argue that it was much bigger at that time. How many days of sailing would it take to cross the ocean? How undeveloped was the entirety of what we now have as the US?
Edit: I'm a fool and read the parent completely incorrectly. Ignore this comment.
Did you post it because you agree with it or just for fun? It's a 250 year old statement in a world that didn't look anything like ours does today. In 1796 the United States was not a global power with nuclear weapons whose entire strength is derived from the global order of trade that we imposed after World War 2.
All of this realignment away from our allies is actually throwing away our greatest strength. I understand why people voted for Trump or a figure like him on the domestic front - people want to bring back manufacturing and lower-middle class jobs? Great, let's work with our allies to do it. To throw away the world order that we won instead of iterating on it is a travesty and a fucking joke.
Basic principles that change with the time aren't basic principles at all. Is the First Amendment guaranteeing freedom of speech irrelevant now because we aren't communicating via handwritten letters and bulletin boards anymore?
to disregard the context in which the founding fathers' ideologies developed is to ignore the utter hypocrisy of their views.
these were wealthy men who owned other human beings for personal economic benefit.
whatever high-seeming notions may have underpinned their political project, their goal was to build a new nation in which they could continue to accumulate dynastic wealth free from monarchial control, at the cost of the very freedoms they claimed to stand for.
Would you also disregard ancient philosophy, or religion? Modern psychology seems to rigorously prove out profound ideas the ancients had about the human mind, yet these ideas were written down thousands of years ago. Why would it be that people from hundreds of years ago would be so divorced from our reality?
I have invested considerable personal resources into fighting for democracy in my country and ended up having to flee leaving behind a rather comfortable life. The United States has always been an inspiration despite its well-known flaws.
Watching this situation unfold is very disturbing. And especially disheartening is the behavior of Republican representatives. A mere month ago these same people were Ukraine's best friends and world's dictators' most hawkish enemies and suddenly they are all parroting a completely opposite narrative. I mean, I can understand electing a pathalogical liar. Happened in my country as well. But turns out others were lying too? Suddenly turns out there's no commitment to values, but only a commitment to one man? If this can happen so easily in a 250 years old democracy, is democracy even worth fighting for? Is the Ukrainians' sacrifice worth it?
Just talking aloud here and not trying to say anything in particular: I've been an HSBC customer for 20 years, 6/7 years ago things started to get a bit weird, and then there was a full blown withdrawal. I do a small amount of business with kids of CCP folks, 2/3 years ago things in those relationships changed also. I've thought for a while now there is something pretty big brewing behind the scenes, the way Trump reacted to Zelensky saying that the USA is going to feel some stuff... again, I'm not trying to say something, I'm not saying war, aliens, paradigm shifting tech, I don't know what I'm saying, but my gut says something starkly unusual is brewing.
DEFCON started the Frankin project less than a year ago. Purpose is to work with the small mom and pop people across the country and volunteer to harden their security. The consensus being that China will be launching a major offensive in the next 5-7 years and this country filled with small pockets of people doing their own thing are deeply vulnerable to having their infrastructure being crippled in a "first strike" kind of attack. Think about it, so much of the country is decentralized and a lot of the people have their infrastructure that the country depends on just running on outdated junk.
The rest of this decade is make or break for the next 20+ years. I honestly don't know if the US is really on the right path. Maybe letting Musk cut everything so the country can focus on the core essentials will save us? Maybe it will doom us? If we go down, I suspect he will go down with us (never getting to mars) so there is that at least. Maybe it doesn't matter anymore? Maybe there really is no leadership at the top so the window has closed and we are just sleepwalking into a depressing era of pain and suffering?
Well I'm Canadian I would really prefer you didn't fall over, it means we're going down also, and I can't say we're the folks you need to be picking a fight with yet our country is boo'ing your anthem at our sports games we're so annoyed. Maybe we need to be here for some reason, I don't know, but it seems like the twilight zone...(btw:have you seen how good robots are recently? amazingly good...)
So you too have noticed "something" that cannot be quantified as "event" yet. I would say from around 2014 things started to move in strange directions here and there around the world. I am not sure if what is brewing is highly unusual, but I would say it is not something we have seen in a last 50-70 years.
Maybe it's just because they're anticipating fallout from an escalation over Taiwan?
Large US tech companies would be crippled because they'd suddenly loose access to top chips and manufacturing capacity over night.
We're living in a classic "pre-war era," similar to what people said about living in Germany between the wars. I don't know what the war is going to be about or even who the sides are going to be (hopefully I won't be on either of them), but I think that's what the tension is about.
HSBC is effectively fully exiting the west. US, Canada and this year UK was announced, also noticed the floors in our building that the ICBK are on are coming up for availability.
If you dig in, you will find that HSBC is an Asian bank with a British regulatory structure. HSBC Group is large, and functionally HQ'd in hong kong, but on top of that, as I said, if you dig in, you'll find a lot of things that show HSBC is an Asian bank with a British regulatory structure, it's why it's used by people like myself.
You’re absolutely right to be concerned. We’re watching a long-term strategy being played out and America is largely a pawn and blind to it because the average person, leaders included, can’t imagine what our world might look like beyond the next 4 years.
The reality is, strategically, China is much much much wiser than the US is and the puzzle pieces are starting to come together in all the ways that are good for them.
And if you want proof of my statement that our society is in denial, watch this comment get downvoted into oblivion.
For one, I’m somewhat familiar with Chinese culture and how their government functions. I would warn against underestimating how quickly they can turn things around, both culturally and economically. They have the ability to make sudden drastic changes with little pushback or resistance from the population. They have focus, reliably execute, and recover relatively quickly from mistakes and are getting increasingly good at social engineering to enable those things. They are thinking 50 years into the future at all times.
Yes, it’s absolutely possible they go too far and end in a revolution but I don’t see that happening in this century. The overall sentiment in the country (outside metro areas) is a tremendous amount of support for their government.
I have no objection to your claim that Chinese pivot quickly. I saw it when Tesla introduced Gigacasting. Some of the Chinese automakers announced and implemented Gigacasting as quick as possible. Quick turnaround after a new idea is presented probably comes from their long heritage of copying and reverse engineering. We have very few orgs in the US that have this kind of burn the boats thinking. Mostly they are in Silicon Valley with companies like Tesla and Apple(more so during the Jobs era but still true today).
>They have focus, reliably execute, and recover relatively quickly from mistakes and are getting increasingly good at social engineering to enable those things. They are thinking 50 years into the future at all times.
Ok all of this is true but it does not address my main point: they have a fundamental problem that began decades ago and the window has now closed to prevent a massive disaster that could take the "steam out of the economic engine". How are they going to resolve this?
>Yes, it’s absolutely possible they go too far and end in a revolution but I don’t see that happening in this century. The overall sentiment in the country (outside metro areas) is a tremendous amount of support for their government.
I haven't kept up with the lie flat movement but I imagine part of the cause of this massive birth rate problem was in fact 996. Its a sort of silent revolution agains the leadership. Young Chinese crushed with the burden of buying impossibly expensive property, having to care for elders and start a family choose to opt out. Are they going to take the people opted out and put them into camps unless they pop out kids and start spending their life doing innovation? Im sure that will do wonders for fostering innovation.
You know those stories about Soviets getting overwhelmed when they visited US supermarkets? That happens with Americans visiting Chinese downtowns. China will have no trouble outlasting the US unless things change radically.
Demographics are not the problem you think they are; industrial economies no longer rest on the shoulders of burly twentysomething coal miners shoveling sixteen tonnes of coal to get another day older and deeper in debt until blacklung disables them.
>China will have no trouble outlasting the US unless things change radically.
Um my entire point was about an issue that will definitely cause them to lose steam before the US. You provided no rebuttal to my point.
>Demographics are not the problem you think they are; industrial economies no longer rest on the shoulders of burly twentysomething coal miners shoveling sixteen tonnes of coal to get another day older and deeper in debt until blacklung disables them.
They rest on the backs of 20 somethings who are forced to take care of their elderly parents, while popping out 2-3 kids while maintaining impossible million dollar mortgages for a 1 bedroom condo while working 996 style hours. In that regard, I only see nothing but doom and gloom coming.
> A mere month ago these same people were Ukraine's best friends and world's dictators' most hawkish enemies
What Republicans a month ago were UAs best friend? I feel like the simping for Russia has been a consistent stance of MAGA since 2016 -- certainly since the 2022 invasion.
Graham’s opinions and stances on everything are akin to a flag blowing in the wind. As soon as the wind shifts, the flag immediately follows. Granted most politicians are like this but I’d venture to say Graham is one of the most consistent.
Trump has been glazing despots for years, nothing about this is surprising. They were never "the world's dictators' most hawkish enemies", quite the contrary. Why else would russian propaganda be so aligned with MAGA?
The entire point that Zelensky was making to Vance is that every instance of diplomacy Ukraine has had with Russia has been discarded when it's convenient by Russia. Trump wants what looks good on TV, which is a peace deal, but without any plan or security assurances Russia will simply invade again when they rebuild their army.
Ukraine needs to rebuild its army too, and would benefit more relative to Russia from a ceasefire, even if Russia reinvaded. You people are so wildly irrational.
That's just not true, Russia is short on tanks, Ukraine is reaching artillery parity, and Ukraine has a permenant manpower crisis whereas Russia has deep reserves it can pull from for training if given time. Western countries would stop aid flows to Ukraine during a ceasefire while Russia would be free to rearm. A temp. ceasefire would not help Ukraine.
Moreover, why would Ukraine want to negotiate a temp ceasefire? If they can snag security guarantees they have better odds of a long term peace.
Fair and I agree with you, but do you agree that the only ways out of stalemate are ceasefire or west entering the conflict? Are you advocating for the west to enter the conflict?
No, I think the US should negotiate a ceasefire, signal more weapons aid to increase leverage on the peace deal terms, and then find a way to get Europe or the US to signal they will guarantee Ukraine's security. I don't think a transactional deal like the mineral deal is a bad idea, because it gives the US a stake and increases the credibility of their security deal, but Trump does not seem to care about actual lasting peace here.
Coming from the people who spent $2.5 trillion fighting goat herders with ak47s for over 20 years, and lost, that's a good one...
Either way it's not a reason to publicly humiliate Zelensky, to announce he's a dictator, to repeat Russian propaganda talking points, &c.
If your version of peace is to unconditionally accept all of the aggressor's demands, shit on the country being invaded and steal their resources don't be surprised if people don't clap
I think the question most others in Europe are concerned about is "How far west does Russia stop?", and given that they held Berlin only about 35 years ago, and they're openly talking about Paris on state TV, the answer is "they don't, unless we stop them in Ukraine already". That whole perspective makes that question somewhat redundant and too narrow in scope given all the context around it.
This is insanity. You have lost your mind. Europe is covered by a nuclear umbrella and is thus in no danger from Russian invasion.
And you still haven't answered the question, which indicates that you don't see any Ukrainian path to victory - rather your intention is to throw all of Ukraine into the meat grinder in order to make yourself slightly safer from a completely hypothetical Russian invasion, which is profoundly unethical.
Your premise and any assumptions that build on that are invalid.
The Soviet Union and China had a war. When they both had a nuclear umbrella, the Soviet Union having twice as many nuclear weapons as they do now. What else... India and Pakistan? The Korean war? mjfl, here's some news... did you know there's _two_ Koreas? Russia is in other European states right now - Moldova, Georgia. Never mind the hybrid warfare, I feel at best the need to only vaguely point in that direction. Just as much as I'll vaguely point out that that nuclear umbrella just shrunk to a quarter of its previous size. And how can you say "Europe is covered by a nuclear umbrella" when the largest nation by area entirely in Europe is not covered by it.
Can you do us a favour and at least make a list of Wikipedia articles or historical events or entire nations we're supposed to pretend don't exist, including, paradoxically, Russia?
Yes? Any response. I agree with you, let's not glorify meat grinders.
In fact, let's stand diametrically opposed to those who would.
I'll just type 'meat grinder' and 'battle' into Google. Here's the top result: "Battles of Rzhev". Let's go to the Wikipedia page for it and Ctrl-F 'glory'. "[...] Military Glory by the President of Russia Vladimir Putin [...]".
There you go. We should stand diametrically opposed to a certain "President of Russia Vladimir Putin". Gee, I wonder if that's the same guy as the current "President of Russia Vladimir Putin"... do you think?
So... any examples of that Quisling, Vichy, Chamberlain approach - roll over and plead for mercy while exposing your belly - that resulted in a permanent peace in Europe? I mean we want to avoid a meat grinder don't we, so given all that history you'll have plenty of proof that this time, this exact situation, will somehow be magically different.
You can't have elections when you're being invaded or under attack, it's not unprecedented and it's also constitutional. The UK for example didn't have elections from 1939 to 1945 due to WW2.
If part of your population is under occupation, they won't be able to vote how they want, and the rest of your civilian population becomes a target for constant bombardment in order to vote "correctly".
The US is the only western country that doesn't have provisions to suspend elections during wartime. Bully on you, you're awesome. But it doesn't make France, Germany, Canada, the UK, Italy, Spain etc. dictatorships because they don't do exactly what America does.
Summary: While questions have been raised about Ukraine’s democratic process, the country is acting in accordance with its constitution. Parliament overwhelmingly affirmed Zelenskyy’s legitimacy, and under Ukrainian law, elections cannot be held while martial law is in place. Despite the challenges of war, Zelenskyy maintains a 57% approval rating, and his mandate is not disputed by the Ukrainian people or their elected representatives.
So? Why do I have to agree with that assessment? THEY HAVE NOT HAD ELECTIONS. The UK had elections during WWII and so did the U.S. During the U.S. Civil War the Union held elections and Congress met and worked without representation from the Confederacy. There is NO excuse.
Different constitutions are designed differently. Holding an election now would be unconstitutional in Ukraine. Zelensky has offered his resignation in return for security guarantees for Ukraine from NATO or the US.
It appears based on this thread HN has fully transitioned into becoming intellectually as interesting as the front page of Reddit, so why not skip the middle man and just link to it outright.
"Intellectually interesting" of course meaning that we should calmly discuss everybody's interests and motivations, and look for deeper meaning, while Russians have been lobbing missiles at Ukrainian homes for the last 3 years.
It's clear as day now that the Trump admin is carrying out the Project 2025 and techno feudalist playbook of consolidating power in the executive branch by removing opposition and appointing loyalists. While at the same time shifting America's foreign policy to be in line with Putin and Xi's.
Maybe none of that concerns you, but many of us don't want the us to descend into autocracy.
The US becoming a Russo/Sino-inspired dictatorship?
Or that most of the people in this thread a) spend a little too much time consuming partisan political narratives-as-entertainment, b) lack a capacity for non-emotional thinking, and c) unquestionably consume the current zeitgeist of their tribe?
I'll place my bet on the latter. Let's revisit in 10 years and see who was right.
How ironic considering that the modern day use of the term "axis of evil" was coined by George W. Bush of all people to justify the Iraq war. And I thought Republicans couldn't get any worse back then.
Yes, as a teen I thought it was so absurd that the world wasn't deeply disturbed by the rhetoric and actions of the neo cons back then. Today, I would gladly take those idiots back.
I think many were disturbed back then. Heck, Obama even campaigned on it. It's just that nothing was done to meaningfully rectify it.
What concerns me even more today is that the narrative surrounding the Iraq war has shifted. Basic things like who started the war and for what purpose are lost in discussions. Even the liberal media sometimes seem to forget that it happened at all when talking about the military industrial complex. It's surreal, seeing all this 1984 BS playing out in the open.
This is a petty excuse. We just witnessed how USA tried to force Zelensky (who is in a much worse position than Israel) to sign a deal, and he refused. Israel voting this way falls in line with who they are.
Yeah. I keep thinking that this is going to be analogous to Chamberlain's "Peace with honor" moment in terms of how it sits in the historical narrative in 50 years.
Chamberlain had a reason - UK army wasn't really ready for a fight. He tried to buy some time to rearm. Misguided or not, you could say there was a reason for that.
Chamberlain had seen many young people die needleasly in the nationalist ravages of the First World War and was trying everything to stop that from happening again, while rearming.
Not sure if he was misguided but he was certainly relatable. There are two solid reasons right there, that might notice been enough, but it certainly wasn’t a clear right vs wrong.
The Germans weren't ready for a fight either. As early in 1936 when Hitler marched a token force into the Rhineland, the French could have called his bluff there. In fact, even Hitler himself nearly called off his forces on sighting of french forces.
The Allies still had a larger and better equipped army at that point, the strategic mistake was having the French completely outflanked through Belgium, in which an earlier offensive with preexisting troops would have made it much harder to happen.
I agree with both you and AnotherGoodName - I should have been clearer.
It's not that I think Trump's actions here are equivalent. They are pretty clearly worse in motivation and objective.
I just think that we're going to head into a dark time for the world, and that future history books (if 2025-2035 goes roughly like 1935-1945, which I'm starting to think would be a horrific but "better than can reasonably be expected" outcome) that what happened at the White House today will occupy a similar place - a sort of last pretense of diplomacy before the storm, where one of the participants (Hitler in the original, Trump here) was never honestly interested in peace, just what they could gain in the short term via extortion.
Deeply embarrassing and disturbing. What a sad spectacle to see the President and Vice President of the United States so beholden to a foreign dictator that they would debase themselves in this way. Unpresidential doesn’t even begin to describe it.
My heart breaks for Ukraine. The outcome of the November 5, 2024, election will prove to be a tragic mistake.
Shameful, embarrassing and disturbing is putting it lightly in my opinion.
The thing that is sad for me is I just feel like I don't have an iota of anything in common with people that could possibly support this kind of behavior. For so long I've been struggling to empathize with Trump supporters. I certainly understand the anger at the Democrats and Democratic leadership (I often share that anger myself). I understand the anger at the direction of the slow societal breakdown I've seen in many parts of the country (and which, ironically, I feel that Vance elucidated very well in Hillbilly Elegy). I understand many of the policy differences.
But it's what I see as the complete moral baselessness and behavior I can only describe as narcissistically bizarre that I just fundamentally can not understand. So often I hear myself saying "Imagine how any other politician would have reacted 20 years ago". And now it's like so many people are OK with stuff like this (never mind that insane Gaza video from just yesterday...)
I simply cannot understand it. And to be honest, I'm not sure I want to understand it, beyond seeing the whole Trump movement through the lens of something like a cult. I just have never been so ashamed of my country in my life.
Because the system traps people into a false dichotomy.
There is no candidate, no party that perfectly represents my views, or yours, nor could there ever be. Yet people are forced to choose between one of two bad options while being fed propaganda from both sides. Everyone is too distracted by the fighting between the sides to question the system itself.
Why is it that in a democracy, instead of voting for policies we believe in, which would seem to be the point, we instead vote for men, who then have power over us? And then they can do whatever they want?
Direct democracy. Maybe it’s flawed too, but it’s less flawed than this.
I understand all this. I've tried to emphasize how I completely understand being totally disgusted by the Democrats on a range of issues. I also understand the feeling that when the system isn't working for you, you have a strong incentive to just support whoever says they are going to blow that system up.
But take a look at the different groups who support Trump:
1. Consider Republicans in Congress. Even if they don't say it, I'd bet dollars to donuts that 75% of them are as disgusted by that Oval Office performance as I am. So you either have the ~25% (and I hope that estimate is high) Marjorie Taylor Greene types, who I already think are disgusting for a host of reasons, or you have the other 75% of them that are just complete and total cowards. They know this is wrong, they know Trump is a creature void of morals, but they're too afraid to go against him, and for what, their jobs? A lot of them are already rich. And there of course have been principled Republicans who have stood up and said that this is just wrong, and especially as it applies to Russia, this goes against everything the party supposedly believed for the past 75 years.
2. There of course is a sizable portion of Trump supporters who are racist, sexist, would be fine if all gay people just died, etc. Now, I definitely believe the Democrats overestimate the size of that portion, and painting all Trump supporters with that brush has been a fatal mistake, but let's not deny these people actually exist. For all the hand-wringing by Democrats about why they lost in 2024, a huge part has to have been that a large percentage of this country is just unwilling to vote for a woman for President (again, definitely not the only reason, but when the division is close to 50/50 all it takes is a couple percentage points).
3. So then you have a lot of people who don't support Trump strongly but think he will improve their lives in some way. And sure, call me one of those "arrogant liberals", but when I hear people talk about some concrete ways about how Trump will actually improve their lives, it's pretty laughably stupid to me. I mean, give me a single policy action by which Trump will help reduce inflation. Whenever I've tried to engage supporters on policy issues, the arguments I get back honestly just sound like rationalizations for "I hate the other side" - which again, I understand, I just don't get this desire to be suckered by a strongman. Trump is so nakedly transparent about his narcissism and how he doesn't give 2 shits about anyone but himself (again, did anyone actually see that Gaza video?)
So I agree with everything you've said about the failures of the 2 party system. I just can't use that as an excuse to understand supporting what I believe to be grossly morally reprehensible behavior on a daily basis.
Yeah, but how you feel about it is separate from what might be done about it. If you just want to blow off steam and morally condemn people, be my guest, but this is exactly what everyone has already been doing, and it doesn’t seem to have helped. You might even say, it only ever makes things worse.
There’s a structure to the political system. There’s a structure to the way that people argue, and what they will accept as arguments. There’s a structure to how we are manipulated by the media and how social media is manipulated. These structural issues are the real problem, but as humans we’d rather see everything as being attributable to the individuals involved. Also known as the fundamental attribution error.
Those issues are solvable in my view, in the long term. Getting there might be rough.
It seems like Russia has managed to polarize US and manipulate one side completely to do their bidding. It's a strategy that they call ideological subversion. Russia has managed to split US in such a way that one side will always pick the opposite opinion from the other side and tie their egos and identities with it, effectively manipulating them into doing anything. For that side the most important thing becomes owning the other side, and not caring about anything else. It is very sad. US right is just victim to a very effective mass manipulation technique from a foreign actor specialized in this.
I’ll be honest, I think both sides are being manipulated in the sense that they each see the other as less over time.
On their whole I think Democratic policies retain more sense at this point but a lot of bullshit snuck into Democratic thinking. The intentions of that thinking were good but the result was obvious division.
I think this is true, but the fact that it’s even possible is the problem. The US will probably develop an immune system against such manipulation in the future. In fact, that effort may already be underway.
It's crazy that this is possible. I wish US would develop this immune system. Where do you see this light at the end of the tunnel to think that effort may be underway though? I hope you are right.
I cannot help but think that we are a victim of prosperity...even the poor have time for lurid entertainment, and that is what this all is for most people. Entertainment. Televised team sports. People have lost perspective on what real loss is.
Why else would you have the cameras in there for that long, and act that way in front of said cameras.
I'd hate to be Rubio or anyone else trying to actually do their job.
It stopped being a Red/Blue issue after the polls closed, this is a issue for the country as a whole.
Is it just like extensive child molestation tapes by donald trump by k-/gb, stroking his ego, a lifetime guarantee of russian indulgence and young russian escorts? Proof of him sexually abusing his daughter? I just don't get it.
The democratic system of checks-and-balances of USA needs to act to contain the Trump individual. After all the current USA government system is not a dictature and thus Trump is not supposed to have dictatorial powers.
That could have gone worse; president trump put his hand on Zelinski to quiet him, this particular action has precipitated physical violence probably since the dawn of language.
So at this point obviously the US pulls all support from Ukraine - weapons, intelligence, the works.
Any negotiations US-Russia will be useless as the US won’t represent anyone with a stake in the war. They don’t have people, territory, anything at stake, they don’t get refugees and generally aren’t directly affected in any way.
What are the chances that they just leave Ukraine, Europe and Russia alone from now on and leave them to sort it out on their own?
Although the analogy between European nation states and US states is very weak, it's hard to resist pointing out that different parts of the US are also not aligned on politics.
What the USA is now proposing is not compromise by any definition of the word. The USA is now parroting Kremlin talking points, word for word. Recently when a US official was asked ~"what is Russia giving up?" He was unable to provide an answer.
My understanding has not improved, since the questions weren't addressed.
Do you see some lesser "compromise" that could work? Or, do you see any options on the table that don't match the previous borders?
How do you see this ending?
That map reflects who wants to continue the war and who doesn't, not anything about the specifics of a possible compromise. A proposal of the agreement does not exist at the moment, so we can only speculate what it might include.
> That map reflects who wants to continue the war and who doesn't
No, it does not. It's a map of countries which actively deny that Russia is to blame for their invasion of Ukraine. Sitting out the vote was an option.
Ideally, I see this war ending by Russia facing internal economic collapse. There were many indications showing that this was a real possibility. That seems much less likely now that they have a partner in Washington.
It appears they have a well functioning war economy [1]:
> Despite all of this, Russia’s economy has not collapsed. But it does look very different, and is now entirely focused on a long war in Ukraine – which is actually driving economic growth.
> In fact, the IMF expects Russia to experience GDP growth of 2.6% this year. That’s significantly more than the UK (0.6%) and the EU (0.9%). Similarly, Russia’s budget deficit (the amount the government needs to borrow) is on track to remain below 1% of GDP, compared to 5.1% in the UK and 2.8% in the EU.
> The first signs appeared at the end of 2024. The ruble has weakened, with the Russian currency having lost more than half of its value against the US dollar and the euro, according to a recent analysis by the Kyiv School of Economics. International sanctions on Russian financial institutions played a critical part in this devaluation. In addition, according to the Kyiv School of Economics, Russian oil exports “dropped to $64.40 per barrel” at the end of 2024 (exports were initially $70 per barrel). This suggests that the Russian government is generating less revenue from oil sales.
> Rising inflation is causing concerns in Russia, too. In his annual televised question-and-answer session last month, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that inflation is a problem and that the Russian economy is “overheating.” He acknowledged that the price of goods has increased, but he attempted to counter this by saying that wages for Russian citizens have also increased. He then concluded that the Russian Central Bank was working to adjust its benchmark to address rising inflation.
> Putin’s points on inflation were telling. The Russian leader seldom discusses problems pertaining to Russian society. Thus, the fact that he felt the need to acknowledge inflation as a serious issue suggests that something greater is afoot. [0]
To further answer your original question, less ideally would be a settlement where the EU and Ukraine are both parties to the negotiation. I am not sure what role the US has at this table, tbh. Full withdrawal from support of Ukraine, and NATO withdrawal appears imminent in any case. A settlement like that might look like:
What Russia gets:
Their territory back in Kursk Oblast
The end of sanctions
A significant portion of Ukrainian territory
What Ukraine gets:
Some contested territory back
All, or nearly all EU held Russian funds for rebuilding the incredible amount of destruction from Russian assault
Permanent stationing of military in Ukraine from a new EU coalition of the willing. (NATO is over, that discussion is pointless)
Yes, their economies health is not the greatest. There are many, to quote that, “concerns”. Concerns and economic growth doesn’t suggest near term collapse.
Can this be tied back to the original comment? I think we agree that a compromise, some level of alignment with Russia, will be required.
What is the clear US alignment with Russia that you see, based on the US compromise? And, what is the compromise? Details of it aren’t
publicly or privately known, since it hasn’t gone that far, and there haven’t been any talks of security promises yet. Is alignment entirely that vote?
This is not a convincing argument. It tells me nothing about why I should not stand with Europe, rather than American isolationism and pro-Putinism. It doesnt even support your own claim about how Europe "actually" is. Wtf does that even mean.
>Europe is sooooooo actually.
What??? What does that mean?
>Idk man you just have to know how actually Europe is.
Though I have not lived in Europe, I have traveled there frequently and hold EU citizenship and I cant fathom what you are saying except your prefrence for America, but not why you prefer it.
With no security guarantees, It’s either continue to fight or be annexed by Russia and drafted first a couple of years down the line to attack Poland/Romania/Moldova
Because Russian shills, the Alt-Right have already burrowed deep into HN. Don't assume much of the discussion here is anything but in bad faith that feigns ignorance to exhaust opposing arguments. It's the classic gish-gallop in play.
This is a divisive topic with a range of opinion. I don't see any evidence of shills so far but if you think you do, you should be emailing us at hn@ycombinator.com so we can look into it, not posting this sort of sinister speculation to the threads. It's the ultimate internet cliché, and has a degrading effect on discussion. Hence that guideline.
Supporting peace via the 2025 version of the Molotov–Ribbentrop pact? It is very important for future world peace that Russia not be successful in this war.
You don't even have to go back to WWII, we let Russia take part of Ukraine in 2014 and look how that worked out. The idea that letting other countries annex parts of their neighbors is a recipe for lasting peace would be laughable if I didn't see it so often. It's like Charlie Brown and the football every time: https://imgflip.com/i/9lvwwu
Well, we might see a vestigial "peace treaty" set up between D and V, with both saying "we'd have peace now except for Z not wanting it, he's the problem".
USA is out of the game. Only question now is if it goes neutral (EU can still buy munitions/weapons) or actually becomes actively hostile, to whatever extent.
EU now needs to step up. This means 7% defence spending, to re-arm and to support UA.
HU/SK will block everything in EU, every step of the way, as both are Putin's.
EU is actually fundamentally unable to respond because it cannot really deal with HU/SK. NATO also. No mechanism to eject members. Enough voting mechanisms require unanimous vote.
EU States need to start organizing things between themselves, sans HU/SK/USA.
Alex Krainer has speculated that Zelenskyy literally can't sign a mineral deal because those rights were a secret part of the UK/Ukraine 100 Year Partnership deal, making this all a bunch of theater.
Russia gets USSR back together? What does Trump get out of that?
And don’t start with any of that “Trump was turned by GRU”, “they have dirt on him”, “he’s bought by Russia”
He’s got a dozen billionaires on speed dial that’ll give him endless money, much more than Russia can afford. Saudis donate hundreds of billions to businesses close to him, etc - he doesn’t want or need money
He’s at the top of power - both houses, presidency, supreme court all will follow whatever he says without a second thought, commander of the strongest military the world has known, richest nation in the world - there’s hardly any more power to gain.
He doesn’t need to care about getting reelected, he won’t get removed from office. He’s 80 and whatever - there’s nothing to fear in his future as he’s at the end. He doesn’t care about the Republican party, so setting that up for the future doesn’t matter to him.
Any dirt they bring out can just be handwaved away as AI generated and no one in his base will believe it regardless.
So he can’t be a Russian asset, he’s beyond that and untouchable to the Russians.
> He’s got a dozen billionaires on speed dial that’ll give him endless money, much more than Russia can afford. Saudis donate hundreds of billions to businesses close to him, etc - he doesn’t want or need money
is flawed thinking.
No billionaire ever needs more money. But they all spend their time trying to make more money anyway. Think about it - these are people who have a billion dollars, but instead of starting charities and giving it away or retiring to an island, they take their money and power and use them to get more money and more power. It's greed. So I reject the idea that Donald Trump doesn't want more money.
He can have direct access to any of the big billionaires’ finances, DOGE is restructuring money left and right. 2.4 billion go into the SpaceX for an FAA contract, who’s to say a billion of that doesn’t go to Trump related businesses.
We’ve seen it happen where foreign dignitaries stay at Trump hotels when visiting DC, etc
There’s just no point in having it under Trump’s name, but if he wishes - he could be the first trillionaire
Yeah he does literally have it all, but it's not enough. It's never enough.
These billionaires, they're sick. Literally mentally unwell. They're addicted to the feeling of getting more. The greed is like a disease, it's like a drug. It's addictive and corrupting.
It's not enough to be wealthy, when there's more money to be had. It's not enough to be president when there's a chance to be a King. If he has a chance to make himself a trillionaire, he will take it. And he won't care what it costs us.
He likes Russian representatives. They speak his language and have a similar outlook. Allying with them will personally enrich him and his family. That’s about it really, which is kinda pathetic with how small it is.
Let me answer that bit first. Most good HN threads are "niche", meaning they are about things far less important than major events. This is on purpose, because if a story's importance were the criterion for HN's front page, then HN would be a current affairs site, and that is definitely not its mandate (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html). One could even say that HN is more for unimportant things, as long as they gratify intellectual curiosity, but the most accurate way to put it is that importance alone is not a criterion.
A certain amount of political overlap has always been part of the mix (that's why the site guidelines say "most" and "probably" - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4922426), but we're careful not to let that part get too large, because we want to preserve HN for its intended purpose.
Here are some links that point to lots of past explanations about this:
If you review the first part of https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and then take a look at these links, and still have a question I haven't answered, I'd be happy to take a crack at it.
Number of comments doesn't make a thread rank higher on HN. Upvotes make it rank higher, and flags make it rank lower. At this moment the balance between upvotes and flags on this story (and other factors, like the time of submission) combine to rank it at #23 or so.
HN's front page is a product of 3 things: community moderation (e.g. upvotes, flags), software moderation (e.g. flamewar detector) and moderator action (e.g. turning off flags, downweighting, or selecting posts for the SCP - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26998308).
In this case, community moderation was removing the story from the front page altogether (because flags were dominating upvotes). I overrode that by turning off the flags. Why? Because whatever else one says about this story, it is an interesting new phenomenon (a phrase from https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html). It may even be unprecedented.
However, I didn't turn off the flags to such a degree that the thread would be at #1 because it is not in HN's interest to have a divisive, indignant, and bellicose topic at the top of the front page. That would send the wrong message about what this site is for. Having this thread on the front page, but lower down, sends an accurate message about what this site is for. (As for what it is and isn't for—that is covered in the links I listed above.)
Another way of putting this is that while it's in HN's interest to have occasional threads on topics like this, it's important that the flames not burn so hot as to risk burning the site to a crisp. After the 'crisp' would come scorched earth, which is not interesting—it would do no good for HN to end up there. It's true that this tends to be the default fate of internet forums, but HN has right from the beginning (https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html) been an experiment in trying to stave that fate off for as long as possible.
I don’t think I’ve ever seen a less divisive thread than this one, having read _hundreds_ of comments in this thread. There is virtually no flame war going on here and opinions are fairly uniform on the matter at hand.
It’s more incendiary for this pretty civil discussion to be called divisive when there’s hardly any evidence that it is. The comments I most disagree with are all about appeasement, which is in my opinion misguided and coming from a place of saving lives (even if all the evidence is there in practice that it won't in the long run), rather than actively malicious.
I'm glad to hear it! but that's in part because I spent hours paying close attention to this thread and moderating it. I've copied a sample of links below. It's not enough to just turn off the flags on these things and let them run on the frontpage—it takes active engagement to keep discussion (on a topic like this) from going off the rails.
I say 'in part' because by far more important is that the bulk of the community is on board with the guidelines (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html). We can only make a difference around the edges. But those edges get pretty bad, and without moderation, some of the worst comments can easily turn into tire fires that end up dominating the thread.
I wish this were inessential and superfluous because it would be so much less work! But that's where we're are.
> I spent hours paying close attention to this thread and moderating it
And we thank you for it… but it also does strengthen the argument that it should be higher up exactly because you’ll want to get the most value out of the evident hard work you, and the others, including the very people you’ve called out who frequently apologise, revise, and add some context to why they felt that way, have done here.
It is a better, denser, broader and more considered sort of discussion than you find on reddit or Lemmy, it is confined to a single thread on a big matter, and it features excellent moderation work (and people being responsive to being called out more than even your typical economics post) - it should stand proudly. Moving it down more expediently because it is more divisive on average, I’ll admit that, does us all a disservice in my opinion.
What's the history of this model? Was it organic, or was it planned from the beginning (or maybe a bit of both)?
It's impressive when relatively small rules can so effectively set the vibe. I suppose you could claim you set rules that are well aligned with the eigenvectors of a nerd.
It was set in motion by pg's original intention for the site (https://news.ycombinator.com/newswelcome.html goes back at least to 2009), and then these ways of articulating it evolved over the years.
> I suppose you could claim you set rules that are well aligned with the eigenvectors of a nerd.
Since I’ve discovered active, I actually look at it first to find stuff that got pushed off the front page while I was not looking at HN.
I appreciate the goal of the front page algo quite a bit, but sometimes it pushes interesting stuff off the front page very aggressively if I am not refreshing HN throughout the day.
As I understand it HN ranking algorithm penalizes controversial threads, as indicated by roughly equal or higher number of comments compared to upvotes or something along those lines.
It is still on the front page right now for me, but at #23, which is exceptionally low compared to where it would be expected to be "naturally" for a post with 1585 points.
If you want more information, I posted a longer answer at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43212835. If you read that and still have a question that isn't answered there, I'd be happy to take a crack at it.
Thanks, I think you do a fantastic job moderating Hacker News and I realise this post is on a topic that usually wouldn't be surfaced here at all. I do wish all our world leaders could be as diplomatic as you.
And maybe I should read the FAQ properly before I comment on where a post 'should' be ranked.
If the Vice Presidency is vacant, the President nominates and Congress (both houses) confirm.
> Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress.
That would not be directing him to vacate the office, but yes he could probably do that. But he wouldn't elect Musk, he could nominate Musk. He'd still need Congress (beholden to Musk for their future seats if GOP) to confirm him. But you also have to be qualified to be President to be Vice President, so Musk would be disqualified anyways.
Who is going to disqualify him? Republicans would just invent some doublethink for why it is okay for this particular African to have that role. The extremely partisan SCOTUS will allow it, and that will be that.
If SCOTUS says it's ok, then the US Constitution is completely tossed out and SCOTUS has no authority to say anything. That's not to say they wouldn't make a decision like that, but to disregard the literal text of the Constitution would make both Congress and SCOTUS unnecessary, they can be scrapped in seconds with an EO after a decision like that.
They'd pull the same stunt that they did for Trump. If Trump had been convicted for the Jan 6th riot, that would've disqualified him from becoming president. So SCOTUS dragged out the appeal that reached them. Then their decision made it ridiculously burdensome to continue. If Musk were nominated as vice president and somebody sued, SCOTUS could drag out that case past the end of the term. Then they'd drop it as moot.
We've already had that decision, last year. Trump v. Anderson. Per the Supreme Court, if Congress doesn't explicitly call something out down to the last detail and already have anyone potentially impacted on double-secret probation, then oops, too bad, nothing anyone else can do to enforce the Constitution.
The Vice-President and President need to meet the standards in the Constitution? Did Congress pass a law establishing how those standards are to be judged and enforced? No? Guess they don't matter then. If Congress wanted, it could pass a law and Trump could sign it. Unless that happens, the Constitution is just unenforceable. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
In Russia they say, "we have lots of laws, just no one pays any attention to them". Russia is a law-less State. Concur with how things are progressing now in USA. Congress and Senate both subverted by too many voters being deceived by D. Elections not well-informed, so not actually functional.
Sure, and I'd default to assuming the % in the military is always higher because they're trained to follow orders.
But if anything makes some among them say "to allow this would be to violate my oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic", then disregarding the constitution would be it.
I'm not saying the administration wouldn't try it. I am suggesting that it may lead to a demonstration of how NIJ RF3 doesn't stop 120×570mm NATO.
And just generally, every time someone told me Trump wasn’t going to last the first term or run again I tried to bet them. A few took me up.
It’s a strange fantasy that guy you don’t like will just go away. How many presidents or VPs don’t last a full term? Anyone who thinks that has let their emotions divorce their logic from reality, and is thus a good person to wager against
I suspect Trump lasting the entire term is less likely.
If something happens to Trump after January 20th, 2027, Vance can serve out the remainder of this term, then run as the incumbent for two additional terms as a frontman for the Musk/Thiel axis, a role he has played well for some time.
If the country's rulers want to bother to keep the pretense of Constitutional government, that is.
It does not seem like Trump actually wants a deal. They are not offering anything. It appears to be simply a pretext to have some reason to berate Ukraine and Zelenskyy.
"Oh you won't take our [completely ridiculous] deal? I guess we'll just have to side with Russia then!" Like that's not what they were going to do anyway.
>a minerals deal with the US ensures that the US will have a stake in defending the postwar ukraine.
It will not. Trump will simply use the deal as an excuse to betray Ukraine (more than he already has). I can practically hear it playing out now.
"I had to force Ukraine to completely surrender to Russia. It was the only way to make sure Russia honored the mineral rights granted to my billionaire friends."
This is what made Mike Pence the perfect VP for Trump at the time - he was never gonna steal the spotlight from Trump. However, Trump is focused almost entirely on loyalty now - the one thing that Mike Pence lacked in the end.
> It looks like the US wants a regime change in Ukraine, it's possible that this became a pre condition from russia for talks to go forward.
It's not just possible, it was stated openly multiple times by Russian diplomats. The official position is: anything signed by Zelensky has potential to be invalidated later, because according to constitution of Ukraine he is not a legitimate president anymore. So this legal loophole should be removed before signing any agreements.
The outcome was predetermined. Z was not fully sold on this, and Trump/Vance just wanted to maximize the optics, hence the fall out. Just a small ripple, the deep states will rebalance this out.
they say i have the best ratings, beautiful ratings, big, huge ratings, and they never talk about that even though our ratings are the best, can you imagine that, they would rather talk about BIDEN, even though biden was the stupidest president, and did nothing for our country, absolutely nothing, a disgrace, really
Reminds me of when Trump bragged about the TV ratings for the White House press briefings during Covid, saying the ratings were on par with "The Bachelor" and "Monday Night Football". Ugh.
The people got tricked into thinking that a transitioned male competing in a 3rd league of a sport nobody watches is a larger threat to them than giving more power to the rich.
No one thinks that's a "threat", they just rejected the party that's pushing the Big Lie that men can get pregnant. The people didn't get tricked into voting for a party that hates them.
Anybody can get a slice of USA’s GDP growth — just buy S&P500. Too many people instead prefer to spend that money on Uber Eats and new iPhone every year.
My senators are both strongly in support of this. Bill Hagerty's website's top news story is from yesterday, but it pretty much restates everything Trump said today. And I'm sure I don't need to explain Marsha Blackburn's opinion. Republicans gerrymandered the state, so the Representative in the House is about the same. Unless I suddenly win the lottery, I don't think they're interested in hearing my opinion.
They notice when lots of constituents call in all at once.
At least you have a congressperson on the wrong side of this who is worth pressuring. I am very tired of making calls that just say "I know you say you're on the right side of this, but will you please try to do anything?"
i've been thinking a lot about this lately. how do we move from asking rhetorical questions of elected leaders into actually compelling them to act on our behalf? there's little to no connection between public will and its representation.
"To the privileged, equality feels like oppression" [questionable attribution]
As a retired union [IBEW] American, I am happy to see more countries gain footing within our global economy. Respectable competition among a distribution of the powerful keeps any one entity from a monopoly of exploiting the entire world/workers.
Bit of a tangent, but I wondered if anyone here is particularly into the serious business of foreign affairs/international relations, and can recommend a primer -- or even a curriculum -- for someone wanting to become more knowledgeable about the field. As with anything, I suspect one is better able to appreciate the ramifications of events of this sort with a more nuanced and informed perspective.
I can recommend every Dwarkesh Patel pod and lecture with Sarah C. M. Paine. History is the best teacher, and that's her specialty. I learned a lot from each of the following:
I can second this recommendation. The first interview he did, he was a bit rusty as a interviewer but the 3 followups was great, he did his homework. All 4 are good tough, I'm not sure it is helpful for "international relations" of today as much as good to understand history from multiple perspective. I think they are a good foundation on "how to think/see perspective in things", but history always have hindsight so practicing that is a bit harder.
There's also Decoding Geopolitics Podcast (full content is paywalled) since he talks with actual experts. There's ofc US bias in experts, and usually actual experts can be kinda boring to listen to initially.
But experts in international politics seems to disagree on a lot of stuff, and when one big thing happens it seems like a new face always momentarily pop up (John Mearsheimer, Peter Zeihan etc, for Ukraine war). A good rule of thumb seems to be to not get too fixated by one voice.
Its refreshing to hear some experts being able to healthily disagree, such as Mearsheimer & Sach in this[1] for example. That should be the take away from Sarah Paine interview too, she's good at making clear what she can & can't say for sure. Contrast that with say Zeihan.
[1] https://youtu.be/uvFtyDy_Bt0?feature=shared
There seem to be at least two kinds of experts. First, there are those who have actually worked as foreign ministers, presidents, chiefs of armed forces, heads of intelligence services, and in other similar positions. Their expertise comes from direct participation in events and first-hand knowledge of how things work. Carl Bildt, Alex Younger, Ben Hodges, Radoslaw Sikorski are people like this.
Then there are the kinds of experts like Mearsheimer and Zeihan, who are little more than avid book readers. They are often wildly off track without understanding it, because they have no real experience to ground them.
The 2 posts you are replying to are about professor Sarah Paine (with one parenthetical reference to Mearsheimer and Zeihan).
Professor Paine has never "actually worked as foreign ministers, presidents, chiefs of armed forces, heads of intelligence services, and in other similar positions", but she has studied the Russian language and Russian culture, and has made a career at the Naval War College in studying and writing on Russia's security policy and situation.
"Having studied the Russian language and culture extensively" seems relatively modest compared to having negotiated the withdrawal of Russian forces from Europe (Bildt) or having led the MI6 (Younger). It's like taking programming advice from someone who has only read biographies of famous computer scientists and never actually worked on a software project with others.
I suspect there's value to both your perspective and GP's insofar as both can help understand international affairs in the present day. The "avid book readers" vary widely in quality but are more likely to write down what they've learned; as someone who doesn't know enough to discern the quality from the trash, I guess I'm asking whose writings are worth the effort.
As a complete layman, I highly recommend the YouTube channel of William Spaniel, along with his second channel Lines on Maps Extra. He explains current political events from his academic perspective. Regarding what happened now, the TL/DR conclusion is that Trump wants Europe to focus on its own defense, while US will brace for potential conflict with China. If you think that NATO might get caught up in a two-front war, this makes a lot of sense. The fact that Trump uses unorthodox methods to achieve this isn't exactly interesting on its own, which is why the heated discussion shouldn't really deserve as much attention as it does.
One more, somewhat important, detail that's also very telling about where the US administration is heading.
Reuters and Associated Press were barred from Oval Office during this meeting, but a Russian state news agency TASS reporter was allowed - into the Oval Office.
Presumably one of the issues being discussed here, such as mitigating the effects of Russia's wildly successful manipulation campaigns that have resulted in both US policy and cultural shifts in favor of Russian interests. To skip some steps in this comment chain, and at risk of being presumptuous, pick an option from this technically-exhaustive list:
Do you believe that:
1. Russia has not engaged in misinformation-based influence campaigns targeting US citizens
2. Russia has engaged in such campaigns but to no tangible effect, and they therefore require no response
3. Russia's influence campaigns saw success, but not to the detriment of the US, and they therefore require no response
4. Russia's success harms US interests, but it would be hypocritical to actively respond given the US' past actions
5. Russia's success is tethered to cultural shifts, which are impermanent and therefore don't necessitate an active response
6. Russia's success can only be effectively countered by the gov't, so civilian attempts at helping are futile
7. None of the items above relate to the topic of discussion in this thread, i.e. this comment effectively strawman-ing
8. The above points are non-exhaustive
I'm quite sure an intelligent person with an open mind can be convinced that each of the above points is false, save the last one.
Okay, a video attributing fault of the UA crisis to the West. Which of the options I listed are you attempting to back with this source, or put another way, which of my implied claims does this counter? Help me see the relevance.
If we rewind the comment chain back to the root, and just consider this video in the context of today's meeting - can you explain how the points made by the video or the general attribution of fault for the crisis lends support to the strategy and conduct displayed earlier today?
If you want to talk about whether or not the US is at fault for the war, you're in the wrong thread.
I 100% agree. I am also deeply dissatisfied with the state of diplomacy. I also think these negotiations should be handled by a strong and independent Europe.
Regardless of who is pulling the strings, they should be negotiating and ending conflict, like in the Minsk agreements, which were torn down by the west. In fact, Angela Merkel herself stated in 2022 that the 2014 peace agreements were an attempt to give Ukraine time to militarize and eventually join NATO.
To follow your line of questioning, which I do appreciate, It would be that Russia has engaged in influence campaigns in the West, of course, but that we do that the West does this as a matter of course worldwide and our schemes are much more elaborate, anyway.
I also agree about in 5, Russia is convieniently riding a wave of populist conservatism which Putin (cynically, corruption-based, or otherwise) aligned with the Orthodox alignment in Russia. (Men/Women are different, global woke policy, SDG development goals etc) Many working class people are sick to death of effete urbane progressive politics (doesn't even really benefit any core economics) I would say this is a bigger propaganda play from Russia = Give sympathetic activists ammunition for cultural victories (that were fragile and brainless Western ideas anyway.)
The problem with this granular obsession of a deep Russia conspiracy inside the US is that you aren't even really aware about what the propaganda they are saying on their side and not really cogniscent that Western foreign policies engage in pretty ugly propaganda, unlawful killings as a matter business.
Russia propaganda is simply more advanced version of the type of propaganda we were doing anyway. It's just that you don't see your own side as capable of misinformation, influence peddling worldwide and they are guilty of it.
EUROMAIDAN was a Western intelligence op — and you worry about what; a few scary Facebook ads? Is there a particular piece of misinfo on RT you are concerned about?
Look into contemporary funding and actions by USAID, National Endowment for Democracy, many NGOs and media organisations. It's pretty blatant and now starting to be documented by our own media:
You want some kind of press release where the US state department announced it as a “coup”?
Are you even slightly familiar with US foreign policy in the world? Do you know about what happened in Kosovo/Yugoslavia? Or the Middle East, South America history? Do you know the typical function of US foreign policy arm is to orchestrate regime change?
You really are a special kind of midwit if you can’t see that by now.
From a quick (and shallow) skim of the thread, I gather that you're representing a minority viewpoint—inevitably so, because this forum is majority Western and naturally reflects the Western point of view. When commenters find themselves in a minority/contrarian position on the internet, they often resort to name-calling and other barbs. It's understandable as a response to pressure, but it's not ok to do that here. We can't apply the rules differently depending on such factors.
At the same time, it's in HN's interest to have contrarian views represented, as long as people do it while respecting the site guidelines. So when I run across an example like this, I often try to make this argument in the hope of persuading the person in your position! It doesn't usually work, but one can hope.
It's also in your own interests to follow the rules, because when you break them, you discredit whatever truth you may be arguing for. That doesn't help you or anyone else, and majorities are always looking for an easy excuse to dismiss minorities. (I'm not talking about the current topic here; I believe all majorities do this.)
I think there's a large portion (let's call it 22.47%... aka the percentage that voted for Kamala) know exactly what's going on, care a ton, and lost the election.
And then there's a large percentage for whom this whole thing just feels futile. It's not that they don't care, but they dislike Trump and feel like Democrats are unable/unwilling to rise to the occasion. (After all, 4 years later, Democrats just fired up the republican base and did nothing to protect Americans)
> (let's call it 22.47%... aka the percentage that voted for Kamala) know exactly what's going on
I thought like this but I've come to realize that a lot of Harris voters were suffering from illusions about the likely efficacy of the government she would form. Regardless of her own competence, the democratic party has serious issues, and not many Harris supporters were being honest (if they were aware) about this until well after they lost the election.
I think it's dangerous to think her voters know what's really going on. The issues are genuinely country-wide and not specific only to republicans.
More level-headed republicans are right about a lot of problems in the USA. They want government efficiency for good reasons. Is DOGE the right solution? Absolutely not, it's insane. But these people are happy to see certain initiatives because they're overdue, and they're not wrong about that. Free speech for example; that has become a bit more dodgy over the years. The western world is beginning to press on freedom of speech in subtle ways (especially in the UK), and a lot of republicans care (they should!) but virtually no democrats I know care.
I know the current administration (or X.com) is implementing the worst versions of these things, I don't support it at all, but my point is: there is good sense on both sides, yet also total nonsense on both sides.
I've read that too. Do we seriously believe that a random person can get into the Oval Office, for one of the most important high level meeting of the past years ?
I know they said that, but, really? Since when does an unauthorized person get access to the Oval Office? That would be a huge fail by the Secret Service.
Yeah, it's definitely a head-scratcher. I wonder how often unapproved people make it in. Seems like a major security risk to have someone unapproved in the room with that many high-level government leaders from multiple countries.
I'm wondering if they were given a pass by another approved news agency or something along those lines.
It's getting to be about time for pitchforks and torches in front of the offices and homes of your elected Senate and House representatives demanding they exercise their constitutional duty of checks and balances against the executive.
At the very least send letters, make phone calls. Let them know if they don't stand up to a dictator they've lost your vote.
Comment on all of the elected Democrats' posts "oh no repulicans just did this!" and let them know that whining isn't leading and they need to shut up and do something.
I'm encouraging every Democrat to register as a Republican, vote for the most centrist candidates in the next primary, and if they win, vote for any Republican that has an independent thought over a Democrat who knows nothing but how to sit around uselessly and complain.
And when the revolution comes, the first people who should get the most blame are those who chose not to use the power they had to do anything about it.
People abroad don't realize, the average American person is completely powerless.
Yes, we may lament the troubles that the current administration is causing for our allies, (or, I guess, former allies) abroad, but there's next to nothing we can do about it.
Again, buyer's remorse is all we can muster right now and it doesn't do anyone any good. At this point, we have no choice but to search for what positives we can work with that come out of the current administration, and just live with the consequences of the rest.
Young people often feel powerless today indeed, not only in the US but in most parts of the West.
One of the reason is that they never had to go through really tough times - as a country. We're living in times of prosperity and stability pretty much all of our lives. And we take it for granted. It's not !
But the thing is, that people do have power. Start calling your representatives, take it to the streets. All of you. If the 50% of voters that voted for Harris show up on the streets protesting, things will change. Take real action.
If the 50% of people voting for Harris show up, that would be maybe 30% of the US. Probably, not, but I feel like being generous. And that's assuming they all show up. Which we both know they won't.
I think people severely underestimate the level of apathy out in society right now. Until things affect them, they likely aren't gonna be terribly interested.
What about all that talk about the second amendment and it being an essential right to fight an oppressive government? Aren’t the “good guys with guns” supposed to be keeping the government in check?
The second amendment was put in place very explicitly as the final check against a despotic overthrow of the Constitution. Realize we're at the very brink and prepare yourself for a revolution. And stop fooling yourself into thinking things can't be that bad.
I said final resort. We’re not there but we’re closer than we’ve ever been in hundreds of years of republic. A responsible citizen has to start thinking. It’s not a last resort that should be taken lightly.
The thing about the second amendment is that if only the side in power believes in it and is willing to uphold it, then you don't really have a right to bear arms, you have a right to oppress the citizenry with violence.
There won't be a revolution, who do you think the gun owners all voted for? As long as Trump doesn't touch their guns, they aren't going to do a damned thing.
I think you're missing the point of what was meant by "prepare for revolution", and confusing the folks who are vocal with their political views and those who aren't.
Yes, options are to have some number(potentially insignificant compared to deaths caused by obesity or overdoses for example) mass shootings or kiss the feet of the dictator.
Maybe you didn't read the part where I said we don't care?
We, as a people, don't care. We don't even care about the problems we have. It's not gonna be easy to make us care about the problem some other people have.
I find this sort of suggestion to be 100% reminiscent from Ship of Fools, or to be slightly more charitable and work-safe, the protestors in the lemonade episode of Boondocks. The captain is nuts, Jasmine is almost a slave, and you're going to protest?
There are plenty of us who are awake. But lots of the voting public wanted this man in office. And they are getting what they wanted, apparently, b/c he was clear about who he is and what he was going to do.
We'll have at least two years of this. One can hope 2026 will see a massive tide turn in congress and the Senate and maybe Trump will be impeached. But, it doesn't seem likely, and even if it happened, they can't impeach his entire administration so not sure how much can really change until 2028.
> b/c he was clear about who he is and what he was going to do.
This was a much needed change; because it was insane having a dementia patient as a president. I dont mean that hyperbolically; the democratic party was ready to have him serve another 4 years when he couldnt hold his train of thought on the debate stage. The democratic party needs to explain why his mental condition was swept under the rug at the expense of the American people.
You posted this 24 times. That's abusive. Please stop now.
Also, we ban accounts that cross into name-calling and personal attack, so please stop that too, regardless of how wrong others are or you feel they are.
Out of curiosity, why is posting the same link repeatedly abusive? This is a long discussion, and I can see some particular information being relevant in many different conversations that are taking place here. In a discussion with only a few comments it would be easy to scan the entire list of comments for interesting information. But I feel like in such a large discussion where everything is drowned out, sharing the same link repeatedly in different places (if relevant to each of those sub discussions) isn’t so bad?
In addition to what pvg (correctly) said, there's a big difference between carrying on a nuanced conversation, where you're connecting specifically to what other commenters are saying, vs. spraying the same material rapidly through a thread.
Because repetition is boring and the goal is interesting conversation rather than ensuring you don’t miss an interesting link. The interesting links are supposed to be a side effect of you engaging in or simply reading an interesting conversation. Summary comments, LLM output and prepared linkathons are discouraged for similar reasons, if the parallel helps at all.
Do you have any examples of “Summary comments, LLM output and prepared linkathons”? I’m not sure what a prepared linkathon is at all, and I wonder if the other two are as bad as you suggest, and maybe seeing it would help.
by "prepared linkathon" I mean specifically what that commenter was doing - you have a pre-made reply of N (for N >= 1) links that you keep spraying everywhere.
But I'm not sure what you mean by "as bad as you suggest". I wasn't suggesting a level of badness, more describing HN's messageboard goals, however aspirational.
Edit: and since we're exchanging questions, I'm curious what sorts of human interactions do you have in mind in which repeating the same thing 20-odd times is not considered, if not outright abusive, at least impolite and non-constructive. I can think of a couple - say, sports events or protests. But none of these map to 'nerd messageboard' in any meaningful way I can see.
Frankly what's worse is seeing such a magnitude of evidence to the contrary of popular discourse, yet being entirely unable to help bring context into the fray.
Instead, we get regurgitation of tired propaganda and heavily misleading narratives. If the world looks exceptionally confusing and chaotic, or if the world is fully of irrational boogeymen, that's just because you don't have the right perspective yet.
The geopolitics community knows the situation well, and doesn't look at Trump as a big scary orange man. They look at Trump as another American elite, who's been elected during a chaotic time in American society. You can also look up Jeffery Sachs (social democrat) who speaks at length about these issues.
I've mostly lost faith in the conversations on here. HN mostly is a competition about who can sound the most fancy. The actual content of the discussion has become tertiary. At this point, my only goal is to reach out to those who are open minded and haven't heard these other perspectives. To hell with internet points.
Well, that's an argument and you certainly can and should make it in response to whoever you are hoping to convince somewhere in the thread. Pasting the same URL at people is not 'discourse' or conversation, it's sloganeering. You can't do that while also decrying "regurgitation".
"All those decades of the arms race, and it turned out there was no greater damage you could inflict on a state than ensure it was led by an idiot." –Mick Herron, Bad Actors (from the Slough House/Slow Horses series)
Sorry about the podcast link, the gist is that Ukraine now can build drones from cardboard, controlled from Kiev, London etc. that can destroy Russian tanks.
More of the Ukraine conversation needs to be focused on this topic. The future of warfare is digital, automated, and utterly terrifying, and it's currently being shaped on the Ukrainian frontlines. Western militaries are going to be able to leapfrog their force structure based on the learnings in this war.
Ukraine is paying with their citizens lives for NATO to receive this education, while simultaneously weakening one of the western world's most dangerous geopolitical rivals. The fact that Americans can't see through the Fox News propaganda to understand this is unbelievable, embarrassing, and will set them back on the world stage for a generation or more.
Let’s be honest though: there has been an immense amount of propaganda on both sides. How many times has Ukraine reportedly embarrassed Russia, knocked them back on their heels, been within weeks of winning? All with young beautiful people on the front lines singing patriotic songs?
Russia is certainly the aggressor, let’s make no mistake. But I honestly can’t make heads or tails of what is actually happening in Ukraine because of all the universal propaganda
>The fact that Americans can't see through the Fox News propaganda to understand this is unbelievable, embarrassing, and will set them back on the world stage for a generation or more.
Just a friendly reminder to not paint "Americans" with a broad brush. We may not have got our way this past election, but there are plenty of us who see through the fucking bullshit.
All the opposition had to say was "I'll end wokeism and immigration and will also [popular policy Trump is against]" and they could have easily won themselves
The Democrats not being capable of winning and not taking the Trump threat seriously is another story. They are the third culprit after the naive voters and the scrupleless Republicans.
Yes but Russians are attacking which makes them more vulnerable, i.e. their armored vehicles. Also, sanctions prevent Russians from using high tech components. Drones are a panacea but a great tool in defence.
And what will happen? Will the GOP do anything? Will the rest of NATO deal a devastating enough blow to Russia that it is forced to retreat? Will Russia not retaliate with a limited nuclear escalation?
Don’t forget that the whole “Iron Dome” thing Trump has been talking about, if viable, would necessarily prompt immediate attacks before it becomes operational.
Don't forget that Ukraine has a pretty good donation website setup if that happens to be a cause you are willing and have the financial resources to give to.
As a Ukrainian, I'd like to caution that perhaps there are two funds you may want to consider over UA24 - one of which has full transparency and spotless track record (there have been concerns over UA24) where-as another used to be a political activist for a long time turned media personality turned biggest fund who directly sources thousands of FPV drones (more than 150k at this moment) and has the best proven quality of the "produce":
I donate monthly to the latter (alongside donations towards my ex-colleagues and acquaintances serving at the front lines and supply, but those are usually private), but I think western audience may be more comfortable with the former. Either way we appreciate your support in this tragedy of a war. Thank you.
https://u24.gov.ua/
You can choose the allocation of your donation, defence, or if you'd rather donate to other causes, humanitarian aid, demining, rebuilding (...)
A few months ago in my city, an ambulance shelled by Russians in kharkiv was shown. It was quite destroyed, and chock full of holes. It was quite moving
I guess he's saying that hn is "non tilted/neutral" toward any political stance, and as such pinning a comment to a Ukrainian donation gov website could be seen as "supporting" someone
It's an age old debate for sure but "bullshit for cowards" isn't reasoning about it, it's propaganda wording just as easily employed by the aggressor trying to silence people who don't support the war. Since there's no need to mask the real reasoning here, why employ those kinds of attacks?
I could have written it nicer but I was annoyed. Thanks for calling me out.
But I stand by the point. What is not clear? If A attacks B, and B would be happy to revert to back to state before the attack, then C saying it's not it's problem, it's neutral or that it only supports "peace" (letting A win by making B surrender) is not C being neutral. It's direct support of the attacker.
I think what's least clear about your framing is how and why e.g. someone wanting to remain neutral/peaceful can ONLY imply their opinion is "B should surrender so A can win" or similar type statements. Thoughts like "if you don't support B then you must hope A wins" or "If you want peace it means giving A what it wants" are not full arguments in themselves, they are just the claims repeated.
For example, there are certainly those who want Ukraine to just surrender some of its land for peace (the POTUS seeming to be one). That by itself does not explain they MUST be supporting Russia, it just opens the door for such a possibility. Some along these lines of wanting peace/surrender don't support Russia but don't think there'd be anything of Ukraine left at all if the war were to escalate further. Others of completely different opinion believe de-escalation over time towards peace talks will lead to better and better "A and B returning things to the way they were" type results given enough time - but only if the pressure/interest/escalation/pile-on is lowered instead of raised. Yet others have different takes on why/how to be neutral/peaceful and what they think it will end with. And, of course, some genuinely don't support Ukraine because they view the situation as a risk themselves - we just can't jump to that being the only possibility without more reasoning for the rest first.
Now I'm not here to try and argue you should agree with these arguments or that if you respond to just the above points you've now countered the full spectrum of opposing opinion by any stretch of the measure. The only reason I bring these examples up is to show how repeating the conclusion "being neutral is only supporting the attacker" isn't as much providing a point as conveying your current stance. To argue points around it is to try to give credence to why that is the only (or most) correct conclusion and approach and where the other opposing ideas all fell short.
When the depth of consideration of counter-arguments instead comes across as "the other side are just bullshit cowards" or "it's just clear" the best you can hope for is a lot of "ooh-rah" for people who already agreed and a coinciding complete write off from those who disagreed.
As an addendum: Folks (not necessarily you, people like to AI summarize comment history) sometimes take what I say to mean I personally don't support Ukraine or that I explicitly support Trump's actions around this or whatever else they come up with. I personally support Ukraine to fully return to its pre-war borders, disavow most of the government of Russia's actions, and am severely disappointed with Trump's treatment of Zelensky (bringing things back to the original thread). I just have relatively strong opinions about how tone of conversation can be overall damaging for a ideology regardless of the intent or literal stance.
I don't think I did any personal attacks. I simply pointed out that, if they think Neutrality is for cowards, they should probably join in the fight that they believe in instead of not acting, aka neutral.
That "if you feel so strongly why don't you go fight" trope is a cliché of personal attack, since it insinuates hypocrisy and cowardice. If you say you didn't mean it that way, I believe you, but it would still land that way with many readers, so it's necessary to disambiguate these things more clearly.
Most come to news.ycombinator.com expecting see ycombinator activities and content from fellow users, not to find out what Dang's latest endorsement is. When we all feel a certain importance to something content about it appears and bubbles to the top automatically.
It's commendable and brave to publicly stand up and show that you have values. I wish more people understood that by watching Zelensky over the past three years.
If you want the actual number, about 13 bucks per month per taxpayer[1]. So about what, three to four coffees a month to protect 40 million free people from defending themselves from autocracy?
You took the $165 / 12 and arrived at 13 bucks per month per taxpayer.
But if you had read the rest of the transcript, you’d arrive at this beautiful part:
“The numbers we came up with, the $165 per person and the $11.25 per person, aren't really real because they are based on this idea that everything we sent to Ukraine and everything we sent to Israel came from tax revenue, and that's just not the case.
MCMANUS: The revenue that goes in is not necessarily connected to how the government is actually budgeting. What we're paying in taxes just does not have to match what we spend. So the whole exercise is sort of irrelevant.
GONZALEZ: It's irrelevant because of one big elephant in the room, which is deficit spending. We spend more than we bring in as a country.”
And from who is the US borrowing most of their money from? It currently owes China roughly 850 billion USD, and it has to pay interest on this.
And how does it pay this interest?
Either it borrows more, growing the problem, or it is a portion of your taxes going straight to China <3.
>And from who is the US borrowing most of their money from?
The American people, largely. China owns roughly 3% of America's debt. The overwhelming majority of American debt is hold domestically (and thus eventually returns to US citizens) But if the 13 bucks weren't precise enough for you, the 4% interest America pays on 10 year bonds I suppose bring the monstrous bill up another 50 cents per decade, truly a game changer when it comes to defending the free world.
Are there actual, living people thinking that donating to Ukraine will influence anything? These donations might as well be a margin of error compared to government funding, aid packages and what not.
The Ukraine is simply too small of a country to actually win a war against Russia, all that these aid packages are doing is prolonging the war that Ukraine cannot win.
It's like saying "if only Germany had <insert Wunderwaffe> it would've won WWII". At some point they were going to run out of men anyway (they did). Sort of like how Ukraine will eventually run out of men if they continue.
Ukraine just recently got at parity in artillery with russia, which is why they are pushing this ceasefire and this is why Zelenskyy is walking away from it just like that.
There is a pretty good chance this set off the countdown to a war in Asia. Japan, SK, Taiwan, Philippines..... now KNOW that they cant rely on the US as an ally which means their only chance against Chinese hegemony is a nuclear weapon. Given that that will take some years while a weak US president is at the helm this is the window for China to invade Taiwan.
This is a time to boycott all of the president's Elon enterprises. I just cancelled my Tesla solar installation in California. If you are thinking about buying a Tesla - don't. Also do not vandalize other peoples' Tesla.
If you are thinking about working in AI for x.ai or Tesla - do not. This will not look pretty on your resume.
I took a look at the mutual funds in my IRA last night. Most of the market index ones hold a lot of TSLA - it seemed to be in the top 5 holdings of several of the ones I have (had). I put in sell orders last night. Not just because TSLA, but because of all the chaos this administration is causing re tariffs and everything else. I'll hide out in treasury money market fund for a while.
Usually we keep the mainstream news out of here but felt I had to post this one because I've never seen anything like it and was curious to hear other people's perspective here.
To me it feels like a setup to look good in front of their audience without any proper desire to engage in true diplomacy.
Some of the stuff I've had to deal with building business to $100MM++++++ revenue give me stress and anxiety. I've been through so much shit at this point I think it's hard to stress me out. Watching that interaction between the 3 of them invoked a feeling I've not felt in a very long time, it was incredibly stressful. That was neither politics nor business, personally I'd have accepted either, but that was not those.
How many millions of workers endure endless shit and disrespect from their boss, but they get the job done anyway for the benefit of their families?
How many business leaders, like you, let slide so much shit and instead focused on what was important for their business?
Even if Trump and Vance were disrespected, suck it up like the rest of us and do the thing that benefits the entire country. They met to make a deal to benefit the country; Trump failed to make the deal.
That assumes that any amount of capitulation would have persuaded Trump to support Ukraine, and that any reasonable deal could have been reached. I obviously can't say what could have been, but every sign Trump (and those in his administration!) has given up to this point indicate that there's only one outcome they support, and that's Ukraine surrendering all or some of its land to Russia, along with a deal barring Ukraine from NATO.
I'm very curious to see how this comment ends up ageing. saved for follow up ;)
My prediction is ukraines got three options;
-Show europe that the US is an unreliable trading partner, and get them to commit atleast $500B, with SF troops coming to ukraine to train their troops.
- Make a deal with trump.
- lose their country.
Yes, and that's also the only outcome Russia would accept, unless Putin is replaced by a US puppet, which seems unlikely; such a puppet would be deeply unpopular in Russia and have great difficulty remaining in power.
The people in Crimea, Donetsk, and Luhansk would also reject any deal that doesn't involve Ukraine surrendering some of its land, either to Russia or to some sort of Republic of Texas limbo-state. So, even if Russia were taken over by a CIA asset, fighting there would continue unless extremely repressive measures were taken.
So that sort of deal is the only way to end the fighting with anything resembling humanity, even though Trump supports it. Stopped clocks, etc.
I can understand, but honestly it was a mistake. I just scrolled down to get here, and there are no curious perspectives being shared or interesting questions being asked, just the entirely understandable and expected mass anger and frustration.
In an ideal world we could have a threat or two like this that would serve as outlets, but what I've actually seen is that having these discussions leads to them bleeding out into other threads that should have been unrelated. HN is going to need to more aggressively enforce its rules about political news if it's going to stay a haven for curiosity and not descend into just another place for angry politics.
Whether we like it or not, politics pervades everything. Attempting to keep certain forums sanitized and "apolitical" while a regime shift is occurring and people's civil liberties face very real threats is to live in an amoral and ahistorical fashion.
I have found myself lately to feel indifferent to many threads on HN that would otherwise have exicted me because of the insane world politics events which were occuring simulatenously but without mention. There is an intelligent crowd here, and important topics ought to be discussed, not just the latest hacker news.
I think a lot of people in tech unintentionally blind themselves to reality by obsessing over technology, and then thinking that is all that matters. It’s a behavior that is incentivized because it helps those with power utilize the tech-blind’s skills for their bidding.
spot on. I am continually shocked by the number of people I work with who will actively contribute to ends that are ultimately against their own best interests just because they are intrigued by the technical aspects of a problem
I disagree. There are lots of interesting things happening in the world, and the HN crowd does a good job talking about them. Those topics—the ones where HN has high quality conversation—are why I come to HN.
Since the inauguration the HN crowd has not done a good job talking about politics. Where we used to be able to have some of the best discussions and comments on political issues I've seen on the internet, the last month or two has consisted primarily of hot takes and aggression, and I can get my dose of that anywhere else, I don't need it here.
The crowd isn't some invariant. The people here and quality of their responses is a function of the kind of topics that get discussed here, the repetition these topics receive, and the grace others have in receiving those comments. You can't just neatly swap in the HN community and say "okay you used to discuss Elixr tooling now it's time to discuss US politics."
What happens instead is, people start getting heated at each other and vitriol across the site increases. Folks who don't find that grace anymore exit the site and folks who are heated stay. This attracts other people who want to be heated. This creates a downward spiral across the community. This isn't HN specific, it's the same thing that happened to pretty much every other public internet community once they started featuring lots of discussion on polarizing politics.
The entire reason HN used to be high quality open internet forum is because politics wasn't a huge part of its contents. But the site has been under quality pressure for some time now and ever since the start of Trump 2024 it's started going downhill faster than it was before. That's fine of course, if folks just want to battle out politics and shout at each other or cry out in anger they can go ahead. But it won't be the "intelligent crowd here" doing it. Those folks will go elsewhere.
As an example, this thread is ridiculously large (2818 comments as of this writing.) There is no way for a reader to get much out of this without copious amounts of minimizing threads, scrolling randomly, or page-searching for terms. The only sense I can make of it is throwing the thread into Gemini and asking it to summarize it for me. The summary tells me nothing that my own thoughts and some social media comments I've read don't already tell me. So what has the "intelligent crowd here" really given us? I'm waiting for op-eds from the MSM and blog authors I follow to give me literally anything more rigorous than the slop in this thread.
> There is no way for a reader to get much out of this without copious amounts of minimizing threads, scrolling randomly, or page-searching for terms...
Or you could, you know, jump from parent to parent and actually read the threads that interest you. I wholly disagree with your broad assessment. I have seen plenty of substantive, interesting comments in threads like this. Of course there will be duds, but that's equally true in threads about the latest front end web framework.
Intelligence and outrage are not mutually exclusive. Again, the world is not an apolitical place. If you do not represent and speak up for your own values, someone else will decide your fate for you. This forum, like all others is a chance to signal boost and stand for the values you care about.
The moderators have also done a good job of keeping the volume of these threads reasonable. Sure, on the new page they are rampant, for good reason, but only one or two max make it to the top thirty on a given day.
Agree to disagree. Speaking up for your own values has nothing to do with winning elections. For that, voters in R districts need to call their reps and tell them their mind. Internet comments don't win win votes.
One problem, which I fear you might be falling into, is that people who find themselves in a minority position tend to get frustrated and then lash out at others in ways that break the rules (https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html).
Then they get downvoted and flagged, quite correctly (because, by hypothesis, they're breaking the rules), and often get sucked into a positive feedback loop*, in which they get even more frustrated and start breaking the rules even worse. Eventually they decide that the entire community is against them and that they can never get a fair hearing.
The conundrum is this: on the one hand, we want commenters with minority views on HN (because it's better for the mandate of the site) and we try (in our limited way) to protect them from abuse by majorities. On the other hand, we can't make it ok for them to break the rules just because they're in a minority. If they keep it up, we have to ban them the same way we would ban others who do that—it's not as if the rules can change depending on demographics, opinions, and so on.
The only approach I know of that has a chance of working is (1) to describe this dynamic to the commenter in your position, (2) acknowledge that there's a greater burden on people who are arguing for minority views, (3) acknowledge that this is unfair but also inevitable, and then (4) try to persuade them (i.e. you in this case) that it's in your interest to scrupulously follow the rules, even when other commenters aren't doing that.
There are at least two reasons why this is in your interest, even though it's hard to do under pressure, and unfair that minority commenters are under extra pressure to begin with.
The first reason is that it will make your comments more persuasive to open-minded readers. There may not be many open-minded commenters on hot/divisive topics, but commenters are a small minority of readers. The more you fall into the trap of venting at other people's wrongness, the more you're going to lose the larger, silent audience who may be persuadable. Worse, in cases when your argument happens to be correct, you're going to end up discrediting the truth that you're arguing for—which is bad for everyone.
The second reason is that if you scrupulously follow the rules, such as by editing out all snark, name-calling, flamebait, and so on from your comments, then if other commenters respond to you by breaking the rules, moderators are in a much different position: we can reply and ask them not to do that without getting a "but what about what they did?" finger-pointing response. Or if we do get such a response, there's a lot more we can say.
I highly respect your contributions to HN and your moderation work. Your post is thoughtful and well written.
It has been incredibly frustrating to witness multiple social networks fall victim to cult-like political ideologies over the years. Seeing that happen once again on HN is especially disheartening. Consider what has happened to Reddit over time—it used to be full of diverse perspectives, but now it has become a toxic, radical-left cult. The same dynamic appears to be unfolding here, and from what I can tell, it is worsening.
I realize I need to do better and avoid resorting to low-effort posts. I agree with what you've said, and I'm glad you're fighting the good fight.
It may be best for me to move on and find somewhere else to lurk—a place that has not yet fallen victim to this scourge.
How would you distinguish between what you csll TDS and sharing of opinions that are group of intelligent between collectively strongly agree on ...like the fact that Trump ran has run many scams throughout his life including Trump University.
Like how can some piece of negative information can be collectively held by a crowd without it being tds?
I assure you your allies see it. What’s funny is what did the US give up its leadership of the free world for exactly? The price of eggs? It took the British Empire fighting two world wars to lose its place! The US is collapsing and the experiment has clearly failed.
disagree. I’m here and not Reddit because I’m interested in the perspectives of people on this site and the information that is shared including on events as unprecedented and impactful as this one.
Can you point me to a comment on this thread that you found to be more substantive than what you'd find on a typical subreddit? I sure couldn't find one in the deluge of low quality hot takes, so if you have one I'd love to see it.
I don't disagree (in that I can't think of one either), but that makes this a terrible subject for an HN thread. We have other forums for collectively bemoaning the state of the world, we don't need that to spread to here. It's poisoning other threads in a really toxic way.
Curiosity and interesting questions won't have any future in the trump world. So yes, this is very relevant to the HN community. Doing nothing is also a choice which has consequences.
Everything is like that with this guy. He looks at the world through the prism of old-fashioned network TV ratings. You saw that during the infamous COVID press briefings (the bleach and light ones), holding the bible after the paramilitary cleared the streets in Washington, D.C., when he stood on the balcony after he had COVID, etc., etc.
It's the same thing here — he literally said as much today[1].
As a worldview, that is incomprehensible to me (and I suspect most people), but it really does help understand the choices Donald Trump makes. The spectacle — the attention paid — is what matters to him. How it looks on TV is what matters. How it actually is, is secondary at best, but often irrelevant.
He does a lot of things that "don't make sense" until you think of it that way. That the executive of a country as powerful as the USA perceives the world this way, and makes instinctual decisions on this basis without any credible effort to reason through the possible consequences, is of course very alarming.
As a US citizen, I'll admit that the "gravitas" of the USA as the "leader of the free world" was always carefully stage-managed. Still, it's depressing to watch momentous and crucial international wartime negotiations degraded to this reality-TV/pro-wrestling level, and so swiftly, for the whole world to watch.
> To me it feels like a setup to look good in front of their audience without any proper desire to engage in true diplomacy.
If that's what it was, I don't think it worked. I think rather that Trump and Vance manufactured a conflict to use as pretense to do what they wanted to do in the first place, which was to cut off Ukraine from U.S. aid. Whether it flies with the American public generally is largely irrelevant to Trump at this point, as he's not constitutionally eligible to run for another term. (He might simply refuse to leave in 2028, but he doesn't need an election to do that.)
That's an interesting perspective, do you have some links to better video? My wife saw it live, but I watched a 4min video from the BBC and it certainly seemed as though a lot of the aggression was on the US side.
There was broad bi-partisan support for the first Gulf War (response to Iraq invading Kuwait) and the war in Afghanistan (response to 9/11).
The broader dissent started to come after the invasion of Iraq (based on the notion of Iraqi WMDs) and the lack of progress in Afghanistan or finding Bin Laden.
Foreign policy under different Presidents is often contradictory and as in any political context, the President usually has some base of support from their own party no matter how far off script they go, simply out of unity or fear of the alternative party benefiting from a lack of unity.
So while a coherent policy of “The US should intervene in all conflicts or no conflicts” would be intellectually consistent, the circumstances surrounding the conflict and the political environment lead to inconsistencies.
Vance made it very clear to the rest of the GOP that Zelensky is an “enemy” now. He misleadingly accused Zelensky of “campaigning with the opposition” because he met with Harris before the election. (He met with Trump too)
That statement was a direct signal to the party to turn on Zelensky and to make him an object of partisan divide, and Lindsay Graham understood that crystal clearly and called for Zelensky to resign shortly after the meeting, not long after praising him.
After sleeping on it, it’s obvious now that this was all to redirect the blame for Trump’s failure to meet his promise to broker peace swiftly.
In the UN resolution, US did not even dare "condemning" Moscow's actions and supporting Ukraine's territorial integrity. They did not even have to do anything but use words, a mere symbolic gesture. It is shameful.
Ah yes because Europeans are known for “sucking up” to Americans. If the EU has such competent leadership, why can’t they handle this themselves? It’s not something that affects the average American
Of course we do. NATO spending commitments are all about buying lots of arms from America as the price of protection. The protection just left, we no longer need to pay our protection money.
The obvious sweetheart deals for US companies to operate tax free, no longer any need. The Visa and Mastercard tax, no longer any need. Following the US to all of its foreign adventures, no longer any need.
That is all going to affect the average American, but probably not as quickly as the self-harm tariffs.
