The official President Biden thread.

[Granny Danger]

1 hour ago, BTFD said:

TBF, it's pretty undeniable that our ancestors have a responsibility for the dumpster fire that is the United States of America.

We should send them an apology card.

I don’t think that we should accept any responsibility for US citizens that cannot distinguish between 1791 and 2023.

[Zetterlund]

 

[Trogdor]

Surely, the Republicans will dump Trump (mentally unstable and a despot) and the Democrats will dump Biden (too old to the point where he is now a puppet). They cannot be the best America has to offer. I honestly despair.

Admittedly, it gives me some solace knowing that America is fucked whereas we are only partially fucked!

[StellarHibee]

17 minutes ago, Trogdor said:

too old to the point where he is now a puppet

Isn't that the point?

[Guest]

During the 1980s, the Reagan regime sponsored, directed and covered up multiple atrocities, including genocide, in El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua. Elliot Abrams was probably the single most influential individual regarding those US actions. He was convicted of perjury for lying about his role in the Iran-Contras Affair but Bush Sr. then pardoned him. 

Here's a US TV clip from 1995 of a journalist suggesting to Abrams that he be tried for war crimes:

 

George Bush Jr and Trump both went on to appoint Abrams as today did Biden, the first Democratic Party president to do so. 

[Zetterlund]

7 minutes ago, FreedomFarter said:

During the 1980s, the Reagan regime sponsored, directed and covered up multiple atrocities, including genocide, in El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua. Elliot Abrams was probably the single most influential individual regarding those US actions. He was convicted of perjury for lying about his role in the Iran-Contras Affair but Bush Sr. then pardoned him. 

Here's a US TV clip from 1995 of a journalist suggesting to Abrams that he be tried for war crimes:

 

George Bush Jr and Trump both went on to appoint Abrams as today did Biden, the first Democratic Party president to do so. 

This psychopath is a good example of what people mean by 'permanent Washington' or the deep state.

Despite an atrocious record and clearly being a disgraceful human being, there's some unwritten rule that he keeps being selected.

[Granny Danger]

So Biden is going to supply Ukraine with cluster bombs.

I eagerly await condemnation from Sunak and/or Starmer.

[StellarHibee]

7 minutes ago, Granny Danger said:

So Biden is going to supply Ukraine with cluster bombs.

I eagerly await condemnation from Sunak and/or Starmer.

Unless he said "Palestine" by mistake in one of his many senile blunders, I'd fully expect a blanket of silence on the matter.

[Guest]

18 hours ago, Granny Danger said:

So Biden is going to supply Ukraine with cluster bombs.

I eagerly await condemnation from Sunak and/or Starmer.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66142554

[O'Kelly Isley III]

18 hours ago, Granny Danger said:

So Biden is going to supply Ukraine with cluster bombs.

I eagerly await condemnation from Sunak and/or Starmer.

What I can't get my around is the US Government's justification.  Is Biden suggesting that across NATO and beyond to countries like Australia and South Africa they can't cobble together sufficient 'conventional' ordnance to supply Ukraine, and the only answer is cluster bombs ?

I must be missing something.

[Zetterlund]

27 minutes ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

What I can't get my around is the US Government's justification.  Is Biden suggesting that across NATO and beyond to countries like Australia and South Africa they can't cobble together sufficient 'conventional' ordnance to supply Ukraine, and the only answer is cluster bombs ?

I must be missing something.

Yup. Cluster munitions, which are universally recognised to cause long-term civilian casualties, are ok by us if it's the good guys who are using them. Even if it's the good guys who will continue to suffer for decades afterwards apparently.

It's a sign that things aren't going to plan in Ukraine. Neither side can afford to lose this, which is s horrific situation to be in when nuclear superpowers are involved. 

Anyone calling for de-escalation is being smeared and ridiculed too. What a world.

[O'Kelly Isley III]

1 minute ago, Zetterlund said:

Yup. Cluster munitions, which are universally recognised to cause long-term civilian casualties, are ok by us if it's the good guys who are using them. Even if it's the good guys who will continue to suffer for decades afterwards apparently.

It's a sign that things aren't going to plan in Ukraine. Neither side can afford to lose this, which is s horrific situation to be in when nuclear superpowers are involved. 

Anyone calling for de-escalation is being smeared and ridiculed too. What a world.

Agreed, and away from the moral aspect it would appear an astonishing admission by the Americans of Ukrainian military weakness.  Or a risky attempt to ratchet pressure on the Russians.  Or simple desperation.  Or all three.

[welshbairn]

2 hours ago, O'Kelly Isley III said:

What I can't get my around is the US Government's justification.  Is Biden suggesting that across NATO and beyond to countries like Australia and South Africa they can't cobble together sufficient 'conventional' ordnance to supply Ukraine, and the only answer is cluster bombs ?

I must be missing something.

The West has probably emptied all their warehouses of excess missile and shell stocks without switching to wartime production like the Russians. There's plenty of evidence of Russia using cluster bombs on civilian areas, so I don't see any great moral problem with Ukraine using them on the battlefield. There's going to have to be a massive mine clearance effort going on for years after the war anyway.

From wiki:

Quote

During the invasion of Ukraine, the Russian army used at least 6 types of cluster munitions: missiles for multiple rocket launchers "Hurricane", "Smerch", "Tornado-S", missile systems "Tochka" and "Iskander-M", as well as RBC bombs -500 with PTAB-1M submunitions.^[6] Smerch missiles were used for 72 submunitions, as well as other charges for 50 submunitions. According to the Russian manufacturer, missiles used in residential areas can contain up to 1.45 kg of explosive and scatter into about 316 fragments.^[2][21] The most large-scale Russian attacks with weapons include:

• 

   

  Remains of clusters and other munitions collected by the State Emergency Service of Ukraine in the Kharkiv region, May 10, 2022
  Shelling of the Central City Hospital in Vuhledar on February 24, 2022 (Donetsk region). According to the UN Monitoring Mission in Ukraine, the Russian attack killed at least 4 civilians and injured 10, damaged ambulances and destroyed a hospital building.^[4] A Human Rights Watch investigation documented the use of cluster munitions as Iskander short-range ballistic missiles, as well as a ballistic missile of the Tochka system with a 9N123 cluster warhead for 50 submunitions.^[16][21][14] Human rights activists called the use of shells with a wide radius of destruction in densely populated areas "blatant disregard for the lives of civilians".^[22]
• The shelling of the preschool "Sonechko" in the city of Okhtyrka on February 25, 2022 (Sumy region). According to the UN Monitoring Mission and Amnesty International, a public human rights organization, an attack by six 220-mm Uragan rockets with cluster warheads on a building where civilians were hiding killed at least 2 adults and 1 child, 1 other child was injured.^[14][4][23]
• Shelling of residential areas in Kharkiv on February 25 and 28, 2022. The UN monitoring mission reported that at least 9 civilians were killed and 37 were injured during the first cluster munition rocket attack.^[4] Four days after the start of the Russian invasion, Amnesty International documented three more attacks with cluster munitions in the northern part of Kharkiv.^[9] At the same time, UN officials reported 9 dead and 37 injured civilians as a result of the attacks. In just 11 days of artillery shelling of Kharkiv by Russian troops, 450 civilians were killed or wounded, apartment buildings, schools and shops were destroyed.^[24] A later investigation by Human Rights Watch confirmed that the Russian side fired 9M55K Smerch cluster munitions into three districts of Kharkiv. The direction of some of the unguided rocket elements stuck into the ground indicated that they were launched from the Russian border.^[10][25] At least 11 missiles were tracked by CNN to the 79th Russian rocket artillery brigade based in the Belgorod region of Russia. She reported directly to the head of the Western Military District of the Russian armed forces, Colonel General Alexander Zhuravlev. Previously, he led the battles for Aleppo in Syria, where there were also reports of massive use of cluster munitions, although the Russian Ministry of Defense denied this.^[26] In April 17, in Kharkiv, at least 3 sappers were killed and 4 sappers were seriously injured from explosions of cluster munitions, who were decontaminating ammunition found in the city.^[27] On May 8, south of the city, in the Sinelnikovsky district of the Dnipropetrovsk region, a 12-year-old boy who stumbled upon it died from the explosion of a cluster submunition.^[28][29] In total, at least 9 people suffered from such ammunition in the Dnipropetrovsk region.^[6]
• Shelling of Mykolaiv on March 7, 11 and 13, 2022. Specialists from the Médecins Sans Frontières association found numerous small holes typical of cluster munition attacks on the territory of the oncological hospital of the city. A later Human Rights Watch investigation confirmed the use of cluster weapons in the shelling of residential buildings. Only during the attack on March 13, 9 civilians were killed in line at an ATM, numerous injuries were recorded among local residents, houses and civilian cars were destroyed. Remnants of Uragan and Smerch cluster munitions, unexploded 9N210 fragmentation submunitions were identified on the photo and video from the scene.^[11][10][12] May 7, the mayor of Mykolaiv, Alexander Senkevich, told reporters that during the shelling of the city, the Russian army fired at least 40 cluster munitions, mainly at residential buildings. As the authorities prepared for such an attack, most of the population was evacuated, but at least 60 were reported to have been seriously injured.^[30]
• Shelling of Mariupol in March–May 2022. Independent media and the Ukrainian side accused the Russian military of bombing civilian shelters with cluster munitions during shelling of the city and attacks on Azovstal. According to the mayor of Mariupol, at the end of April, during the two-month siege of the city by Russian troops, more than 20 thousand people died - twice as many than the 2 year occupation of the city during World War II.^[31][32] Oksana Pokalchuk, director of Amnesty International Ukraine, said they were able to prove the use of cluster munitions by Russia after interviewing a victim who provided them with a fragment of ammunition that was removed from his thigh.^[33]
• Shelling in Bucha and other cities of the Kyiv region. According to Oleg Tkalenko, deputy chief prosecutor of the Kyiv region, forensic experts found fragments of cluster munitions in bodies from mass graves in Bucha after the retreat of Russian troops. The exact number of civilians killed specifically due to the use of cluster munitions in the village was unknown, but at least 8 out of about 500. The Bellingcat war crimes team confirmed the use of RBK-500 cluster munitions with PTAB-submunitions in Bucha 1M and cluster missiles fired by the BM-30 Smerch. The mayor of the city, Anatoly Fedoruk, stated that "Bucha was turned into a Chechen safari, where land mines were used against civilians".^[11] Many civilians were killed by cluster munitions in Borodyanka.^[5] The damage from cluster munitions in the vicinity of Gostomel was so great that many animals died from them.^[5]

In addition, it was reported about the use of cluster munitions in the residential sector of the city of Pokrovsk (Donetsk region, March 4),^[34] Krasnogorovka (Donetsk region, March 27),^[35] Slavyansk (Donetsk region, April 22),^[36] and in the villages of Kiinka and Pavlovka (Chernihiv region, February 28).^[37]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use_of_cluster_bombs_in_the_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine

Edited July 8, 2023 by welshbairn

[Granny Danger]

4 hours ago, FreedomFarter said:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-66142554

It’s lukewarm but at least it’s marginally better than nothing.

[Zetterlund]

22 hours ago, welshbairn said:

The West has probably emptied all their warehouses of excess missile and shell stocks without switching to wartime production like the Russians. There's plenty of evidence of Russia using cluster bombs on civilian areas, so I don't see any great moral problem with Ukraine using them on the battlefield. There's going to have to be a massive mine clearance effort going on for years after the war anyway.

From wiki:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Use_of_cluster_bombs_in_the_Russian_invasion_of_Ukraine

It would be a minter for the collective West/Nato if this was the case, given that we're repeatedly reminded of how much of a shambles the Russian military is (and has shown itself to be). Soviet-era equipment, GDP of Spain etc.

We were also told months ago that the Russians were out of ammo and fighting with shovels.

The worrying thing is that the baseline for what is an acceptable level of involvement in this war keeps on rising, with almost nobody interested in trying to de-escalate. Not so long ago sending tanks and F16s meant WW3. Are tactical nukes next? Someone is going to do something incredibly stupid as the situation becomes more desperate.

[Granny Danger]

6 minutes ago, Zetterlund said:

It would be a minter for the collective West/Nato if this was the case, given that we're repeatedly reminded of how much of a shambles the Russian military is (and has shown itself to be). Soviet-era equipment, GDP of Spain etc.

We were also told months ago that the Russians were out of ammo and fighting with shovels.

The worrying thing is that the baseline for what is an acceptable level of involvement in this war keeps on rising, with almost nobody interested in trying to de-escalate. Not so long ago sending tanks and F16s meant WW3. Are tactical nukes next? Someone is going to do something incredibly stupid as the situation becomes more desperate.

What can be done to de-escalate?

[Zetterlund]

10 minutes ago, Granny Danger said:

What can be done to de-escalate?

That's not for me to say. But at least a willingness to start talking about it would be a start. It was there in the first months of the war but was shut down for whatever reason.

At the moment the strategy seems to be to keep killing as many people as possible and see what happens. The numbers are not in the good guys' favour in that game, and as evidenced by recent developments the anticipated Russian collapse isn't happening any time soon.

 

[StellarHibee]

30 minutes ago, Granny Danger said:

What can be done to de-escalate?

We could stop with the misleading propaganda for a start. Russia's involvement with Ukraine clearly goes far beyond "Russia bad". NATO's been poking at the wasp's nest and they've came out stinging. Until there's an honest discussion about what is going on and why it's going on, they'll never be an honest resolution to the problem.

Edited July 9, 2023 by StellarHibee

[Granny Danger]

1 hour ago, StellarHibee said:

We could stop with the misleading propaganda for a start. Russia's involvement with Ukraine clearly goes far beyond "Russia bad". NATO's been poking at the wasp's nest and they've came out stinging. Until there's an honest discussion about what is going on and why it's going on, they'll never be an honest resolution to the problem.

When one country attacks another sovereign country it’s not unreasonable to label the aggressor as ‘bad’.

There’s certainly wider politics at play but appeasing Russia ain’t the answer and I’m struggling to see any de-escalation that precludes that at the moment.

[StellarHibee]

2 minutes ago, Granny Danger said:

When one country attacks another sovereign country it’s not unreasonable to label the aggressor as ‘bad’.

There’s certainly wider politics at play but appeasing Russia ain’t the answer and I’m struggling to see any de-escalation that precludes that at the moment.

It's very easy to label them as 'bad', especially when there's a heavy political motive to do so. Just as it's easy to turn a blind eye when there's a heavy political motive to do so (see Israel).

However, labelling them as 'bad', isn't going to positively contribute to any de-escalation measures. There are clearly reasons behind Russia's aggressive approach towards Ukraine. But our political elite and the puppet media don't want us to think about that. They just want us to think "Russia bad" and nothing else.

In order for de-escalation to occur, there must be political will on both sides of the divide. So far, there doesn't appear to be any political will from either side to find a resolution beyond all out nuclear destruction.

In the end, there won't be any goodies and baddies.  Just countless avoidable casualties in a war that each side became too politically selfish to avoid.