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Russian invasion of Ukraine


Sonam

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1 minute ago, Highlandmagyar Tier 3 said:

He has just broken international law by recognition of these breakaway regions. He won't think twice about trundling into Ukraine.

Yes yes because he's just like Hitler based on all those analogous tactics that you've provided, erm, zero evidence of. 

Recognising two more diddy post-Soviet clients is exactly the same challenge as overseeing the occupation of an enormous sovereign state. The hamster is truly doing overtime tonight. 

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1 minute ago, LongTimeLurker said:

He aleady did that previously with Crimea and Sevastopol. What they have in common with the DNR and LNR controlled areas is that they are majority ethnic Russian and pro-Putin. Trying to control Lviv would be a very different kettle of fish.

Ah! The same pre context of the German annexation of the Sudentenland.

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The mass they have on the borders will just roll in as a ' peace keeping' force, just the prelude to a full Ukraine invasion.
Why would they need to given both regions are firmly pro Russia anyway. Zero need to keep "peace" in either region as today's announcement will spark little if any unrest among the local populations.
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1 minute ago, virginton said:

Yes yes because he's just like Hitler based on all those analogous tactics that you've provided, erm, zero evidence of. 

Recognising two more diddy post-Soviet clients is exactly the same challenge as overseeing the occupation of an enormous sovereign state. The hamster is truly doing overtime tonight. 

And yet he has recognised 2 breakaway regions of a Sovereign state. And annexed a full region of a Sovereign state?

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1 minute ago, Binos said:

As is everywhere else which is why it's never happened 

It almost happened in the early 60s when the US military thought they could win. There were generals were presenting on plans to destroy 100 cities in Eastern Europe, USSR, China and North Korea. 

The USA has left the ABM treaty under Bush 2 and the INF treaty under Trump. 

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2 minutes ago, Billy Jean King said:
17 minutes ago, Highlandmagyar Tier 3 said:
The mass they have on the borders will just roll in as a ' peace keeping' force, just the prelude to a full Ukraine invasion.

Why would they need to given both regions are firmly pro Russia anyway. Zero need to keep "peace" in either region as today's announcement will spark little if any unrest among the local populations.

The presence of Russian forces there will mean Ukraine can't attack.

The republics were never going to be politically integrated back into Ukraine anyway after 8 years of war. 

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14 minutes ago, virginton said:

Consolidating a fait accompli from 8 years ago is not in the same ballpark. 

Why didn't he do it then though? An extra salami slice wouldn't have made much difference to the sanctions. The only advantage he's gained is raising cold war fears back on to the world stage, and probably conned a few at home that it's a great victory. Meanwhile Kiev will have lost a substantial number of pro Russian votes against the pro western parties. 

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6 minutes ago, Highlandmagyar Tier 3 said:

And yet he has recognised 2 breakaway regions of a Sovereign state. And annexed a full region of a Sovereign state?

South Ossetia and Abkhazia were regions of a sovereign state. That sovereign state has not consequently been annexed by Russia. 

That does not for one moment legitimate Putin's actions, but it does make your reductionist shrieking about what comes next utterly foolish and not supported by any credible evidence. 

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2 minutes ago, LongTimeLurker said:

If Viktor Yanukovych hadn't been toppled in an extra-constitutional manner none of that would have happened. 

He was a massive ally of Moscow and had bailouts from them, therefore inviting huge Russian influence which the Ukrainian people did not want.

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1 minute ago, welshbairn said:

Why didn't he do it then though? An extra salami slice wouldn't have made much difference to the sanctions. The only advantage he's gained is raising cold war fears back on to the world stage, and probably conned a few at home that it's a great victory. Meanwhile Kiev will have lost a substantial number of pro Russian votes against the pro western parties. 

He has been banging on about the Minsk agreements constantly since 2014/15, insisting this was the only way to resolve the conflict. He seems to have finally run out of patience and accepted the other side will never agree to it. The end result would have been the same, with the breakaway regions being officially recognised by Russia, but it the end he's done it without getting the nod from Kiev.

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2 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

Why didn't he do it then though? ... 

He wanted to use the Minsk accords to have the breakaway republics do to Ukraine what Gagauzia and Transnistria do to Moldova and make it very difficult for Ukraine to have a fully pro-Western foreign policy. Instead of meekly playing along Zelenskyy purchased the Turkish drones that decimated the armed forces of Nagorno-Karabakh.

 

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13 minutes ago, welshbairn said:

Why didn't he do it then though? An extra salami slice wouldn't have made much difference to the sanctions. The only advantage he's gained is raising cold war fears back on to the world stage, and probably conned a few at home that it's a great victory. Meanwhile Kiev will have lost a substantial number of pro Russian votes against the pro western parties. 

Because Russia as much as Ukraine's leaders were convinced to give the Minsk protocols a go by heavy mediation and diplomacy. Which both sides did, though not without incidents. 

The relationship between the two states has deteriorated further since 2014, while the Anglo-US sabre-rattling has finally done its job in fatally undermining Minsk (a Franco-German breakthrough) and putting Washington's interests east of the Carpathians again. 

I'd suggest that Putin is actually now consolidating what he thinks he can get. And quite frankly, I'd prefer an international situation in which these issues were clarified to one in which everyone pretended that Crimea or Luhansk were ever going back to Kiev's rule.

The West is free to enact sanctions and Russia may well pay a high long-term price for that gain. That's how realistic geopolitics should work though - as opposed to pointless morality plays that only set up the Ukraine as a slaughterhouse for proxy armies. 

The big winner of course is China, which gets the pleasure of seeing the US getting entangled in Eastern Europe while gaining Russian goodwill for its benevolent neutrality. Biden has been played here thanks to the Clinton-level chumps in his White House. 

Edited by vikingTON
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3 minutes ago, Highlandmagyar Tier 3 said:

He was a massive ally of Moscow and had bailouts from them, therefore inviting huge Russian influence which the Ukrainian people did not want.

Debatable, pre-2014 pro-Russian candidates often won Ukrainian elections precisely because they were pro-Russian. Lopping off Crimea, Donetsk and Lugansk from participation in those elections wasn't the smartest thing Vlad has ever done because it tipped the balance of Ukrainian politics more heavily towards pro-Western nationalism.

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