this post was submitted on 02 Jun 2023
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“We believe the prerequisite for meaningful diplomacy and real peace is a stronger Ukraine, capable of deterring and defending against any future aggression,” Blinken said in a speech in Finland, which recently became NATO’s newest member and shares a long border with Russia.

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[–] Zagaroth@lemmy.ml 32 points 1 year ago (3 children)

What's wrong with helping a country defend itself from invasion by imperial warmongers?

And to be clear, yes, I am calling Russia imperial warmongers. They have been actively invading neighboring countries for decades to expand themselves. And what is an empire if not a nation built on the conquest of other countries?

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 12 points 1 year ago (2 children)

That is absolutely not what the west is doing. Ukraine is being used as a proxy to weaken Russia using the formula that RAND outlined here. All the west is accomplishing is prolonging the conflict and it will not change the outcome. Anybody who thinks this is being done for the benefit of Ukraine is absolutely delusional.

Maybe people living in the west should focus on stopping their empire from conquering countries before getting on their high horse.

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 20 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nah, I prefer to stop countries from annexing pieces of other countries.

The US hasn't annexed anything since 1959, and I was born too late to stop that. But Russia can't help itself, and even gives youngsters a chance to oppose annexation.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Maybe you should figure out how to stop your own regime from invading countries before playing world police then. US is literally occupying part of Syria as we speak. Just how ignorant are you exactly?

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

There are far more Russian troops in Syria. I choose the lesser evil.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The legitimate government of Syria invited Russia to help it defend itself against the US regime, but do go on.

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

And how much Syrian land has been annexed to the US?

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Around a third of a country including major food and oil producing regions. Are you in a cave where google isn't available?

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Huh, I didn't realize that we had a 51st state. Who is the new governor?

Wait, I just looked at a map. It turns out the US borders haven't changed. Are in you in a cave where the definition of "annexation" is unavailable?

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Oh I'm sorry, your shithole country is only occupying Syria without having officially incorporated the regions you're pillaging. That makes it totally different. 🤡

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yes, it does. It means that the US is among the countries that gave up using force to alter its boundaries, whereas Russia is not among them.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's right, instead US just comes and occupies countries whenever it feels like. Totally different though. 🤡

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Many countries, including Russia, just come and occupy countries whenever they feel like.

Actual annexation is what makes Russia the greater evil.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nah, the country that massacred over 6 million people with its war on terror is the actual greater evil, and the reason US does mass murder around the globe is because of people like you https://bylinetimes.com/2021/09/15/up-to-six-million-people-the-unrecorded-fatalities-of-the-war-on-terror/

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Russia has far more blood on its hands than the US, starting with almost 6 million in Ukraine alone.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 8 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That is objectively false, but you keep on doing you.

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You're right, it's up to 7 million dead in the Holodomor.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 year ago

Perhaps, educate yourself on what actual historians have to say on the subject.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/2500600

During the 1932 Holodomor Famine, the USSR sent aid to affected regions in an attempt to alleviate the famine. According to Mark Tauger in his article, The 1932 Harvest and the Famine of 1933:

While the leadership did not stop exports, they did try to alleviate the famine. A 25 February 1933 Central Committee decree allotted seed loans of 320,000 tons to Ukraine and 240,000 tons to the northern Caucasus. Seed loans were also made to the Lower Volga and may have been made to other regions as well. Kul'chyts'kyy cites Ukrainian party archives showing that total aid to Ukraine by April 1933 actually exceeded 560,000 tons, including more than 80,000 tons of food

Some bring up massive grain exports during the famine to show that the Soviet Union exported food while Ukraine starved. This is fallacious for a number of reasons, but most importantly of all the amount of aid that was sent to Ukraine alone actually exceeded the amount that was exported at the time.

Aid to Ukraine alone was 60 percent greater than the amount exported during the same period. Total aid to famine regions was more than double exports for the first half of 1933.

According to Tauger, the reason why more aid was not provided was because of the low harvest

It appears to have been another consequence of the low 1932 harvest that more aid was not provided: After the low 1931, 1934, and 1936 harvests procured grain was transferred back to peasants at the expense of exports.

Tauger is not a communist, and ultimately this specific article takes the view that the low harvest was caused by collectivization (he factors in the natural causes of the famine in later articles, based on how he completely neglects to mention weather in this article at all its clear that his position shifted over the years). However, the fact is that the Soviets really did try to alleviate the famine as best as they could.

On the other hand, we can look at what an actual intentional genocide looks like where Europeans massacred so many indigenous people in North America that it changed the climate!

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/nation-world/national/article225350745.html

Not to mention such hits as the Irish and Bengal famines.

[–] MikeTheComrade@lemmy.ml 12 points 1 year ago (3 children)

It's really sad how duped American citizens are here. They truly believe that when changing their bio pics to a Ukraine Flag that they're doing something. They believe their government has the best interest of Ukraine while what they're actually supporting is their government using Ukrainian bodies to weaken an adversary under the guise of defense. No one learned anything after Iraq, it was mere MONTHS ago that liberals were giving BUSH praise! They don't care about Abu Ghraib or what happened in Guantanamo Bay. A lot of people here are in for a rough awakening.

[–] JillyB@lemmy.ml 21 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I'm confused. Do you think Russia taking Ukraine by force is what's best for Ukraine? Do you think their people are volunteering to fight because they just don't know what's best for them? Even if Ukrainians wanted to maintain independence out of some misguided patriotism, isn't it their right as a sovereign nation to decide that?

From the US perspective, Ukraine wanted to join NATO, aligning themselves with us. Then Russia invaded. If the US didn't support Ukraine, the world would know they can prevent a weaker country from joining NATO by invading. After Iraq and Afghanistan, there's no desire to send US troops but we can provide weapons and intelligence.

[–] MikeTheComrade@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Weapons, intelligence and Ukrainian bodies are an extremely cheap deal to weaken an adversary, don't you think?

When it comes to wanting oil though, US and Iraqi bodies aren't so important. As long as you can dupe your own citizens into believing there's WMD's, it doesn't matter.

And of course Ukraine knows what's best for them. That's why they keep asking for a roadmap to NATO but the US is like "Nah" - https://www.ft.com/content/c37ed22d-e0e4-4b03-972e-c56af8a36d2e

So of course they're left to negotiate. Again, the US Government doesn't care but their citizens think they do.

The US is against peace if it doesn't get more money to the military–industrial complex or if it doesn't weaken an adversary, like in this case.

[–] Tretiak@lemmy.ml 5 points 1 year ago

The US is against 'any' attempt by any country to use its resources for its own purposes. America behaves like any other imperial power has, throughout history. If Russia or China had the power the US currently does, they'd be doing the same thing. It's why 'Empire' as a concept can coexist just as easily with 'democracy' as a framework as it does in autocracies. Because every State out there wants to maximize it's share of power in the world. And this includes the US. That's why fundamentally things don't change all that much, regardless of who gets into power.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago

By volunteered to fight you mean being abducted on the street, beaten, and sent to die?

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The people of Ukraine have told the world what their best interest is: removing Russian soldiers from their land, by force if necessary.

The US is only interested in Ukraine when their goals align. Everyone knows this, including most Americans and most Ukrainians.

However, it turns out that US and Ukrainian goals do, in fact, align. The US isn't "using" Ukraine any more than Ukraine is "using" the US. They are openly cooperating to achieve a common interest.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The Ukrainian people are being kidnapped off the street and sent to die by the regime US installed in Ukraine after overthrowing a democratically elected government. Most Ukrainians don't want to have a war and have their lives destroyed. The only people who want this war are ghouls living in the west who aren't personally affected by it.

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Tankies can always be counted on to project the worst in themselves.

There are hundreds of thousands of Russians in Georgia and Kazakhstan who can explain which side is kidnapping young men off the street and sending them to die for a war they care nothing about. Meanwhile, opinion polls of Ukrainians consistently show that an overwhelming majority want to continue the war until Russians are defeated.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 1 points 1 year ago (2 children)

We have plenty of video evidence of this happening in Ukraine, but whatever you say my little dronie. And yeah, opinion polls mean so much in a country that's now effectively a military dictatorship.

[–] JasBC@beehaw.org 3 points 1 year ago

....nice, your stance must mean Russian-ones meant shite before the war even began then right?

[–] FlowVoid@midwest.social 1 points 1 year ago

If you don't believe in opinion polls, then your claim that most Ukrainians are against the war is based on nothing but the voices in your head.

[–] yogthos@lemmy.ml 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Americans are subject to the best propaganda machine that money can buy, and people running the regime are certainly getting their money's worth.

[–] Tretiak@lemmy.ml 6 points 1 year ago

"Any dictator would admire the uniformity and obedience of the U.S. media." - Noam Chomsky

[–] Tretiak@lemmy.ml 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Yeah, no. The people that say crap like this, and uncritically swallow down the propaganda, always fail to take geopolitics seriously. In the last century, Europe (and Germany in particular) nearly destroyed Russia. Twice. If you’re Putin, and you continue to see a military alliance year after year, encroaching further and further up to your borders, what the hell are you supposed to do? If the USSR expanded the Warsaw Pact right up to incorporate Mexico and Canada, what do you reasonably think our response would be? Just look at Russia’s military defense budget. If you think is a country preparing and readying itself for any dream of imperialistic aspirations, you are crazy.

[–] pleasemakesense@lemmy.ml 13 points 1 year ago

Why does tankies support Russia they're fascists lol

[–] JasBC@beehaw.org 5 points 1 year ago

In the last century, Europe (and Germany in particular) nearly destroyed Russia.

Russia entered WW1 on the same spaghetti-treaty-basis as every other nation that entered the conflict of their "own" accord.

The USSR entered WW2 as a German ally and tried to once again erase Poland and the Poles as the common German/Russian imperialist ambition required. And instead of preparing for the inevitable war that literally everyone but Stalin saw coming, the Soviets collectivly spent the mid-to-late 1930s partaking in the Great Terror, nearly destroying their own nation for the sake of satiating a madman's ego and paranoia.

If you’re Putin, and you continue to see a military alliance year after year, encroaching further and further up to your borders, what the hell are you supposed to do?

....stop promoting chauvanism? Stop trying to revive the USSR against the will of those who willingly left? Stop invading your neighbours? There's like a million different ways to remain as a anti-democratic leech-state in this world without needing to use military force.

If the USSR expanded the Warsaw Pact right up to incorporate Mexico and Canada, what do you reasonably think our response would be?

It's nice you think the US can just arbitarily expand NATO without the consent of other members, that joining NATO isn't a choice. Likewise, it's nice you apparently don't get it was the same for the Warsaw Pact - Mongolia wasn't allowed in on it as European Communists opposed having to support potential conglict between the USSR and China.

Just look at Russia’s military defense budget. If you think is a country preparing and readying itself for any dream of imperialistic aspirations, you are crazy.

They've invaded two former members of the USSR, have active orders to invade a third if the oppurtunity arises, and have drawn up plans for invading a fourth-one. Sorry, but I'll rather accept the apparent reality that Russis is a myopic yes-man state that is currently doing war and committing genocide against Ukrainians.