esteban wrote:
I blame EU for not having a spine and telling the US to [expletive removed] off, that will end up badly, this is our backyard, we would be the ones that will pay the price if it (quite predictably) blew off
You hit the nail here. Not that I agree, but the very philosophy that we can let “eval” (call it “wrong” or whatever you want) pass because the dislike towards the US is larger, is rather – interesting.
IMO, NATO is a military allegiance to the USA. There is no difference between this allegiance (in principle) and the millions of other allegiances throughout history. What is different is that the US has proven (again and again) that it has the will and the capability/power to fight evil (sorry, I mean fight what is “wrong”). There is no guarantee the US will not turn evil itself, but so far so good. In Norway, even the far lefties have changed. For them, NATO has turned from being an instrument of the imperialistic USA to become an instrument of freedom and democracy. A rather remarkable 180, but made possible by Putin. Stoltenberg as the Secretary General in NATO has also helped massively on that 180 turn.
What other alternatives are there? For Norway, NATO is a guaranty, not only from evil forces in the east, but also from evil forces within Europe. Our experience with neutrality is exceptionally bad from WWII, and the enemy came from the heart of Europe. Since WWII, the only reason Sweden and Finland has not become (true) members, is because Norway is. The US, UK and Canada is the “no brain”, natural choice to form an allegiance with for Norway. The only other alternative based on reality would be a Nordic/Scandinavian allegiance, possible also with Germany, if it wasn’t for the not so stellar experience with Germany from the not so distant past. The modern Germany has not shown it has the will and power to fight evil. Not by a long shot. Alone, we are way too few people to make a difference.
Peter wrote:
This just goes round and round.
Exactly. I have said what I wanted, I hope sufficiently clearly.
There has even been a bit of meaningful discussion, for which I am really grateful (some really nice, well-reasoned posts, esp. by MooneyDriver and A_A). Too much regurgitated emotional propaganda talking points without reasoned backing-up, but well, that is the current world. :-(
Better to end it now.
How is GA affected in the countries bordering Russia?
In Ukraine it is obviously shut down.
What about countries which have donated equipment to Ukraine; for example Slovakia?
Before the invasion, people must have been pretty careful to not go near the border, no?
LeSving wrote:
You hit the nail here. Not that I agree, but the very philosophy that we can let “eval” (call it “wrong” or whatever you want) pass because the dislike towards the US is larger, is rather – interesting.
Sigh. I guess the separation of our mental models of what is going in the world is perhaps too large to get the point across without it being misrepresented.
I did not want to sound condescending and therefore did not explain things in little steps like for small children, but apparently that is the only way.
Please, bear in mind, I am not trying to convince you of my point of view, to accept the ideas I am posting, I am just trying to get those ideas across so you can understand them, so we can reasonably discuss about the whole issue without talking past each other. Even that seems to be asking too much.
What I was referring to:
In 2008 Bucharest NATO meeting, many things were discussed. USA came up with the idea that the next countries to join NATO would be Ukraine and Georgia. Several European diplomats expressed strong reservation about that, saying that is a bad idea that would lead to significantly worsened relations with Russia and potentially to bloodshed. Nevertheless USA pushed on and managed to put that (‘next countries to joining NATO would be Ukraine and George’) into the final communique.
Preliminary check: Do you dispute correctness of the above statement? Do you need sources? (I mean, google is not enough?)
So, “EU growing a spine to tell USA off” means simply EU not agreeing on such final communique, despite USA pushing for it.
To me, that is good preventive diplomacy, working to diffuse potential future problems ahead of time, pushing for EU’s interest in stable and peaceful relationships within its neighbourhood.
To you, that obviously means ‘letting the evil pass’. Why? The only explanation I can come by is that you a-priori believe that Russia is a-priori evil whatever we do, and any sign of actually taking into account its fears is a sign of our weakness that it would only exploit.
Second check: Am I misrepresenting you? If so, please, correct.
If you really believe that, then Russia has every right to fear you, because the only logical action for you, with such a belief, is to contain and eradicate Russia.
Remember, that is way before any bloodshed in Ukraine, way before 2014 and Crimea annexation.
Are you sure that at that time the Russia was the unavoidable evil with which there was no reasoning?
Overall, and that is backed-up by several historians (but, of course, such voices are not currently in the mainstream media, because that would undermine the current narrative and weaken support for Ukraine, and would lay a bit of blame on squeaky clean us), the Russia indeed was on a path to true integration with the Europe, but a steady trickle of events (each stage of NATO expansion, Balkan wars, colour revolutions, the trick with Libyia, …) showed them that the West still views them as an opponent, not a partner. The west’s arrogance of ‘of course, we know best, and our way is the only way’ did not help either.
Basically, our fear of Russia helped to form the Russia we got now. We helped to raise the beast. I do not dispute it is a beast. I dispute our innocence in the whole affair.
Peter wrote:
How is GA affected in the countries bordering Russia?In Ukraine it is obviously shut down.
What about countries which have donated equipment to Ukraine; for example Slovakia?
Before the invasion, people must have been pretty careful to not go near the border, no?
Before the invasion, most people did not truly believe there will be a real invasion. Also, it helps that Slovakia is at the very western end of Ukraine, far from any action (even today). Furthermore, I believe vast majority of GA activity in Slovakia is to the west of Kosice -Presov line anyway, you would go more to the east only if you wanted to fly to Ukraine, which was obviously not a bright idea at that time.
I am not sure about military restrictions, there was (and still is) quite a bit of NATO military traffic, but those guys fly high up.
esteban wrote:
We helped to raise the beast
Not according to Stoltenberg (former prime minister of Norway and now Secretary General of NATO), and not according to Niinistö (president of Finland, and a friend of Putin). Russia is just across the border from both countries. Finland has been invaded by Russia several times. Since WWII the relationship with Russia has been good. It has been good all the way up to the invasion. Niinistö said that Putin has changed completely during the last couple of years. By changed I mean mentally. Russia as a country has become more and more despotic over several years, with Putin gaining more power for himself. But the change in Putin has happened recently, at least what anyone can tell.
To explain this with NATO expansion is just nonsense. The overall pressure on Putin has quite obviously been too much, but this is mostly from internal affairs, weeding out enemies, gaining more personal power. Today he is a man who sees enemies everywhere. In a normal democracy, we have things in place to prevent similar stuff from happening. I mean, Trump is clearly right on the edge, and there are other countries in Europe too that are right there on the edge (Hungary, Turkey). We also have China, where the exact same thing is happening where Xi Jinping is gaining more and more personal power.
We can look at history all we want, trying to find reasons for this and that. Nothing good will come out of it, because the single error here is the lack of opposing forces to stop despotism from happening within a country. Those opposing forces may never have been there in the first place, or they may gradually (and deliberately) been eroded.
The only thing that is left, is for us that still live free and democratic lives, to stick together and fight against this evil with all the forces we have. End of story.
The only thing that is left, is for us that still live free and democratic lives, to stick together and fight against this evil with all the forces we have. End of story.
Yes indeed. Evil has a lot to do with morality which is a universal human concept. It is a distraction to bring up religion, and all its historical baggage, or try to rationalize the behavior of the Russian government. There is no justified rationale, their actions are evil and based on paranoia. The problem is when you don’t want to admit evil exists, or confront it with potential force, because it makes you uncomfortable with your own position and history.
LeSving wrote:
We can look at history all we want, trying to find reasons for this and that. Nothing good will come out of it, because the single error here is the lack of opposing forces to stop despotism from happening within a country.
This I don’t buy. The country (both the despotic leader, and the opposition to him) does not develop in vacuum. The external forces influence and shape both the leader, and the opposition. All the external forces I mentioned on Russia were pushing Russia towards nationalism and fortress mentality, weakening the case for the opposition (btw, often-celebrated oposition’s Navalny’s roots are nationalistic, if you don’t know). The process was long, it did not happen in the last few year, that’s when the dam broke.
LeSving wrote:
The only thing that is left, is for us that still live free and democratic lives, to stick together and fight against this evil with all the forces we have. End of story.
And I am saying: Observe and think carefully, don’t get swayed by emotional pressure, because this one convenient evil is not the root of the evil. Putin is not the reason for Trump’s popularity, for Brexit, for Erdogan and Orban, for rise of nationalism and extremism, for the polarization of western societies. Those are symptoms of internal rot that is way more dangerous to our democracy and freedom than Putin*.
Regarding fighting Putin with all the forces we have: I am really torn here. On one hand, it would be really nice to just beat him and be done with it all. On the other hand, the world just does not work like that. Any success by Ukrainians has been met by escalation of brutality by Russians. What makes you believe that will change in the future? What is the end game? Because all I see is wishful thinking ‘he will eventually lose’, while we are relentlessly marching on an escalating path that seems to have only one ending. *radioactive dust.
Bringing up a former US president, Brexit and who knows what else is also a distraction, and trying to dodge reality. People want and need competence and the attempt to draw a parallel to Russian paranoia and despotism is ridiculous. I would be more concerned about the current US President, given that his executive branch of US Federal Government is responsible for your security, and whether he is competent to protect Europe in the way Europe has made necessary.
The “end game” is that the price of liberty is eternal vigilance.
An interview with François Hollande
To some extent one would expect him to do some retrospective self-justification (all former leaders do that) but it is an interesting commentary on recent history, and not only on France.
