Essay by Eric Worrall
George Soros is desperate for Russia to suffer a crushing defeat, so Europe can focus more resources on international climate action. Some of that action may include political attacks on Republicans.
House Approves Last-Minute Stopgap To Avert Government Shutdown—Leaves Out Funding For Ukraine
Brian Bushard
Forbes Staff
Sep 30, 2023,02:49pm EDTThe House of Representatives approved an 11th hour stopgap measure to keep the federal government funded for another 45 days, with just hours left before the deadline to avert a shutdown, sending the bill to the Senate for a vote.
The House voted 335-91 to pass the resolution, meeting the two-thirds threshold required, with 90 Republicans and one Democrat, Illinois Rep. Mike Quigley, opposed to the measure, arguing it lacked funding for Ukraine.
The 71-page continuing resolution adds money for disaster relief, but leaves out military funding for Ukraine, a key criticism from far-right House Republicans who have called for sweeping funding cuts despite pleas from the Biden Administration for $20 billion in additional funding for Ukraine.
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Read more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/brianbushard/2023/09/30/house-approves-last-minute-stopgap-to-avert-government-shutdown/?sh=2732273010b0
George Soros’s article from March, in which he links ending the Ukraine war to climate action;
Russian defeat is inevitable, and will allow world to focus on our real problem — Climate change
The countries of the former Soviet empire eagerly await defeat of the Russian army in Ukraine, and the world will be able to focus on climate change, writes George Soros
THU, 23 MAR, 2023 – 01:28
GEORGE SOROSIt is just over one month ago that I gave a speech on the eve of the Munich Security Conference. Since then, so many remarkable things have happened — and have happened so fast — that it is worth comparing my predictions of a month ago with actual developments.
…
The countries of the former Soviet empire, eager to assert their independence, can hardly wait for the Russian army to be crushed in Ukraine. At that point, Putin’s dream of a renewed Russian empire will disintegrate and cease to pose a threat to Europe.
The defeat of Russian imperialism will have far-reaching consequences for the rest of the world. It will bring huge relief to open societies and create tremendous problems for closed ones. Most importantly, it will allow the world to concentrate on its biggest problem, climate change.
…
Read more: https://www.irishexaminer.com/opinion/commentanalysis/arid-41098510.html
How will that concentration on climate change manifest?
We don’t often catch a glimpse behind the curtain of European politics, but such slip was a public boast by then British Climate Change Minister Claire Perry, about all the good they were doing, reaching out to elected US politicians, and helping US politicians to sabotage President Trump’s America First agenda.
UK bypasses Donald Trump to discuss climate change with US city mayors directly
Claire Perry, the Climate Change Minister, says British Government is now speaking to ‘other players’ in US about how to fight global warming
Ian Johnston
Environment Correspondent
Tuesday 25 July 2017 14:21The UK has started bypassing Donald Trump over climate change, talking directly to city mayors and other officials committed to trying to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the new Climate Change Minister has revealed.
Claire Perry, who was appointed to the post after the general election last month, said that British ministers had not “missed an opportunity” to tell the US President that they were disappointed he had decided to withdraw from the Paris Agreement on climate change, the news service Bloomberg reported.
She said she had been speaking to “other players” in the US, including the mayor of Houston, Sylvester Turner, who visited the UK last week.
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Read more: https://www.independent.co.uk/climate-change/news/uk-donald-trump-climate-change-us-city-mayors-talk-direct-paris-agreement-houston-sylvester-turner-a7859291.html
Want to see something more recent? Zelensky made a speech to Congress a week ago, in which he affirmed ending the war was vital to climate progress.
… We know the possible effects of spreading the war into the cyberspace. The artificial intelligence could be trained to combat well – before it would learn to help the humanity. Thank God, people have not yet learned to use climate as a weapon. Even though humanity is failing on its climate policy objectives – this means that extreme weather will still impact the normal global life and some evil state will also weaponise its outcomes.
And when people in the streets of New York and other cities of the world went out on climate protest – we all have seen them… And when people in Morocco and Libya and other countries die as a result of natural disasters… And when islands and countries disappear under water… And when tornados and deserts are spreading into new territories… And when all of this is happening, one unnatural disaster in Moscow decided to launch a big war and kill tens of thousands of people.
We must act united – to defeat the aggressor and focus all our capabilities and energy on addressing these challenges.
…
Read more: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/9/20/full-text-zelenskyys-speech-to-the-un-general-assembly
Could they make their intentions any clearer?
I provided evidence the British Government, at that time a member of the European Union, thought it was OK for British taxpayer resources to be used to interfere in US politics, to “bypass” President Trump’s America First agenda. I also provided evidence, the words of George Soros, that the utter defeat and breakup of Russia is a green movement priority.
I believe the evidence supports my opinion that if the USA helps Ukraine and Europe to crush Russia, to such an extent the Russian Federation collapses and no longer poses a military threat to Europe, some of the European state funds liberated by cutting defence budgets may be directed towards helping US candidates who support European style green policies.
How else could greens like Soros and his European friends push forward clearly articulated plans for advancing the global green revolution, other than to “bypass”, brush aside or otherwise neutralise the political opponents of radical climate action?
The war has probably already killed more than 200,000, not just tens of thousands. Best current estimate is more than 70,000 Ukrainian military deaths, 10,000 civilian and 120,000 on the Russian side, to include criminals, non-Russian ethnic conscripts, such as Buriyat and Chechen fighters, contract soldiers and mercenaries, eg Syrians and Cubans.
Russian casualties around 240,000 Ukraine probably up around 90,000 including civilians according to reasonably impartial intelligence agencies.
Not all are deaths .
Why the Red for comments on casualties? The numbers seem in the correct areas as far as I can tell. No invasion by one country of another is ever bloodless, especially one which is mismanaged as this war appears to be.
Before wondering why the Ukrainians are so determined to resist research The Holodomor, a genocide as far as Ukrainians are concerned. Most alive today in Ukraine will have heard about through relatives who lived through it and the Nazi occupation.
Whether or not you agree with supporting Ukraine or Russia, doesn’t change either the numbers of killed or how Ukrainians feel about Russia.
Other, non-MSM commentators, say the reverse. People like The Duran channel who have interviewed ex-CIA and US military officers giving the opposing view:
Russian casualties in the tens of thousands, Ukrainian ones now into the hundreds of thousands. There is even talk about the Ukrainians conscripting women instead of press-ganging available males off the street.
Remember when this war started and refugees started flooding out of Ukraine? The first thing the Ukrainians did was stop military-age males leaving the country.
Apart from the Ukrainian oligarchs, of course. A sad case of “Women and captains first.”
Russia is playing a war of attrition, knowing that Ukraine is running out of soldiers as fast as it running out of Western military aid that was going to perform a miracle with that “Spring offensive.”
Strange how that exactly agrees with the Russian propaganda line, which is always more or less the exact opposite of what other sources reveal, or has an added or missing zero in it.
Russia owns more people in the USA than you realise.
Ex-CIA and US military officers’ views don’t mean much to me. IIRC, their estimate of the length of this war was two weeks, culminating in total Ukranian capitulation.
During the Cold War, they always over-estimated the strength of the Russian economy and military strength.
Fool me once – shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. fool me thrice-plus… I obviously like to be scammed.
Ludicrous propaganda.
The death rate is calculated to be 7:1 in the Russians favour. One Ukrainian official even blurted out that there were 400,000 Ukrainian soldiers dead on the battlefield, since when the June offensive has seen 70,000+ added to that total.
A draft peace deal was agreed between Russia and Ukraine in March of 2022 in which the Russians agreed to withdraw entirely from eastern Ukraine to their pre February 2022 position in return for Ukraine to become a neutral state with no membership of NATO.
Biden doesn’t want peace in Ukraine. He want’s all evidence of his criminal activities there erased by the destruction of the country so he despatched the odious Boris Johnson to order Zelensky to tear the draft peace agreement up.
Since then Russia has entertained at least three attempts by other nations to broker peace, China, Turkey and a delegation of African nations. All have been rejected by Ukraine and the west.
Biden is trashing America, why would anyone imagine he has any compunction about trashing Ukraine?
A neutral Ukraine is a castrated Ukraine. Why would any nation agree to that? Maybe if you were around back in ’39 you would have suggested that France and Poland likewise become castrated. Hitler also wanted a castrated GB, but that nation told Hitler to “piss off”.
The Ukraine offensive started June 4. In less than 4 months, about 80,000 Ukrainians died and wounded, plus much equipment destroyed
According to a recent full page NYTimes article, Russia’s net gain was 188 sq miles, mostly to improve its defensive lines
Ukraine soldiers are clearing mines, on foot, at night, because tanks, etc., cannot cross the mine fields, cross the tank ditch, get past the concrete obstacles.
Ukraine soldiers hiding in the woods are flushed out with phosphor bombs and destroyed
Ukraine soldiers, on foot, advance, “take over an abandoned village”, with photo op and flag, then they get destroyed by UAVs and artillery lobbing shells from 25 miles away; village and soldiers obliterated.
Now you probably understand why the offensive is so slow.
Russia has annexed areas whose ethnic Russian people voted to REUNITE with Russia, because they were part of Russia for more than 300 years.
When Ukraine was made independent in 1991, all of a sudden they found them selves in enemy territory, because the extremist-nationalist, Kiev regime, installed by the US, adopted an “Eradicate-Everything-Russian” policy, i.e., banned opposition parties, closed down opposition Media, banned the Russian language, closed down the Russian Orthodox Church, destroyed monuments, banned Russian books. The list is long.
All such actions are against UN and EU rules
Ukraine wants to join the EU, so it can start sucking on the Brussels tit.
It was the decision by the democratically elected President Yanukovych NOT to sign an agreement with EU that was the start of the accession process that precipitated all this.
Because, that was a good agreement for Brussels, but a bad one for Ukraine
Russian gains were in Bakhmut, before the counteroffensive. Since then, Russia has lost area.
Last year, Russia lost huge swaths of captured turf around Kyiv, Kharkiv, Kherson, Chernihiv, Sumy, Poltava, Mikolaev, etc.
According to the NYTimes, Russia gained 188 sq miles since June 4
Losing huge swaths, was due to pulling back behind defendable lines.
After the pull back, Ukraine is wasting itself, on foot to get by the obstacles. See my above comment
Since when has anyone on WUWT believed a single word the NYT says? Or the Washington Post. Russia OWNS them.
There are online resources that immediately show that this is a lie.
Who benefits from massive renewable deployment? The people selling the gas needed to back it up.
Who loses from nuclear power. The people now no longer selling the gas.
Cui Bono,.
LOL, it was never captured it was occupied for a while then abandoned when it became clear that route of action wasn’t worth the losses.
Crikey,. straight from the st Petersburg Troll and Vodka factory.
Well if that is the case Russia will be in Kyiv in three weeks wont it? Rather than slowly retreating.
You do realise there is an election on and Russia is pouring every liar they own into the mill, because the ONE hope Godfather Putin has left is that US support for Ukraine will collapse.
Leaving Ukraine defenceless to be looted raped and tortured to death so there will only be pro Russian and Russian speaking people left on it.
Not gonna happen.
I have been many times in Ukraine, inc the now occupied bankrupt Crimea.
Ukrainians may have their problems, but they have their own language and culture, and are ready to die to defend everything they built since the (not in any way useful) Budapest agreement.
The agreement Putin’s Russia simply tore up.
writing utter rubbish.
Clearly you have never been in Ukraine, and understand zilch about Russia (hey now your boss Prigo is dead- you gonna quit working for the troll farm?)
HotScot is SNP. An anti-English racist, nationalist.
In WW2 the Irish were the same, They were neutral.
They saw no difference between the British Empire and the Nazi Party.
For the 1940’s Irish or the 2020s Scottish the Holocaust is a price worth paying to cause pain to the fighting Brits (or Ukrainians, whose children are being kidnapped and rehomed outside Ukraine).
Also anti-American and a clueless dupe of Putin’s propaganda lies, due to utter ignorance and intolerance. I’m 1/8 Scots Highlander myself.
The SNP is literally Nazi, ie the Scottish Nationalist Socialist Workers’ Party, although just like the German Nazis, not really for workers at all.
The “ukranian official” was EU commission persident, Ursula von der Leyen, who read out the total <i>casualties</i> as total <i>deaths</i>, because she’s not very bright.
Russia’s peace agreement would have forced Ukraine to cede Crimea, would have effetively ceded the eastern industrial heartland of Ukraine, and would have also rather coincidentally ceded control over Ukraine’s unexploited oil and gas fields.
The requirement to demilitarise and become “neutral” is effectively a reduction to vassal status, as it would no longer have had any independent political will.
And, as with previous treaties between Russia and Ukraine, there was absolutely no guarantee that Russia wouldn’t simply tear it up and try again later.
But… but… you should have faith in comrade Putin, and also of comrade Wilpost. And, we all know, Zelensky is a Nazi. Can’t you tell when he speaks? Sounds like Hitler! Always ranting about the Ukrainian master race while bombing hospitals, orphanages and other public areas in The Russian Federation! Just because comrade Putin, some years ago, cried that the collapse of the Soviet Union was the worst thing to happen in the 20th century- or that he has often said Ukraine isn’t a real country, no need to think this war is some kind of Russian imperialism. Russia has informed us that only America and its puppets in Europe are the only imperialists today.
Some of the coast of Ukraine was once part of the Roman Empire- for centuries. I think Mussolini should have had the right to restore that empire- including the coast of Ukraine. It wasn’t nice of the American and British imperialists to restrain IL Duce.
No reason at all to distrust the Russians. /sarc
Incorrect. Ursula von der Leyen blurted out 100,000 as a figure for Ukraine casualties, not 400,000. That 400,000 figure actually WAS from a Ukraine official, possibly in the defence or similar departments, but I can no longer find the reference. The only thing I’m taking from this, and the leaked documents from the Pentagon, are that there are huge numbers of people losing their lives there and we’re arguing over statistics.
Fair enough, and I agree that it’s a waste of lives. The responsibility for those lost lives rests squarely on Putin’s shoulder, which is something a worrying number of people here seem unwilling to accept.
OP was still making a less than honest argument, of course, by taking a casualties number and claiming it as a deaths number. The same person can count as multiple casualties if they keep getting patched up, sent out to the front, and injured again.
“Fair enough, and I agree that it’s a waste of lives. The responsibility for those lost lives rests squarely on Putin’s shoulder, which is something a worrying number of people here seem unwilling to accept.”
Exactly right.
It’s amazing the things otherwise intelligent people can talk themselves into believing.
Lots of conspiracy theories so far in my reading of the comments. Like: Biden sending the British leader on a mission to undermine peace in Ukraine!? Come on! Where’s the evidence for that?
So many conspiracy theories, so little time.
There will huge numbers more if Russia is allowed to prevail. They are already charged with genocide,rape, torture,. forced transportation of children to Russia to be ‘re-educated, and the reason the Ukrainians supported the Nazis in WWII was,because unlike the Russians, they hadn’t killed 30million Ukrainians yet….
Why does Russia claim Crimea is full of Russian speakers? Because they ethnically cleansed it of its original Tatars. Look it up. Why is the per capita support for Ukraine the greatest among ex Sovbloc nations? Because they know what its like to be run by Russia.
You do not stop deaths by surrendering, when you are facing an enemy who is perfectly prepared to kill every man woman and child in your country.
It wasn’t Putin who tore up the Minsk peace accords from 2014. Ex German Chancellor and French President both confirmed that the deal they helped broker was simply a delaying tactic, a ruse, to give time to build up the Ukrainian military.
Nor did Putin tear up the one that was tentatively agreed in Turkey shortly after the start of this sorry affair.
Zelinsky was ready to sign, until orders came from Washington (via Boris Johnston) that he was not allowed to.
Why should any Russian leader believe the West is acting in good faith?
The West wanted regime change in Moscow. I would still say they should be careful what they wish for.
For internal political reasons Putin is probably not able now to settle for less than regime change in Kiev AND Washington DC. He may well get both.
“Zelinsky was ready to sign, until orders came from Washington (via Boris Johnston) that he was not allowed to.”
How ridiculous! Do you realize you are believing ridiculous things? You are making claims for which you have no proof. This is called a conspiriacy thoery.
Putin’s right hand man before Putin killed him, said the invasion of Ukraine was done to conquer territory and make money from doing so, and all those other reasons you gave above were BS used as propaganda so Putin could give himself permission to invade.
Greed and delusions of grandeur are what caused the invasion of Ukraine.
That and weakness shown by President Biden in the withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Biden’s running away from the battle gave Putin the idea that Biden would run away in Ukraine, too. And Biden would run away from Ukraine if he thought he could get away with it politically, which he cannot. So instead of running away in Ukraine, Biden slow-walks the support the Ukrainains need to defend themselves.
Biden is a timid little warmonger.
Bribem is a bought and paid for traitor.
Along with most of the Left leaning US media, the right leaning US media, 30% of the democrats and 50% of republican politicians.
Why only 30%? because another 20% actually believe the Leftist spew coming out of the FSB and being funnelled to all the bought and paid for left wing organisations.
Russian weaponised Marxism, and funded all the hard Left and EcoHippy anti-nuclear organisations of the Cold War. Since then it is taking over right wing ones as well.
It never ceases to amaze me the number of unfounded conspiracy theories Putin gets his dupes to swallow.
Got any documentation on this claim that both the French and German leaders have admitted that the whole Ukraine independence movement was never anything more than the final phases of a decades long plot to remove Putin from power.
As to your belief that the US secretly runs the Ukraine, got any actual evidence to support that? Or is it just another thing that Putin has instructed you to believe. Are the Illuminati the source of this plot, or perhaps it’s the Free Masons operating alongside the Bilderburgs?
Why would anyone believe that Putin is acting in good faith, especially when hes been stating that that the rebuilding of the Soviet Empire has always been his goal.
Why would Putin ever settle for less than regime change in Ukraine, that was the whole reason why he started the war.
Ursula Vonda Liar, who escaped prosecution for corruption and cronyism when the German minister of defence, by being chosen (not elected) to be President of the EU, which has never impeached or sacked a single top official ever.
Following the grand tradition of a drunk (Jean Claude Junker) and a mafia man (Barroso)
The money the FSB didn’t spend on blackmailing and Bribing US politicians and media stars they spent on buying the EU, and especially Germany’s politicians. Why did Communist borne Merkel agree to plant so many windmills and shit down nuclear power to placate the greens that her country became utterly dependent on Russian gas?
Cui bono?
World war three is started, and we are all being gaslighted. You saw through global warming, why cant you see through this?
I agree, you have fallen for ludicrous propaganda. Ukraine could not survive that level of combat losses.
No such draft deal exists. And if it did no one would trust Russia any more.
Show me one case in which the Russian state has acted with any honor with respect to any deal it has agreed to?
You gave your post the correct title: “Ludicrous propaganda”.
The hot scot comes out with his usual nutter ex-plod opinions about Ukraine, a place he has never visited and knows sweet F-A about Russia also.
If you are so pro-Putin, why don’t you try living there?
I have, and so have my family, which is why we left!
Numpty!
Ukraine’s October counteroffensive plan is “camouflage for Zelensky’s scheme to steal more money from the West,” Sputnik News quotes former State Department liaison Lt. Scott Bennett as Ukrainian casualties (killed/wounded) top 90,000 since June 4.
https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/10/90000-ukrainians-lost-meat-grinder-western-idiots-pushing/
“Ukraine’s October counteroffensive plan is “camouflage for Zelensky’s scheme to steal more money from the West,”
Oh, brother! Another pathetic conspiracy theory.
They read it on the internet, it must be true.
My figures were for deaths, not casualties, which include wounded, missing, captured or deserted.
Your figures were plucked out of someone’s arse.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gr2EYKbjsAw
is a shade more balanced and informative.
The CR, sans Ukraine funding, has now been signed into ‘law’ by His Corruptness. Ironic, no?
They still hope to get a separate Ukraine funding deal.
Yes, this bill was only a temporary funding bill but assurances were made to those who are in favor of Ukraine funding that those funds would be included in the permanent resolution to be done within the next 45 days if they went along for now.
The same money to Ukraine as for building the wall on our southern border, for as long as it takes?
“They still hope to get a separate Ukraine funding deal.”
They *will* get a Ukraine funding deal.
Otherwise, our whole foreign policy position will crumble.
It’s alright to hold the Europeans feet to the fire by requiring them to pay their full defense obligations. Half the EU nations are spending the required amounts and about half are not, so the ones who are not are fair game for criticism from United States politicians.
But if U.S. politicians cut off funding for Ukraine arbitrarily, then they are destroying NATO cohesion, and on top of that, they are encouraging our enemies Putin and Xi in their reckless behavior.
It is in the interests of the United States that Putin be prevented from taking Ukraine. Americans troops are not required, only American money. The Ukrainians are more than willing to fight for their country. We should help them all we can. It is in our greater interests, not just in Ukraine, to do so. Not to do so would be extremely damaging to the United States on the world stage.
Putin’s goal has always been the destruction of NATO, so naturally those who support Putin also favor it.
If the USA withdraws support for Ukraine, China will walk into Taiwan and Russia into Alaska, the Baltic states and Poland. And we will have WWIII on our hands.
McCarthy was called a traitor, not to be trusted, because he had agreed to hold an up/down vote on Ukraine aid, before the Senate voted to end the looming shutdown.
GOP rightists are pi..ed, want his scalp
Everything will work out for ze best by granting pharma companies more immunity.
A small group of Republicans are causing problems for the rest. This is called a “tryanny of the minority”.
This small group of Republicans are being useful idiots for the radical Democrats. They are weakening Republicans in a time when they should be trying to make Repubicans look as strong and competent as possible. So, for all intents and purposes, this small group of Republicans are putting us in danger of putting another Democrat in the White House, which would end the freedoms of all of us, including this small group of Republicans.
We need to elect about 300 Repubicans to the House of Representatives next time, and then a small radical group of Republcians won’t make any difference, because they won’t have the veto power. Give someone a little power (Gaetz) and sometimes it goes to their head, and they think they can do just what *they* want to do.
We’ll see how this works out. We’ll see the results of their machinations. Some of them talk a good game, but then reality sets in.
“What am I signing?” — Creepy Joe Bribeme
Thats just total BS. I don’t believe for one second he bothers to question or is interested in what he is told to sign.
I can’t answer for Soros, but for the millions supporting Ukraine against Russia this has nothing whatsoever to do with climate change, except that Russia has long funded green and anti nuclear groups to ensure that renewables , which need Russian gas, triumph over nuclear power, that doesn’t.
Perhaps Soros is lying because he has assets tied up in Russia, but for Europeans, who have, unlike the USA, been occupied and slaughtered by French, Germans, Russians, and even Islamists in their history, its all about not wanting to be Russian, as they all have that T shirt already, and prefer McDonalds to beetroot soup and boiled cabbage.
We are profoundly grateful for US aid to Ukraine, even if it allows accountants to make some kudos out of obsolete kit that would have to be written off anyway.
Ukraine is fighting our war against one of the most vicious regimes this side of North Korea, who have been paying enormous sums to corrupt Western politicians and media people for years. The ideological Left’s play book was written by the KGB for the sole purpose of destroying Western Culture. Russia controls the Left’s message.
This is not just some nation and some country that is of no interest to the USA. Russia is a threat to the whole West, and if it is allowed to get away with this it will in the end swallow up the whole of Europe and want Alaska back.
If we don’t support Ukraine, will we support Poland? You and we have signed a treaty to say you will. No matter what bollocks Soros says or how much Russian propaganda tries to tell you this ‘is not your war’.
Well said.
”I can’t answer for Soros, but for the millions supporting Ukraine against Russia this has nothing whatsoever to do with climate change, except that Russia has long funded green and anti nuclear groups to ensure that renewables”
Yep. China as well. Of course this stupid conflict never would have started if NATO had any balls right from the start but Putin played them like a violin. All they (NATO) needed to do was tell Putin that if he put one foot into Ukraine it would get chopped off. But NOOOOOOOOOOO. Piss-fart around and worry about nukes that would never come is what they did and continue to do. All of NATO is to blame for letting this happen. Now they have to pay for their tactical errors.
I would like to know: You fully support the theft of Ukrainian agricultural land, the use of Ukranians as lab rats, orphan breeders and mail order wives, and specifically, you approve of the genocide Monsatano, Cargil et al unleashed upon the Orthodox Christians, bombing planes, schools and apartment buildings until they begged for help, which only Russia had the gumption to answer?
I hate it when this site gets political, and all the …ishness starts hanging out!
Is there anything so stupid, that you won’t believe it.
Are you really insane enough to believe that Russia invaded the Ukraine, in order to save them from Monsanto?
PS: If the Russians only invaded because the Ukrainians were begging the for help, who is it those same Ukrainians are working so hard to kill Russian soldiers.
Oddly enough there is a comment somewhere from a Ukrainian in the occupied territories “we were not against Russians. Many of us had Russian friends,we spoke Russians well as Ukrainians, we were against Putin and the regime…
…until the Russians came and smashed our cities, raped and tortured us, filled mass graves with us and stole our children. Now we hate all Russians”
Was it wrong to let Russia invade Crimea?
OK, appeasement didn’t work (again) but at least it made it clear to everyone that the West was trying to avoid a war.
Did the west object when Nikita Khrushchev carved Crimea, which had been part of Russia since Catherine the Great, off Russia and handed it to Ukraine?
Nope…..Not a squeak.
Would Russia care if America handed New Mexico to Mexico?
Nope.
Would Russia care if America attacked Mexico 70 years later to take New Mexico back?
Nope.
OK.
Let’s hand Orkney back to Norway and the central belt, Edinburgh and Glasgow back to England.
Don’t worry about it. We will send foreign military in and the do a plebiscite. I’m sure we can get over 90% agreement at gunpoint.
Russia won’t care about that, either.
Because they don’t care about democracy.
While we are at it, can we send in the British Army to take Dublin, and to Edinburgh to put the SNP on trial and de Nazify Scotland.
Oh and France, can we have back Brittany, Normandy, Gascony….
..and de Nazify Rhodesia and South Africa, and of course, the USA, which really belongs to Britain. I mean they all speak English and they all really want to have King Charles for president? (Lord knows he couldn’t be worse than Biden)
As you point out, Khrushchev was the leader of Russia, when he gave away the Crimea. Which means it now belongs to Ukrainians. It is illegitimate for to invade to take it back, just because he wants to rebuild the Soviet Union.
By your logic, Mexico would be justified in attacking the US to get back the southwest, and Russia would be justified in attacking the US in order to recover Alaska.
Well on your stupid ex-plod comment basis we should invade Kaliningrad and hand it back to Germany+ some other historic “errors”:
Only problem, it would certainly provoke the (re) invasion of Poland which if you remember started the 2nd world war.
Russia had its Navy in Crimea since 1783, after winning a couple of wars with the Ottoman Empire, which ceded all the northern lands of the Black Sea, from western parts, the Danube to Odessa to the eastern part of the Black Sea, including Crimea, etc.
Remember, the Crimea population voted to be reunited with Russia by 95%, to end the nightmare of being forced to speak Ukrainian.
Kiev banned the Russian Orthodox Church, banned opposition parties, banned Russian TV shows, banned Russian books, the list is long.
“Russia had its Navy in Crimea since 1783”
I think they have pulled out of Crimea recently. The Ukrainians are doing a lot of damage to their ships and infrastructure there.
Yeah, I have noticed the Ukraine supporters ignore history or ignorant as they don’t realize Ukraine has been part of Russia for most of the last few hundred years which is why there are a lot of Russians in the easter half.
Are you advocating that N. America be given back to the first people’s. After all, they were here before we were?
Russia starved, murdered, exiled and drove off the indigenous inhabitants of Crimea, the Tatars. They were still a majority well into the 19th century, as during the Crimean War. The USSR finished them off, so that now they’ve largely been replaced by recent Russian immigrants.
The few remaining Tatars want Ukraine to control Crimea, just as they preferred Turkey in the 18th and 19th centuries.
The latest Defence minister of Ukraine is a Tatar.
Blatant untruths.
“the Crimea population voted to be reunited with Russia by 95%, to end the nightmare of being forced to speak Ukrainian”
In your dreams!!!
I never read such a load of old twaddle ever.
I was many times in Crimea before 2014.
Nobody was being forced to do anything, and the tartars who knew they were about to experience a 2nd genocide boycotted the fake plebiscite with the Ukrainians.
Crimea was already a semi-autonomous area before 2014, and as bankrupt as ever – living off tourism, gambling & prostitution, just like it tries to today.
Zilch to do with Ukraine or language.
Actually, it was the West and NATO who destabilized the region that forced Russia into a corner who realized they were being primed for removal as Biden himself stated.
I notice not a single person here who commented bothers to mention history back to 1991 where the West told Yeltsin that NATO wouldn’t expand eastward that Russia was originally concerned about the Warsaw pact was dissolved and small nations freed by the Russian Federation.
Here is why Russia finally invaded Ukraine who were abusing the dominant Russian people that caused the civil war to brew up in the Donbass area.
Eisenhower Media Network
1990 – U.S. assures Russia that NATO will not expand towards its border “…there would be no extension of…NATO one inch to the east,” says US Secretary of State James Baker.
1996 – U.S. weapons manufacturers form the Committee to Expand NATO, spending over $51 million lobbying Congress.
1997 – 50 foreign policy experts including former senators, retired military officers and diplomats sign an open letter stating NATO expansion to be “a policy error of historic proportions.”
1999 – NATO admits Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic to NATO. U.S. and NATO bomb Russia’s ally, Serbia.
2001 – U.S. unilaterally withdraws from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.
2004 – Seven more Eastern European nations join NATO. NATO troops are now directly on Russia’s border.
2004 – Russia’s parliament passed a resolution denouncing NATO’s expansion. Putin responded by saying that Russia would “build our defense and security policy correspondingly.”
2008 – NATO leaders announced plans to bring Ukraine and Georgia, also on Russia’s borders, into NATO.
2009 – U.S. announced plans to put missile systems into Poland and Romania.
2014 – Legally elected Ukrainian president, Viktor Yanukovych, fled violence to Moscow. Russia views ouster as a coup by U.S. and NATO nations.
2016 – U.S. begins troop buildup in Europe.
2019 – U.S. unilaterally withdraws from Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty.
2020 – U.S. unilaterally withdraws from Open Skies Treaty.
2021 – Russia submits negotiation proposals while sending more forces to the border with Ukraine. U.S. and NATO officials reject the Russian proposals immediately.
LINK
In that same agreement that you consider sacrosanct, Russia also pledged to respect the territorial integrity of the Ukraine. It only took Russia a few years to violate that pledge. But you seem to feel that the west is still bound by the agreement.
Regardless, the only person who ever talked about Ukraine joining NATO was the Ukrainian leadership. And it was quite understandable, Russia had already attacked them twice to steal land, and was mobilizing it’s forces to take the rest.
It was called appeasement when Hitler play the same game.
It would have been better if Hitler and Stalin had been allowed to beat each other’s brains in, which they both had drawn up plans to do.
Unfortunately, Britain drew a red line with Poland, which was simultaneously invaded by both monsters. Hitler then went West and the whole mess ended up with Stalin occupying half of Europe.
As someone who hails from ‘wokeachussetts’ (probably sic), you should be painfully aware that there are a lot of unintended consequences when government’s throw their weight around.
Except- Hitler would have defeated Russia if we stayed out of. I see nothing wrong with being a citizen of the most powerful nation on the planet- balancing the power structures of other nations. Better America than any other nation. So, the nations that were our enemies in WWII are now are allies and our former allies are our enemies. Basic Machiavellian. As for Wokeachusetts, it sucks big time. It’s now 100% woke and just about everybody living here- all of the media, academia, even most businesses sing the climate emergency opera.
Except that America was two years late in joining the war in Europe. By which time the single most decisive battle of the entire war was raging: “It was Stalingrad that would be immortalized around the world for turning the tide for the Allies in World War II” https://origins.osu.edu/milestones/august-2017-stalingrad-75-turning-point-world-war-ii-europe?language_content_entity=en
Contradicted by Biden telling the world that America has run out of 155mm artillery shells to send to Ukraine.
What business is it of America to balance the power structures of other nations, especially since you can’t balance you own nations borders from invasion by immigrants.
Why?
Considering you followed that statement with: “As for Wokeachusetts, it sucks big time. It’s now 100% woke and just about everybody living here- all of the media, academia, even most businesses sing the climate emergency opera.”
Russia doesn’t do WOKE.
‘…especially since you can’t balance you own nations borders from invasion by immigrants.’
Ouch! Of course, there seems to be a lot of that going around in the West these days.
Anyway, if you ever figure out why folks who dislike everything ‘Biden’, including his administration’s overt wokery and support for climate alarmism, can be so eager to support a corrupt regime 1) that the corrupt Biden family was up to their eyeballs in, and 2) whose WEF / UN approved leader greatly assisted the Left / Democrats in throwing Trump under the bus, please let me know.
Biden would wash his hands of Ukraine just like he did with Afghanistan, if he thought he could get away with it.
But the political will in Washington DC in both parties is to support Ukraine, and the polls show a majority of Americans support Ukraine, so Biden has to make it look like he is in line with this thinking.
But Biden is definitely slow-walking the support to Ukraine, as an appeaser like him is likely to do.
The USSR and UK would have been defeated in 1941 without US Lend Lease and Atlantic patrols, plus Japan’s deciding to attack the US rather than the USSR.
“What business is it of America to balance the power structures of other nations”
Some of those nations may be serious threats to the United States so the U.S. has to “balance their power sturctures”.
The world needs a policeman. Can you think of a better one than the United States? Somebody has to unite the good nations against the bad dictators.
Well the UK. More experience of it than anyone.
Right, so a country with a 300 year history nominates itself to police nations with 1,000+ years of history? (The first State level society, the Erlitou culture was an early Bronze Age urban society and archaeological culture that existed in the Yellow River valley from approximately 1900 to 1500 BC. [Wikipedia])
3,923 years of Chinese history, but America knows best.
A country with a single common language, culture, faith and economy deems to be the global policeman across nations with hundreds of different cultures, languages, faiths, economies and innumerable interconnected borders?
A global policeman which has invaded, bombed and brutalised at least 71 nations since WW2.
A global policeman that invented and used the first and only nuclear weapons ever used in the world, then objects when other countries deem it necessary to develop their own nuclear deterrent to that threat, then has the audacity to scream Dictatorship at selected countries that deem it appropriate to arm themselves with the very weapons America deems appropriate to attack other countries with.
A global policeman with hundreds of nuclear armed military bases scattered across the globe.
A global policeman which can’t control one of only two borders it has with other nations.
A global policeman that fosters gender confusion and racial division in its own country.
A global policemen with skyrocketing crime levels and minority groups demanding, and getting, the nations police forces defunded.
A global policeman with levels of political corruption so entrenched that a political nomination guarantees a life of extreme wealth.
A global policeman which amassed the greatest industrial society in the world, astonishing wealth, then gave it away to China and has military veterans sleeping on the streets.
This is your idea of responsible, global stewardship? Just which country is the global dictator here?
You should realize that Russia was being heavily supplied by America for several years before they finally arrived in Normandy in June 1944.
‘As for Wokeachusetts…’
I knew there was good chance that I spelled it incorrectly.
I’m hoping the word ends up in the dictionary- that’ll be my main legacy, coining a word that to me has a lot of meaning, personally. I’ll skip for the time being mentioning much about how I’ve been stabbed in the back a number of times by this utterly corrupt state.
Get someone to do a cover of the BeeGee’s ‘Massachusetts’ with Wokeachusetts instead – that’ll start the ball rolling!
Had Germany been able to focus all of their troops on Russia and had America not provided huge amounts of material aid, Germany would have been able to beat Russia. There’s a chance the Italians could have been talked into sending a few troops as well.
My point is Russia means the West harm, but I presented evidence that European leaders are also not acting like friends.
I never said Europe should stop supporting Ukraine, what I said is there will be serious consequences for the USA if the USA continues supporting Ukraine.
Maybe the US people will decide supporting Ukraine is worth the price of empowering EU leaders who have demonstrated their eagerness to massively meddle in US politics. That is not for me to decide. All I am doing is pointing out the consequences.
Where is there evidence of this?
https://www.newsweek.com/russia-state-tv-discusses-nuclear-strike-yellowstone-volcano-1783485
This is a retired Russian Naval officer pontificating on a TV show.
We have plenty of those in the west.
It is not evidence of official government policy.
Evidence?
They invaded Ukraine.
Oh! You think that anywhere Russia wants to control is not western?
Guess Scotland will fall under Putin’s dictatorship and you will then explain why Scotland has always been opposed to the West.
Evidence isn’t what you really want, is it?
They also invaded Georgia and rescued the mass murderous Assad regime in Syria when it was one day away from being overthrown.
How many of the 71 countries America/NATO has invaded since WW2 would you like me to name?
How many despotic regimes America/NATO has helped/formed over the same period would you like me to name?
You also ignore that Syria is as entitled as any other to invite assistance from any other country it wishes, Russia is in Syria by invitation. The numerous American military bases in the country are not, but you wouldn’t call the American presence there an invasion……Despite it being so.
“For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.“
Yes, they invaded Ukraine BECAUSE the west made it clear they wanted to surround Russia with NATO bases then provoke a war for the purpose of destroying Russia.
In other words, the west made a decision to help those countries that were being threatened by Russian aggression.
That would be NATO threatening Russia with nuclear weapons being placed in Ukraine, directed at Moscow.
America didn’t like it when the USSR tried than in Cuba, but sure, you Yanks are just fine repeating the same mistake.
100%.
But Kiev bombing it’s own people for 8 years is OK as far as you’re concerned. No American help for those people yet you are happy to conduct your own invasion of Syria under the pretext of protecting its people.
Russia didn’t want to control anything in Ukraine. A draft peace deal was signed in March 2022 with Ukraine which described the withdrawal of Russia back to its pre-February 2022 positions.
Biden, via Boris Johnson, ordered Zelensky to tear the deal up.
“Where is there evidence of this?”
Where to start? How far back in time do you want to go?
Go as far back as you wish. I’d welcome your historic insight.
You might want to go back to the year 907 and the Rus’-Byzantine War when Oleg led an army to the walls of Constantinople.
You’ll have around 800 years to cover before the formation of the USA in 1776.
American’s believe they have a divine right to judge other countries when they have no concept of the centuries of conflicted history the European and Indo-China continents have evolved from
We have numerous interconnected borders with, in many cases, entirely different cultures, languages, economies and peoples living cheek by jowl. We have endured wars and border disputes long before America was around, none of which conforms to straightforward, black and white analysis.
By comparison, settlers in America all but wiped out the indigenous populations and carved up the country into borderless States with a common language, culture and economy. There are two borders, Canada and Mexico.
Most Americans don’t have a clue where Ukraine is never mind the first inkling of its history.
Ukraine is Biden’s personal war, destroying as much evidence as possible of his family’s predation on the most corrupt country in Europe.
The USA signed a treaty to keep Ukraine whole, Russia signed the same treaty and then reneged and invaded. Would you trust a person who signed a contract with you and then reneged? If the USA reneges on its promise then the world will know not to trust them in the future.
Nonsense.
Russia attempted to negotiate with Ukraine before the SMO, they refused.
Former German Chancellor Angela Merkel recently admitted the Minsk Agreement was signed with Russia as cover for the west to train and provision a Ukrainian military.
I would ask you the same question: “Would you trust a person who signed a contract with you and then reneged?”
Furthermore, Russia and Ukraine signed a draft peace treaty in March of 2022, a month after the SMO began. Biden despatched Boris Johnson to Kiev to order Zelensky to tear it up, which he did.
I’ll ask it again: “Would you trust a person who signed a contract with you and then reneged?”
Eric,
The Europeans, part of the Golden Billion in Eden, saw Russia as a colony, a convenient, nearby, low-cost gas station to be exploited; sell them Mercedes at high prices, etc., and buy energy and materials at low prices, for decades.
Thousands of European companies set up subsidiaries in Russia after 1990, to sell goods and services. This led to more control over the Russian economy and an unhealthy dependence of the Russia economy on Europe
Then Brussels, aiming to cement its dominance, dreamt up rules and regulations of Energy Packages, which were aimed against Russia. Brussels aimed to get total control over Russian-owned energy properties in Europe.
On top of that, NATO expanded beyond East Germany to the Russian borders
Then, the U.S. decided to install an extremist-nationalist government in Kiev in 2014, after ousting a legally elected President
It is easy to see where this was going if you are an alert Russian
None of that was working out in favor of Russia, because that was the intent of Western actions
“Maybe the US people will decide supporting Ukraine is worth the price of empowering EU leaders who have demonstrated their eagerness to massively meddle in US politics.”
I think this is much ado about nothing.
There was no massive meddling. EU leaders talking a few local U.S. mayors into signing up for Net Zero is not massive meddling in U.S. elections.
None of the meddling in American elections in the past can be considered “massive”, not Russian meddling, or Chinese meddling, or any other nation’s meddling. There is no evidence this meddling influenced even one vote.
Soros was a Nazi collaborator. Russia kicked him out the country long ago.
It’s now clear that there is a Nazi problem in Ukraine since the Canadian parliament, to a man/woman/thing, rose to their feet and applauded a Ukrainian member of the Waffen SS, a proscribed terrorist group with every member condemned as a war criminal when the extent of their atrocities were discovered at the end of WW2.
Poland is now demanding the extradition of that Ukrainian Nazi to stand trial for his crimes. Poland has also stopped providing any military equipment to Ukraine.
As for the rest of your nonsense, America/NATO has prosecuted at least 71 major conflicts overseas since WW2. American troops have been mobilised 241 times since 1991 and has several hundred overseas military bases.
Russia by comparison, has something fewer than a handful of overseas military installations of which, Syria is by invitation whilst Americas presence in the country is by occupation.
Now America is meddling in Taiwan, which was handed over to the Chinese in 1945 following its occupation by the Japanese and liberation by US/UK and Chinese military. The Potsdam Declaration refers.
There is no evidence whatsoever that Russia wants to March into Europe. Indeed, we were all assured by people like you that Russia’s army is weak, ineffective, populated by conscripts and criminals, and would soon be destroyed by Ukraine. How could they possibly march into Europe, especially as they are allegedly being defeated by Ukraine?
This is an outright lie. Poland is continuing to fulfil its arms agreements with Ukraine, to supply warsaw era equipment while it renews its own military from NATO suppliers. The fact is, they’re running out of warsaw pact equipment to send.
Poland no longer supplying weapons to Ukraine amid grain row
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66873495
Poland will no longer send weapons to Ukraine, says PM, as grain dispute escalates
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/sep/21/poland-stop-ukraine-weapons-supply-grain-exports-dispute
Bring receipts when you call me a liar.
Sounds more like my assessment than yours.
Your source for this?
https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/confident-of-poland-continuing-ukraine-military-support-despite-strained-ties-nato-chief-says/ar-AA1htC5R
https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1816567/poland-wobbling-on-promise-ukraine-weapons
they’re having an argument about grain imports, which are still being blockaded by Russia (the aggressor, remember, who is the cause of all of this in the first place).
I called you a liar because you tried to spin this as something other than what it was. Poland is angry because Ukraine’s grain is flooding its markets. That grain is only flooding its markets because Russia invaded Ukraine and bombed its ports on the black sea until they were unusable.
Whilst Poland is “confident” it will resume arms supply to Ukraine, factually, it has stopped supplying them.
I see. Russia is supposed to be happy that NATO membership for Ukraine was being discussed placing nuclear weapons just minutes flight time from Moscow.
Try that in Cuba.
My statement was: “Poland has also stopped providing any military equipment to Ukraine.” (you even repeated it, for clarity) replying: “This is an outright lie. Poland is continuing to fulfil its arms agreements with Ukraine, to supply warsaw era equipment while it renews its own military from NATO suppliers.”
No mention of spin there. You called me a liar and I called you out.
Irrespective of the grain deal, Poland has stopped providing arms to Ukraine.
Have the dignity to admit you were wrong instead of squirming.
Poland’s ambassador to the U.S., Marek Magierowski, has written a comment in the Wall Street Journal (Sept. 26th) as to why “Poland Won’t Stand for Lectures on Ukraine“. History, current events, and indignation wrapped into a 542 well-worded essay.
Soros is an Hungarian, who tried to undermine his own government
He was exiled from Hungary
Holocaust groups will hunt down a 97 year old slob that sold potatoes to a concentration camp. If Soros was the “Nazi” that some claim he is, those same organizations would be after him for his assets.
I guess the speaker of the Canadian parliament resigned because Hunka wasn’t a member of the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS.
I agree with you in most ways. The parallels with Hitler around 1938 are striking, although swallowing all of Europe and wanting Alaska? Such hyperbole does you no good.
However, Ukraine is almost as corrupt as Russia, and it is my tax dollars being sent there and wasted there.
If Biden were not trashing the economy and weakening what he is not stealing, I might well send money to Ukraine, but I might not — it is my decision, not Biden’s or Congress’s. Or Trump’s.
So why didn’t we provide weapons to Ukraine when it was part of the USSR? Or to Hungary in 1956 or Czechoslovakia in 1968 when the Soviets crushed their rebellions?
We should have, but the Soviet Union was both dangerous and had too much influence in the US.
“We are profoundly grateful for US aid to Ukraine, ”
Is that the Royal “We”? You don’t speak for this European.
Peace with Russia was available in Europe from 1991. But that wasn’t enough for powerful people in Washington DC.
This proxy-war has been long envisaged and promoted, even when think-tank reports said expanding NATO into Ukraine would likely provoke military conflict with Russia.
Peace with Russia was fine for a while (remember the ‘reset button’) until Germany and France asked Russia to support them against USA on the Gulf War situation. After that there had to be a political gap between Russia and Europe or USA stood to lose all European influence.
I fail to understand why that wasn’t a good thing.
Western propaganda bombarded us incessantly with tales of Saddam gassing his own people. But when the Obama installed, Kiev puppet government in Ukraine bombed their own people in eastern Ukraine for 8 years for having the audacity to demand self governance, not a squeak from anyone.
Maybe they didn’t see it the way you do.
Does that justify killing your own citizens?
Not only is the Ukraine funding taking money from climate action, both climate action and Ukraine money is taking food out of people’s mouth, and kicking people out their houses and into a tent in a city park.
Govt just prints more, devaluing by a bit the money already in the economy causing some inflation. When inflation gets bad enough that a public revolt against the govt is a possibility, the govt declares war on a neighboring state with a winner-takes the-wealth outcome. It’s been the way of governments since fiat money was invented.
The global geopolitical scene has changed in the past twenty years, even other European nations seem to be showing little commitment to getting seriously engaged in stopping Russian revanchist ambitions.
Revanchist: Seeking revenge or retaliation.
Against whom? Last I checked, the “West” have been “getting back at the enemy” since 1913.
Methinks yer ass is burning about all them “religious” organisations recently expelled from Russia? Very revanchist, that.
You truncated the full definition “revanchism: a policy of seeking to retaliate, especially to recover lost territory” (Oxford).
Precisely! The only people who lost territory, were BlackRock, Vanguard and what was that pharmaceutical company the Bidens have stoick in, again?
So, the revancists, by your definition, is JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs and the Federal Reserve System, using their taxpayer-funded thugs in the Pentagon and Brussels, trying to reclaim the Donbass, for more GMO and bio-“defence”?
Goddit!
Where in history do you stop? Russia under the Czars had an expansionist empire building campaign from at least the 15th century. Should we insist borders are returned to the 1970s or the 1470s?
Should the UK breakup where would the borders be. How about Hadrian’s Wall and Offa’s Dyke as starting points?
I don’t have ‘a dog in the the fight’, I’m simply offering a
possibleprobable Russian motivation.Russia isn’t run by the Czar’s any longer.
Russia (the USSR) having been handed eastern Europe by the allies following WW2 struck upon a contractive policy in 1991 when the USSR peacefully dissolved itself.
Can you name another nation in the world in recent history, which has peacefully and voluntarily contracted it’s geographic area of control?
Since which time, Russia has embraced democracy (you might not like the flavour of democracy it operates but everyday Russians are quite happy with it) and economically improved it’s lot beyond all recognition in just forty years.
I also fail to understand why Germany, the country most responsible for WW2, is accepted into NATO; but Russia, a nation which sacrificed 26 million people fighting Germany in WW2, was refused entry into NATO following the break up of the USSR.
Well, that’s not true, I do know. It’s because NATO is jobs for the boys. It has no reason to exist, as the reason for it’s existence, communist USSR, no longer exist’s.
Obviously yes.
Notably the UK. The Winds of Change speech was an official declaration of the end of the Empire. When Malta voted to stay part of the Empire the UK over-ruled then and insisted they leave.
This is not like Russia’s empire who enforced their empire as long as they could afford to.
The US returned almost all of the land that we conquered during WWII.
The Soviets on the other hand, kept almost all of the land that they conquered.
That’s a fair point and another good example.
That’s funny since Russia didn’t annex anything since 1991until the Civil war started inside Ukraine…….
The Republican Party Slogan
Make Russia Great Again
Yeah, right? Bill Clinton pressured Ukraine to nuclear disarmament, offering a promise also signed by Russia to guarantee Ukraine.
Barack Obama showed what such promises were worth in 2014, with Crimea. Obama also refused lethal aid to Ukraine.
Hillary Clinton was totally responsible for the Russiagate claims, that Putin was somehow responsible for her loss, along with Trump somehow collaborating.
Obviously, Ukraine has become a proxy for domestic bumfights, with aid being a cover for other concerns, or a laundry for other causes.
“Obviously, Ukraine has become a proxy for domestic bumfights, with aid being a cover for other concerns”
That’s right. And these “other concerns” may end up putting another Democrat in the White House, which would be devastating for the nation and for our personal freedoms.
There are a number of Repubicans who need to look at the Big Picture, not just their little piece of the puzzle. The Big Picture being: The radical Democrats are an existential threat to our freedoms.
If you make Republicans look extreme, or incompetent, or ignorant, then you help the radical Democrats steal our country away from us. Squabbling over the small stuff, like a Ukraine budget, does just that.
Yeah, I know you think our budget is out of control and it is , but we can survive a little of this for a little bit longer. What we can’t survive is another radical Democrat in the White House. Your priority should be to prevent that from happening. All else is unimportant at this time.
The situation in Eastern Europe is due to the Democrats, generally, with Bill Clinton’s cronies looting Russia rather than actually trying to support new governments.
The Democrats since LBJ have treated all foreigners as tools in their domestic games, and are quite willing to ignore their own policy of a few years earlier to score a point.
I just think you might be playing into the Democrats current scam.
Kruschev didn’t see the end of the Soviet Union as a possibility….
It’s a wickedly complex history as Trudeau found out!
Not really. The Bolsheviks stole the world via their Federal Reserve System, and all the rest is various groups trying to escape the Bretton Woods slavery. All other “history” is propaganda designed to hide this economic system from the public.
The reason we hate National Socialism, is because it robs power from the neo-Nazi’s and their enablers*, while giving working plebes delusions of relevancy and happiness.
The world is where it is, because so many people have been convinced that public issues are “complex”, and only “experts” have the right to air opinion. You and I receive our opinion from shiny susperstars who sift through the “information overload” for us. The glittery background hides the puppet strings very well indeed.
-* I shall remind no-one of the cultural background of the neo-Nazi leadership harassing the American public two weeks or so ago…
You should do some reading matey
You mean, I should read what you read, and definitely not question it?
Besides, it’s not what you read, so much as what you learn from it. Which is why you should start reading some stuff you don’t necessarily agree with, then you may learn why I smiled at your snarky comment.
No, he means read something other than the conspiracy theory websites where you get most of the lies you keep spreading.
Trudeau was in diapers when the NAZI butchers of Jews and Poles were welcomed in Canada
Trudeau is still in diapers. Trudeau, Freeland, and Guilbeault are Canada’s Great Embarrassment, in every policy they’ve ever touched.
Soros would want Russia defeated, wouldn’t he?
He did, after all, collaborate with the Nazi’s.
Perhaps he should attend the Canadian Parliament some time soon and be applauded.
What would happen if Russia were defeated? Total collapse of the rouble, businesses going under and able to be purchased for peanuts? Of course Soros wants Russia defeated – he’s planning on moving in and taking over the oil and gas businesses, probably plans on making an absolute killing.
Russia losing, weakening, breaking up like Yugoslavia, would be a free for all
The West would swoop in and start plundering, even more than it did under Yeltsin
Putin put a stop to the plundering
The West hates Putin, especially after becoming an ally of China, Iran, North Korea, and a leader of BRISC plus
Agreed, but Russia was driven to ally with China by the west’s naked aggression.
I entirely agree.
“What would happen if Russia were defeated?”
Russia is not going to be defeated by the Ukrainians.
What the Ukrainians are going to defeat are the Russans who are attacking them in Ukraine. Once the Russians attacking the Ukrainians in Ukraine are expelled from Ukraine, then the Ukrainians will stop their forward movement and not seek to defeat the whole of the Russian nation.
If the Russians pull out of Ukraine, the war will be over.
If Putin were to pull out of the Ukraine, his internal opponents would pull him down, and do to him what Putin has done to so many who have opposed him.
That’s why Putin won’t, can’t give up his war in the Ukraine.
A lot of conflating goin’ on here.
I am embarrassed that anyone on this site would see any connection with the Ukraine invasion and global warming. Seriously?
I am further embarrassed that Republicans (establishment RINO’s and conservatives alike) would conflate Ukraine with Iraqafghanistan. Yeah, pull our boys out of Ukraine, no more body bags, etc etc. This is not a proxy war. Ukraine is not our client state. We have no troops there and won’t be sending any. It was a DC politicians’ piggy bank, but that era seems to be over with the coming Congressional hearings.
What is our interest there otherwise? Russian aggression?
Well, Ukraine gave up its nukes in exchange for our promise to guarantee their borders. Maybe we should give them a handful of old tac nukes to square things.
NATO was formed to inhibit Russian expansion in Europe. Every bomb, gun, rocket, and tank was acquired to blow up invading Russian tanks and kill invading Russian soldiers. That’s what the Ukrainians are using them for. The more they do, the less we need to worry about.
If we stop funding them, the Ukrainians won’t stop fighting the Russians. They’ll just lose more men and the Russians will lose fewer.
Here’s the big worry. Putin has been doing little aggressions here and there to add to his empire. Chechnya twice, Georgia twice, now Ukraine twice. If he continues, somewhere he may inadvertently light a fuze – thinking of WWI now – that would lead to a real major war.
The more pain he receives in Ukraine, the more body bags his people receive at home, the more scrap iron his tank corps turns into, the less likely he is to try this someplace else. The less likely something larger happens.
I didn’t write the Soros article, nor did I write Zelensky’s speech. Winning the Ukraine war is a priority for people who have shown no hesitation to massively interfere with US politics, in the name of climate action. They want to use resources liberated by crushing Russia to advance their green agenda.
Why should the Republicans help governments which do not mean them well? Denying US funding to Ukraine was the right action.
I’m not saying all help to Ukraine should stop. If European leaders want to help Ukraine, they should pay the bill. Having a real problem to address might stop them spending money stirring up mischief in America.
An additional consideration, the EU has a population of 448 million people, vs the USA’s 331 million. Why is the USA always expected to do the heavy lifting?
The neo-con military industrial complex has wanted to do the heavy lifting, ever since WW2.
Russia, a former ally, is their evil enemy, but they had not counted on China, etc., rising that fast and and then becoming an ally of Russia, and then leading BRISC plus.
A huge challenge well beyond US capabilities, with Europe being a hindrance more than a help!
The US had to blow up the pipelines to send a signal to foot-dragging Germany to “get with the program”
Germany was in danger of losing Mercedes sales, so immediately did a 180, and send real weapons, which were promptly destroyed by Russia; a Leopard tank costs about $5 million.
I see you are still trying to push the lie that the US blew up that pipeline.
Is there any nonsense that you won’t push, so long as it protects your patron in Moscow?
Stopping Russia is the right thing to do. Russia is the aggressor. Repeatedly.
Do you really think that Russia means you well? If so, it says a lot about the decline of the Republican Party. Reagan was a crazy fool but an honest crazy fool. He would be disgusted with the current Republican Party that has lost its honesty.
You claim that this is mere avarice. You don’t want to pay the money to lead the free world and instead would rather surrender. Let me be clear. The rest of the world does not see you as greedy, but as cowards. You abandon the role of defender of democracy because you are afraid. And Russia, China, Iran and the rest rejoice at your defeat.
America/NATO has prosecuted 71 major conflicts since WW2.
American troops have been sent into combat 241 times since The USSR voluntarily, and peacefully, broke itself up in 1991.
But Russia (a different entity to the USSR) is the aggressor?
What planet are you living on?
But do remember the USA hasn’t been involved in a war in all that time; 1942 was the last formal declaration of war by the USA. Which should be important actually – as Pearl Harbour was an attack on a countries armed forces by another countries armed forces without warning by a declaration of war. Which the USA also insisted was included in the Geneva convention as a definite no-no after the event.
Reagan the “crazy fool” understood world affairs better than you do, on his worst day. And the Republican establishment hated him as much as you do. Your overall grasp of facts is pathetic.
Reagan opposed socialists, which makes him a crazy fool in the eyes of the socialists.
“Reagan was a crazy fool”
I usually agree with you, but I’ll have to disagree with this. Reagan was not a fool. He was a very sensible man. One of the few that has their head on straight. He saw the threat of communism clearly. He understood how economies work, and how they don’t work.
Reagan, like every other Republican, was demonized constantly by the Left and the leftwing Media, so you may have been told some things about Reagan that are not really true. I think that is highly likely.
Reagan was not a fool.
Because the biggest warmonger on earth, the Federal Reserve System, has been indoctrinating Americans into breeding cannon fodder ever since 1913?
But don’t worry, those vultures are already moving to Japan and China, they’ll probably keep New York and Washington, and contract Milo de Milo to bomb the rest “back to the stone age”.
For McMillan: That Milo de Milo joke is what’s called a literary reference…
Winning the war against Hitler meant cooperating with Russia and other regimes who’s histories were not sparkling clean.
Ah but the ends always justify the means, don’t they?
That just about exemplifies the blatant, spiteful ignorance of this whole mess. Do you have the tiniest bit of grey matter to contemplate the wisdom of nukes on Russia’s border? How would you enjoy some in Mexico, Cuba, Venezuela?
Idjit!
I’m only allowed one upvote for that comment, so have a thousand in print.
Nonsense on a stick.
NATO was formed to respond to any aggression from communist USSR, a very different entity to todays democratic Russia, and one which had fought WW2 on the side of the allies.
The USSR never had any intention of expanding, it built a wall to keep westerners out!
The west unwisely handed the USSR eastern Europe as reparations for the 26 million people they lost in defeating Nazi Germany.
In 1991 the USSR voluntarily and peacefully contracted. Please name me a nation in recent history which has done that.
Why then, would modern day Russia seek to repeat the mistake it had voluntarily and peacefully rectified, by marching across Eastern Europe?
Chechnya, Georgia, and Ukraine are all border states with Russia. They all have a history going well beyond the history of 300 year old America. American’s simply cannot get their heads around the complexity of the European continent which goes back thousands of years.
Nor does America have any border issues other than immigration. It just wanders across the rest of the world spreading it’s version of democracy at the point of a gun, and has failed every time. We might think Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan etc. etc. etc………
HAHAHAHAHA do tell
Russia, democratic?
Wow, just how delusional can you get?
Excellent comment, Mike.
We ain’t got no troops in the Ukraine. Nobody has proposed sending them and the Ukraine hasn’t asked for any.
Sige Heil! Must support those Nazis over the Russians. Must continue never ending wars for our Military Industrial complex.
You all do know that the next step is open deployment of US military advisors into the combat zone. This former SF soldier that spent 8 1/2 years on teams targeted to Eastern Europe, would be shocked if there aren’t some already there either with to cover of being “observers” or sterile. What they do admit is: (6) Simon Ateba on X: “SHOCKING NEW DETAIL: U.S. Army Hospital in Germany Is Treating American Soldiers Hurt Fighting in Ukraine. NY Times writes, “The Army’s Landstuhl Regional Medical Center has quietly started admitting Ukrainian Army soldiers who were wounded in combat, most of them American… https://t.co/Iie9cP8ZNd” / X (twitter.com)
There are obviously already advisors from other NATO countries there. Certain high tech systems being deployed into the combat zone now demand it!
Britian is going to put their advisor in openly: Grant Shapps to ramp up support for Volodymyr Zelensky (telegraph.co.uk)
Large elements of the US military fast reaction forces, from the 101st and 82nd Divisions have already been deployed to Eastern Europe.
The escalation continues towards exactly what so many here have claimed will not happen.
Well said. I always wonder how the pro-intervention zealots can remain blind to the fact that Zelensky said nothing about the Biden’s involvement in Ukraine corruption when the Democrats impeached Trump and the media / government suppressed the Hunter laptop expose.
I’m totally onboard with sending Grant Shapps to the Ukraine front lines.
The only reason I can think of that Grant Shapps (nee Green – other nom de plumes are available) was propelled well beyond his political abilities (tea boy springs to mind) is that the labour party is rabidly anti semitic and the means to counter that was to promote the nonentity Shapps within Conservative ranks so it could not be accused of the same.
The Ukrainias are defeating the Russian troops.
There is no need for an American escalation that would call for American troops to be sent into Ukraine.
That *will* happen if we let Ukraine fall, and then Poland will be next on Putin’s list, and then you can pretty much guarantee U.S. troops will be involved in that.
I say we stop Putin in Ukraine, using Ukrianian troops. Then NATO and U.S. troops don’t have to get involved.
LOL!
F-16s for example. Biden said sending them would be an act of war. Now we send them.
Just approved: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/9/23/ukraine-to-get-us-long-range-atacms-missiles-us-media-report
Large elements of both the 82nd and 101st and other US troops holding maneuvers in Eastern Europe.
And Britain advertising sending advisors into the combat zone.
Move along. Nothing to see here.
Kicking Russia out of Ukraine is NOT crushing Russia.
… The countries of the former Soviet empire, eager to assert their independence, can hardly wait for the Russian army to be crushed in Ukraine. At that point, Putin’s dream of a renewed Russian empire will disintegrate and cease to pose a threat to Europe. … – George Soros.
They appear to intend more than a simple military victory, and Russia retreating and licking its wounds.
Russia has never given up the idea of becoming the “third Rome”. Whatever hatred Russia’s former colonies have- NATO’s policies are not about crushing Russia but getting it out of Ukraine.
I don’t have a problem with Europe helping Ukraine, the problem is if the USA helps, Europe has resources which I believe it will use to interfere with US domestic politics.
It is right for Republicans to vote against more support for Ukraine, in the sense that it would be right for Turkeys not to vote for Christmas.
Europe needs to do far more- it’s their backyard. American needs to focus on the real problem- China.
The odds of the Biden administration focusing on the threat of China are exactly the same as the odds they will secure the southern border. ZERO!
Biden might not be- but the American military sure is.
To the extent that they can without the CNC getting involved. China owns the CNC.
The US military is focussed on woke DIE insanity.
Indeed? More so than on pronouns? And is this the same American military whose (now former) JCS Chairman bragged about committing treason by promising to disclose national security secrets to China? In any event, if we take on China now, our readiness is so bad we are going to get our a$$es handed to us. Our own “war games” showed that.
Funny, everything Biden does seems to help the Chicoms. Maybe it’s all those millions of dollars they gave Joe.
What threat does China present to the USA?
It offered cheap land and labour – America transported it’s entire industrial base to the country, and now blames China for its economic woes.
People like to point at labor costs, but I think regulatory ‘arbitrage’ was just as big a factor, if not much larger. It costs a lot in terms of shipping and handling costs to globally transport raw materials and finished goods, and, at least theoretically, the West should have had an advantage in capital, which should have increased worker productivity, thereby reducing domestic labor costs to some extent. Unfortunately, these advantages were pissed away on the regulatory side around the same time the ChiComs starting backing off from full-blown Marxism. At that point, the real risk of capital confiscation was in maintaining domestic operations.
Of course, I could also point out that it’s difficult to build and maintain productive infrastructure when you’re ‘investing’ a huge portion of your national income in unproductive assets and meddling in everybody else’s affairs.
What, like installing military bases across America?
Don’t talk wet Eric. Europe is largely a lap dog to the US with the UK foremost on its knee.
America blows up the Nordstream pipeline and Germany goes down the economic drain without a squeak.
Please get real.
Many in the US military never relinquished the Cold War idea of “…bringing Russia to its knees and disarming it…” The idea of the USA being the only country in the world with a nuclear arsenal is attractive to the USA and anathema to most of the world which would be ok with either a balance of power or total disarmament on all sides.
Where is there evidence for this?
He’s talked about it many times. See his recent comments about Poland, or his pursuit of the Union State with Belarus, or…well…his unprovoked invasion/occupation of parts of Ukraine, Georgia, and Moldova for that matter.
Yet after being in office for 23 years he finally invades Ukraine not for expansion plans but to create a buffer zone against NATO and to defend the abused large Russian population in the Donbass area.
He invaded Ukraine twice in 2014 already, and Georgia before that, and Moldova before that. He regularly threatens other neighbors. “Buffer zone” and “abused Russians” is ridiculous Russian propaganda.
This is the third time that he has invaded Ukraine, in the meantime he’s been taking over other countries.
He’s been talking about it for decades.
First off, most of the former Soviet republics already have their independence. Those that don’t have internal oligarchies that would have to be over thrown before they can gain complete independence.
Do you have any evidence that the new Russian empire would quickly collapse should Putin lose his war? Yes, Putin will quite probably be pulled down and disposed of by his internal rivals, however a new dictator would quickly assume power and things would pretty much go back to the way they were.
The only difference would be a few more countries joining NATO and the Russian military would be too embarrassed to show their faces for a few decades.
Oh, oligarchies like the Kennedy, Bush, Clinton and Biden oligarchies?
Well, I for one have a little trouble following the argument here.
I agree that a strong free Europe has money to spend, and politicians tend spend it on crazy things, including supporting some green agenda which in return also supports the green agenda in America (maybe a little less direct as implied here, but there is no doubt about it for me) and in particular wasting US taxpayers money on nonsense climate measures which are not supported by scientific facts.
But beside the moral problem of not helping while Russia commits genocide on Ukranians, helping Europa and Ukraine to be free and remain democratic (aka having the freedom to do silly things with their money) is definitely in the American interest and needs to get any support it needs!
From Europe, NATO and yes also from the US!
There can only be the question if this is balanced, the US has helped a lot already, but that does not seem the argument here!?
Not funding/helping Ukraine directly supports a totalitarian regime with a despot with world ruling mania!
What are you talking about a “free Ukraine”. All political opposition has been outlawed and the Presidential election cancelled. All free press in the country has been outlawed. You really need to pay attention to what is going on!
>> You really need to pay attention to what is going on!
Like in the Southern and Eastern part of that country .. where all those body bags come from..
About those other statements in your post.. it seems like the Ukranian press is happily reporting about an election to be hold in 2024.. which contradicts everything you wrote!
However, you are quite correct that the war ridden Ukraine is not pefect and various crimes have been committed from various people.
Yet, it is clear it is way more humane now than it would be under Russian control, it deserves US support, but of coruse that support can have demands about democracy attached to it (and it does already)
Ukraine is even more CURRUPT than Russia is, and they did outlaw political parties after the Civil war were started by the Fascist Ukrainians.
America is the principal player in destabilizing the region as well shown in this LINK
The Kiev regime has, for the last 9+ years since 2014, been bombing the ethnically Russian southern regions of it’s own country. But Russia stepping in to intervene is ethnic cleansing?
Really?
Russia has, for the last 18+ months created a military border mostly encompassing eastern Ukraine (the Russian part of Ukraine, remember?) and has sat there and defended it against determined attacks from the Kiev regime.
Explain to me how that constitutes genocide against Ukrainians?
Russia attempted to stop the entire military operation in March 2022, one month after they crossed the border into Ukraine.
They signed a draft peace treaty with Ukraine which resolved that Russia would withdraw entirely from eastern Ukraine in return for Ukrainian neutrality and an agreement never to join NATO.
Biden didn’t like this so despatched Boris Johnson to order Zelensky to tear up the agreement. In return, Biden spends hundreds of billions of US taxpayers money to destroy all evidence of his crime families activity in Ukraine.
At least three offers to broker peace in the region have been entertained by Putin, in Moscow. One by China, one by Turkey and one by a delegation of African leaders. Biden won’t even talk to them.
Clearly, you have no idea what is going on here.
I’m not sure that Soros’ hoped-for “crushing defeat” of Russia is a likely outcome of sustained, or increased levels (or even massively escalated levels) of western aid for Ukraine. Even if the “Ukraine is winning” propaganda that we are being fed by our leaders and their media lapdogs were true, I fear that Vlad would rather start WW3 than face defeat.
And I’m not at all certain that the faceless manipulators behind the white house wouldn’t see that as a positive outcome.
Russia has a ‘no first strike’ nuclear weapons policy.
America ditched theirs years ago.
My opinion is that if a tactical nuclear weapon is used on the Ukraine battlefield, it won’t be Russian, and Russia will do precisely…..Nothing.
All eyes will, rightly or wrongly, turn to America as it’s the only country ever to have used nuclear weapons and the world, led by Japan, will abandon even a pretence of being allied with the country. It will be economic, political, diplomatic and social Armageddon for the USA.
“I fear that Vlad would rather start WW3 than face defeat.”
I don’t think you should fear that. Putin is not suicidal.
Setting off a nuke in Ukraine could lead to a general nuclear war which would kill Putin, and why should he take such a chance just because his troops are kicked out of Ukraine? He still has all of Russia, all to himself. He can happily dictate to those people. That ought to satisfy his inner dictator.
Listen and think!
https://youtu.be/aJbFwen1luA
I’m immensely proud he’s a fellow countryman.
But was this his swan song, as I’m sure the mob are coming for him soon.
“George Soros is desperate for Russia to suffer a crushing defeat, so Europe can focus more resources on international climate action.”
George Soros might do better to question whether the general level of military spending is necessary, as well as recalling some history.
The one thing 9-11 did is make some people question whether trillions of Dollars actually made Americans safer. Where was the security state when Americans needed it?
The Western media is very verry slowly beginning to acknowledge that the Russians are going teach another lesson. Again.
Napoleon and the Austrian Corporal also failed big time when their adventures led them to poke the bear from Western Europe.
But George Soros is 93 in the shade. If he has not learned those lessons yet it is probably too late for him to do so.
“Napoleon and the Austrian Corporal also failed big time when their adventures led them to poke the bear from Western Europe.”
Yes, but those two dictators were existential threats to the Russian homeland, so naturally people are going to fight very hard to preserve themselves. What choice do they have? It’s fight or die.
Ukraine poses no such threat to the Russian nation. Ukraine is not going to invade Russia. That’s why many Russian men are trying their best to avoid being sent to Ukraine to fight. It’s not their fight, it’s Putin’s fight.
Anyone who thinks Soros & Co spent their own cash on their political causes needs vision correction.
This is just crazy. I dislike George Soros as much as you do, maybe even more, because he is working to destroy Israel. And, I despise Joe Biden, who is a senile, corrupt and treasonous, piece of excrement.
But, Just because either or both of them agree on a course of action does not mean that I must oppose that course of action.
What I care about is the welfare of the United States and its people, and beyond that the peace and well being of the entire world.
Domestic politics is not what I am worried about.
With that as my view point, I must favor supplying Ukraine with as many arms as we can make and work to destroy the military power of Russia.
1. Russia is an imperialistic power with revanchist claims on huge chunks of Europe and Asia. Within the last15 years they have invade adjoining countries to enforce their claims. Russia regularly uses disguised actors to conduct cyber attacks on American infrastructure (remember Colonial Pipeline).
Russia has more nuclear weapons than the rest of the world combined which makes them dangerous.
For the last 30 years you have heard American politicians from Obama to Hillary to GW Bush explain that we can reset relations with Russia and make them a partner for peace. Russia has responded by being more belligerent, more aggressive, and more imperialist.
Russia has now explicitly allied itself with China our most important and hostile peer competitor.
Recall also that Russia is also the only European Country that shares a border with the United States (in the Bering Straits). Scratch the more reactionary Russians and you will hear that Alaska and the Pacific Coast of North America down to San Francisco Bay are Russian territory.
It is foolish to think that Putin’s Russia can be treated as a friendly, or even non hostile, power.
2. Russia’s February 2022 attack on Ukraine has been a disaster for the Russia military, because the Ukrainian military and people did not fold and because the counterattacked strongly and well. Part of their ability to resist is that the NATO countries have supplied them with arms. The US has supplied many of those weapons. If I have any criticism of this policy it has been that it has been too slow and too indecisive.
Properly armed, the Ukrainians can break the Russian army and drive them out of Ukraine. Considering that Russia is an always has been a hostile power, this would be a big win for the United States.
.
3. We must remember that China is a bigger problem than Russia. China is highly likely to attack Taiwan. This is something the US must prevent not only because of knock on effects (e.g. damage to US ally and economic partner Japan) but because it would shatter supply chains in vital high tech industries.
A Ukrainian success against Russia would show China that invading an adjacent democratic nation is not an easy victory or an inexpensive way of achieving your goals. Further, Breaking the Russians will deprive the Chinese of an ally that could tie down Europe while they attack Taiwan. Folding on Ukraine would encourage the Chinese in the belief that they can win by making their actions too expensive for us.
Remember the old Chinese proverb. kill chicken scare monkey. Russia is the chicken.
4. The dollar numbers being quoted as the cost of US aid to Ukraine are, in the context of the Federal Budget, very small. More importantly, they do represent cash being sent overseas. They are being spent to build weapons in the US by American workers. They are being spent to ramp up production lines that we desperately need to expand and keep in operation. An attack by China will eat up our inventories in no time at all. If you are worried about the Federal Budget, and you should be, attack the useless green new deal subsidy hog fest. Nothing that buys is half as useful as a 155mm shell.
“4. The dollar numbers being quoted as the cost of US aid to Ukraine are, in the context of the Federal Budget, very small. More importantly, they do represent cash being sent overseas. They are being spent to build weapons in the US by American workers. They are being spent to ramp up production lines that we desperately need to expand and keep in operation. An attack by China will eat up our inventories in no time at all. If you are worried about the Federal Budget, and you should be, attack the useless green new deal subsidy hog fest. Nothing that buys is half as useful as a 155mm shell.”
Excellent points.
Most of the money for Ukraine military aid is being spent in the United States. This money is enhancing U.S. defense infrastructure. What’s not to like?
You can see an interesting animated map of day-by-day progress of the land war in Ukraine here. The image below shows screencaps of the maps on September 27th in 2022 and 2023. The red area hasn’t changed much, except for Ukraine regaining a strip of farmland on the northwest side of the Dnipro River, including the ruins of Kherson. Despite the much-applauded Ukrainian counter-offensive, that won’t be able to continue when winter sets in.
365 days of continuous death and destruction for a rather small gain of territory. And we are being told by our leaders that Russia is on its last legs.
Click on the image to see it at full size.
I’m not a Russian sympathiser or apologist like some of those I see on the ‘net. I would love to see Ukraine beat them back to the pre-2014 border. Collective memory of the Holodomor is baked into the Ukrainian sense of identity; Ukraine deserves to win, but it’s just not happening. Sorry. The US and Europe need to lean on Ukraine to negotiate before it’s too late.
Ukraine deserves to win, but it’s just not happening. Sorry. The US and Europe need to lean on Ukraine to negotiate before it’s too late.
As I said above, the mistake was made BEFORE the start of the war but now, of course, progress has all but stalled due to the hundreds of thousands of land mines installed by the Russians, sometimes 10 kilometers deep.
After reading the comments section I have come to the realization that more than one hobby horse is being ridden at this rodeo.
Some people have some information, others have different information. Some people have one perspective, based on their location, others have a different perspective. The ability to share these differences is important, not to blindly follow a censored, heavily biased narrative solely created to force us along a pre-ordained path. Vive le difference!
I do much better in a forum format than a blog where I can post a lot information showing it is the West/NATO who created this problem in the first place, they are the ones who destabilized the region and make open threats to destroy Russia I could even just link to large posts I have made in a forum showing declassified documents that shows the West reneged on their promise not to expand NATO after 1991 but I am not going to irritate Anthony and Charles in posting a bunch of links to a forum.
What the comments show is that intelligent people can look at the same things and come away with completely different opinions about what they have seen.
I think emotions have something to do with this.
Where you live and your experiences also have a lot to do with it. Those living half a world away can afford to be hawkish, those with it next door or just a few countries away need to have a much more pragmatic outlook.
Had Putin intended to seize Ukraine it would have taken 12-14 days. This is a grift and nothing more. Intention is to drain armaments and money out of America and NATO and it is working like a charm. And the Big Guy is getting his 10%, bet your ass on that.
I suspect Putin’s generals lied about state of readiness, corruption appears to be a huge problem in the Russian military.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12304431/amp/Putin-purges-three-generals-taking-total-fired-suspended-vanished-11.html
That is one of the possible scenarios being talked about since Russia has most of the region already east of the river while leaving the rest of Ukraine intact as a buffer against NATO.
Putin did intend to seize the Ukraine, he was just surprised to find out he didn’t have the resources to do so.
For all the resources being drawn out of US and Europe, even more is being drawn out of Russia, and they have a much smaller economy to support those demands.
Really? This is how you are dealing with this, Mr Anthony Watt? Censoring people who are speaking out on the global geopolitical situation? Really thought better of you. What a disappointment.
I don’t buy into this argument. I don’t give a damn what Soros thinks or says. The Europeans are acting irresponsible concerning CAGW and they will continue doing it until the average European gets fed up with being lied to and cheated. Even Europeans won’t put up with this crap forever. How Europe wastes it’s money is their business. If the US has a chance to cut Putin down to size we should. That Biden is at the helm is really unfortunate, he is less than worthless but I am not convinced that we should abandon Ukraine’s efforts because their leader is questionable and ours is worthless.
Russia did nothing while Trump was president, because Trump promised to flatten Moscow if Russia tried pulling any funny business. The moment he was out, and Biden was shown as the weak puppet he is, Putin resumed his plans for the conquest and subjugation of former soviet territories.
I believe the debacle in Afghanistan happened in August and Putin started building up Russian troops around Ukraine about a month later.
Russia has enough soldiers to last until the western budgets break under the strain of inflation.
I don’t think we can safely predict who will break first.
There are some indications Putin has serious health problems. A doctor I spoke to suggested Putin’s face looks puffy, which might indicate corticosteroid treatment for lymphoma, so maybe he’s in too much of a hurry. Politicians in a hurry make mistakes. If this is true, he could almost be out of time.
If Putin had been smart he would have waited, set his own house in order, watched the EU collapse under its own incompetence, and invited nations to peacefully join a new Russian economic block.
But Russia has a long way to go to set their own house in order. I’ll never forget a story I heard from a merchant banker who was invited to Moscow for a conference. Moscow wanted to leverage their resources wealth into turning Moscow into a major financial centre, on a par with London, Paris or New York. But they messed up the pitch. After the conference, the banker (and presumably everyone else) received a visit from an official who provided a phone number to call if the mafia or any government officials caused any problems.
This isn’t what bankers wanted to hear. They didn’t want a special number they could call, they wanted a stable regulatory environment and transparent rule of law, a predictable operating environment which didn’t depend on how much they paid their friend in the Kremlin.
Eric,
Recently, Kiev claimed the Ukraine population was 33.5 million, but 7.5 million are in ethnic-Russian Crimea, and four annexed areas, that voted overwhelmingly to reunite with Russia, leaving 26 million, but 10.7 million are over-60, pensioned retirees.
That leaves very few able bodied men for fighting, rebuilding the country, etc., compared with Russia, which has a population of about 150 million.
The long-term prognosis of Ukraine is dire and down hill.
Ukraine will be a black financial hole
The US will end up spending far more money (all added to national debt), for “as long as it takes”, than in Vietnam, Iran, Afghanistan, and we all know how successful they were.
Yeah, right, “voted”…give me a break. Just how credulous are you?
His probable successor is Medvedev who is a bigger war hawk than Putin is, and the nation is stable as they understand they are in danger from the war like NATO/West absurdly aggressive actions against them.
Don’t be fooled. Soros is no friend of the west.
Soros is one big reason why crime is running rampant in some American (Democrat) cities.
Soros is not our friend.
Soros is a hardcore socialist/communist. He needs no excuses to justify attacking Republicans.
Liberation from the Nazi Zelensky looks like this
I think I’d rather have Zelensky, and so do all the rest of the Ukrainians.