lukethethird
unknown member
In that case the madness would appear to be escalating.
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What is the US interest in Ukraine?
- Thread starter atanu
- Start date
Father Heathen
Veteran Member
I wasn't aware that The U.S. had plans to install nuclear weapons in Ukraine, nor that the U.S. had attempted to annex Cuba.
Where humans are concerned, that is often what madness does. You can reason with a person. You can't reason with a mob of them.
lukethethird
unknown member
Whether nuclear or conventional, Ukraine is the red line and yes, the US was poised and ready to invade Cuba.
Is "poised & ready" different from "invaded to acquire"?
lukethethird
unknown member
The difference then was the leaders, they agreed to communicate with each other. Soviet ships carrying nuclear weapons to Cuba agreed to turn back while the US agreed not to invade Cuba and the US also agreed to remove missiles from Turkey that were aimed at the Soviet Union. This time around there was no assurances that Ukraine would not join Nato which in turn would allow missiles to come right up to the Russian border aimed at Moscow, so Putin sent in the troops.
Kathryn
It was on fire when I laid down on it.
Yes, the Tigray War. Not many people outside of Africa have heard of it. The US sends humanitarian aid (about 3 billion a year) to Ethiopia but that is FAR outweighed by what we send to Ukraine, (about 31 billion in defense aid, which differs from humanitarian aid).Are you talking about this?
Tigray war - Wikipedia
en.m.wikipedia.org
Blinken praises Ethiopia on Tigray peace, no return to trade programme yet
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken praised Ethiopia on Wednesday for its progress in implementing a peace deal to end the Tigray conflict, but stopped short of ushering the country back into a U.S. trade programme.www.reuters.com
Kathryn
It was on fire when I laid down on it.
Of course not.
mikkel_the_dane
My own religion
Then learn to spot your value claims even if you call them opinions.
Okay. And so...?
mikkel_the_dane
My own religion
That is so, because if the example from above holds, that it is nothing but about racism, as Tigray are about brown people.
The situation as it currently stands is what amounts to a war of attrition between Russia and Ukraine. The US and NATO can't get involved directly, so the most we can do is continue to send aid to Ukraine as they continue to fight against the Russians. The casualties are high on both sides, there have been ongoing atrocities and war crimes, the devastation is widespread.
Assuming that NATO doesn't declare war on Russia to defend Ukraine, then it appears that this state of affairs will continue for quite some time, and the death toll will continue to climb.
That's the reality, as it currently is, and there's absolutely nothing anyone outside of Ukraine or Russia is willing or able to do about it.
Since you mention "moral realism" here, what choice can be made which is both moral and realistic?
You can wish for Putin to die or disappear, but that wouldn't be very realistic, would it?
Or you can advocate continuing the current status quo of sending arms to Ukraine and allow the war of attrition to continue. How do we realistically expect that to proceed?
Maybe Ukraine will win, maybe not, but either way, the outcome will lead to an utterly devastated country with hundreds of thousands of casualties (possibly millions, by the time it's over).
If Russia wins, then it would be (at the very least) a humiliation for the West, which would appear even weaker in the eyes of the rest of the world (despite all the macho hand-wringing by our leaders afraid of "showing weakness"). When we could have bargained from a position of strength, the West chose to gamble everything on a Ukrainian victory, and this is a gamble the West can't afford to lose. This is a new exercise in brinkmanship. Not the same as the Cuban Missile Crisis, as some have suggested, but we're getting closer to the brink just the same.
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mikkel_the_dane
My own religion
Well, yes. It would be a humiliation for the West if Ukraine looses. But it would be worse for Ukraine.
That is the bias I spot in you sometimes. You talk of Russia, the USA and NATO, but somehow Ukraine doesn't matter.
The problem is that there is no good solutions. There are only bad solutions based on different biases.
I do get mine, I am biases in favor of Ukraine as a nation and a people and that I even treat them as a nation and a people is a bias.
So here is the trick as used now by Putin and I get how he gets there.
It is existential for the survival of Russia as he understands it, that Russia in effect controls Ukraine. I get that and I get that he hints at if that is not the case, it will lead to nuclear war.
So the current brinkmanship are on both sides and I have chosen a side, because right now it is how that is. For an actual peace deal or if it turns into a frozen conflict or other results that is in the future.
I'm not sure how you reach that conclusion. It's worse for Ukraine right now. The only thing that can make things any better for Ukraine is if the fighting ends. Remember, you were speaking of "moral realism," and declaring a cease fire and commencing peace negotiations would be the morally realistic choice to make at this point. It doesn't mean surrender, but at least if the war and killing can be stopped for a while, that might save some lives.
I consider that the moral choice here would be to try to save as many lives as possible. Keep fighting, and more people die. Stop fighting, and lives can be saved. Which is the moral choice here?
It's not a question of biases, although perhaps we all may have our own particular biases. Some people who are strictly pro-American, the America Firsters, have a certain bias where America is the only country that matters to them. Sometimes they're called "isolationists," although they represent an earlier view of foreign policy which many people today consider to be irrelevant in today's world. It worked for its time, and it allowed America to grow from its infancy without any real entanglements or interference from Europe.
However, I also recognize that there are certain realities about this world and the mechanisms which run it.
I understand where many are coming from. But there are no good solutions. This seems more than just a border dispute. This is where too much national pride comes into play. Or in Putin's case, maybe it's more a matter of "mobster pride," just like in the movies where a mob leader demands respect and tribute.
So silly and simplistic.
lukethethird
unknown member
Personally i think there has been a lack of diplomacy from before the start. I brought up the Cuban Missile Crisis to explain red lines, how all countries have them, and also how diplomacy solved that crisis, and by the way Taiwan is China's redline and what countries are over there on the other side of the Pacific with their military presence threatening that line as we speak? Diplomacy could easily have prevented Putin from sending his troops in. Putin wanted assurances that Ukraine would not join Nato. Those assurances would have prevented this bloodbath, and now Ukraine is paying the price with their lives. Diplomacy, before or after a war, those are the choices, if there is an after.
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lukethethird
unknown member
I did not know that nukes were deployed there.It appears that USSR did deploy nukes.
So either a country is forbidden from joining an alliance or else we invade it? That is such a weak, thin excuse. That isn't diplomacy, it's extortion.
lukethethird
unknown member
It's a fact of life, red lines are drawn and this is what happens when they are crossed. Ukraine joining Nato means that missiles can and will be brought right up to the Russian border aimed at Moscow. No Russian leader would tolerate that and neither would an American leader tolerate missiles in Cuba or Mexico aimed at the US. It's the way things work on this planet.