| ▲ | IncreasePosts 6 days ago |
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| ▲ | tediousgraffit1 6 days ago | parent | next [-] |
| This line of reasoning keeps popping up and something about it bothers me - why go to war when you can get what you want in other, cheaper ways? It seems likely the correlation is real but so far no one has adduced any reasons to assume the causation actually goes the way they assume. |
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| ▲ | pclmulqdq 6 days ago | parent [-] | | If you note that what Russia wants is Ukrainian territory (first Crimea in 2014 and then a land connection to Crimea in 2022), that was guaranteed to involve some amount of war. That will give you everything you need to infer the correct direction of causation. | | |
| ▲ | tediousgraffit1 6 days ago | parent [-] | | Why do you think Russia wants territory? Why did they suddenly develop an appetite for territory in 2014? | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 6 days ago | parent | next [-] | | > Why did they suddenly develop an appetite for territory in 2014? Did they? They took a chunk of Georgia in 2008 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russo-Georgian_War) and have been actively occupying some of Moldova since 1990 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transnistria_conflict). | |
| ▲ | pclmulqdq 6 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | They have wanted it since the fall of the Soviet Union and access to the Black Sea has immense strategic value to them. They only had geopolitical (and local political) cover to get it in 2014 and 2022. | | |
| ▲ | tediousgraffit1 6 days ago | parent [-] | | So not because ukraine rejected them in 2013? To be explicit, I still have seen no evidence for the premise that '_some_ amount of war' was inevitable. Belarus would seem to be an obvious counterexample. | | |
| ▲ | 6 days ago | parent | next [-] | | [deleted] | |
| ▲ | pclmulqdq 6 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | No person seriously discussing that region of the world would have ever thought Ukraine would give Crimea to the Russians without a fight. Countries, in general, don't give up land without a fight. Crimea is also one of the most militarily valuable pieces of land in the world. Putin, at the same time, wanted to do some "re-unification" of some previous Soviet territories including Crimea. I'm also not sure why you're citing Belarus here. It was split off from the Soviet union in 1990 and governed itself the whole time despite being essentially a vassal state of Russia. Belarus has not ceded any land to Russia, either. Edit - I see what you're saying about control or territory. If you want control, directly controlling the territory is better than having a puppet government. While Russia would have accepted a puppet government, as they have in Belarus (since there has been no good opportunity to go to war with Belarus to take it over), they had the opportunity to go to war for direct control and the West made it clear that Ukraine as a vassal state was not an option (see the 2014 revolution). If you think someone wants control, why do you think that they see $0 of extra value in directly owning the territory? | | |
| ▲ | tediousgraffit1 6 days ago | parent [-] | | > It was split off from the Soviet union in 1990 and governed itself the whole time despite being essentially a vassal state of Russia. It's obvious that Russia wants ukraine as a vassal as well. I would note that the invasion of Ukraine was launched _via_ Belarus, despite the fact that Russia does not formally control that territory. So again I ask, if Russia can get what it wants (which is _control_, not territory) without going to war, why would it do so? Let's be plain - we are ultimately dancing around an empirical question, whether Trump will be hawkish or dovish towards Russia. Ultimately I think he's too chaotic for past behavior to be a good guide. So let's see what happens! I for one hope that you are right, but I think I have plenty of reasons to be cautious. |
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| ▲ | energy123 6 days ago | parent | prev [-] |
| Whoever was POTUS played no role in the timing of 2014. Putin invaded Donbas in 2014 in response to a revolution in Ukraine that ousted the unpopular Russia-aligned Yanukovych. Not because Obama was POTUS or because Trump wasn't POTUS. |
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| ▲ | IncreasePosts 6 days ago | parent [-] | | Okay, and why did Putin wait until 2022 to (re)invade Ukraine, if that was the goal? Shouldn't he have done it when he had a stooge in the white house? | | |
| ▲ | ceejayoz 6 days ago | parent | next [-] | | > Shouldn't he have done it when he had a stooge in the white house? If you think said stooge is likely to get reelected (which, except for COVID coming out of the blue, was highly likely) and that stooge is already making noise about isolationism, why interrupt? 2022 looks a lot like an "oh shit, plan B" scenario. | |
| ▲ | dragonwriter 5 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | > Okay, and why did Putin wait until 2022 to (re)invade Ukraine Because that's when he had intelligence leading him to believe the Ukrainian regime would crumble quickly or capitulate in the face of a large-scale invasion, and possibly also the NATO would fail to unite and respond, in part due to the success of Russian influence operations, which were not only directed at the US. | |
| ▲ | energy123 5 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Conversely, why not invade to destabilize the incumbency of the non-stooge so that the stooge wins re-election and then use the stooge to negotiate a favorable frozen conflict? Or why even attribute it to POTUS at all? Why not attribute it to the fact that Ukraine's military power was growing due to the Western training that they were receiving over the previous 10 years, and Putin was effectively on a clock to invade? Eastern European conflicts have never revolved around who is POTUS. |
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