| ▲ | delusional 5 days ago |
| No we're not. Nobody in the EU has transitioned to a wartime economy. We are helping out a strategic ally. If Ukraine falls tomorrow an cedes add territory to Russia, the EU is not going to continue fighting, because the war will be over. That of course assumes that Putin stops at Ukraine. The point is that this isn't our war. |
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| ▲ | jyounker 5 days ago | parent | next [-] |
| Nine years ago I was in Riga talking with a Latvian friend, and even then she was telling me how Russia was broadcasting separatist propaganda into Latvia While the EU may not be at war with Russia, Russia is already at war with the EU. |
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| ▲ | snowwrestler 5 days ago | parent [-] | | Russia is pursuing low stakes, plausibly deniable, minor nuisance actions against the EU and U.S. It does enough to fool itself internally that it has a great enemy in The West, to which it is bravely standing up. The purpose of this is to unite enough of the domestic population to suppress dissent and keep the current regime in power. The reality is that it is actually at war with only one small neighbor, which is going so badly that they have had to import troops from North Korea. Embarrassing. If they actually engaged in war with the EU, more specifically a member of NATO, they would lose quickly. So they stay well back from that line. |
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| ▲ | weweersdfsd 5 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| The truth is that Russia has been making war preparations for a long time, also within the EU. In Finland even during the "good years" (between fall of the Soviet Union and Georgian war) Russian businessmen kept buying property that made zero financial sense, but was located close to strategic infrastructure or military bases. |
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| ▲ | K0balt 5 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| You’re in a zero lot line flat and your neighbors house is on fire. I’d be pretty motivated to help out as well, but I don’t think I’d be quite so cavalier about not being on a wartime footing. Russia has shown repeatedly throughout history that it does not honor international agreements in good faith, and that it sees military adventurism as a legitimate way to expand its borders. After the dust settles on the Ukraine war, if Putin still has the capacity to wage war, he will not likely stop with Ukraine. It is by now obvious that a limited incursion into Poland, for example, will not spark a global thermonuclear war. Ukrainian suffering is both the litmus test and the vaccination against nuclear escalation that Putin needs to contemplate further expansion. Political alignments aside, if I were based in Europe I would be very, very concerned. |
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| ▲ | valval 5 days ago | parent [-] | | [flagged] | | |
| ▲ | aguaviva 5 days ago | parent | next [-] | | This is a wildly unpopular opinion after 2022, but ... False. Ukraine not only has everything to do with Europe -- it is unequivocally European in culture, language, historical involvement and (to the extent that Russia is also considered to be unequivocally European) geography. It isn't something one can even have an opinion about. Any more than one can have an "opinion" about India being a part of Asia. | |
| ▲ | throwawaymaths 5 days ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Yes, and Ukraine has steadily going down in corruption since Zelenskyy. So if you actually care about corruption and aren't a concern troll, you will want to encourage the current regime and not the reverse. | | |
| ▲ | valval 5 days ago | parent [-] | | Zelenskyy has stifled opposition and politically persecuted his enemies, actually. | | |
| ▲ | K0balt 5 days ago | parent [-] | | Your comment is pretty myopic considering the fact that Ukraine is in a state of martial emergency and is actively being invaded by a merciless and lawless regime. She is on a wartime footing, with her very existence as a country once again in jeopardy at the hands of a much more powerful, longtime aggressor. Realigning political positions in a way that keeps them firmly aligned with the martial interests of the state is expected and required. For better or for worse, Ukraines civil government is, for now, primarily a military organization as the country and its people are fighting for their lives. This is the one specific case where it is reasonable, just, and needed to require loyalty, focus, and vigor within an otherwise democratic system. There is a reason why martial law grants the president extraordinary powers. If Ukraine survives, she will have to sort out the return to normal democratic rule, but for now the government is at war. | | |
| ▲ | valval 5 days ago | parent [-] | | Don't worry about that, he's been doing it since his inauguration. If you think his actions played no part in this war coming to be, you've been informed a bit selectively. | | |
| ▲ | K0balt 4 days ago | parent [-] | | Frankly it would be shocking if there wasn’t some kind of fuckery afoot in any given Eastern European nation. But that in no way justifies this territory grab by Russia, or the invasion in 2014. Russia is clearly attempting to annex a neighboring country through military adventurism, and is doing so in contravention with all international law, and also in a way that is intentionally cruel and borderline genocidal. Russia has lost all legitimacy as a nation worthy of being taken seriously as a global citizen, and has reduced itself to a kleptocratic mad-dog rouge state. | | |
| ▲ | valval 3 days ago | parent [-] | | The propaganda has landed well on you, it seems. | | |
| ▲ | throwawaymaths 2 days ago | parent | next [-] | | How can you be so certain it hasn't landed on YOU? After all I mentioned that corruption has gotten better and you responded with a cookie cutter response about authoritarianism, which is not necessarily the same as corruption. You've basically eaten Russian talking points and regurgitated them wholesale without even stopping to critically think about context. | |
| ▲ | K0balt 3 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Not so much. I have personal involvement that informs my opinion. |
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| ▲ | concordDance 5 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Even Botswana and Zambia aren't in the same league: https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/gdp-per-capita-worldbank?... | | |
| ▲ | valval 5 days ago | parent [-] | | Frankly Botswana is beating Ukraine in GDP and Zambia in perceived corruption. | | |
| ▲ | aguaviva 5 days ago | parent [-] | | Frankly Botswana is beating Ukraine in GDP Ukraine's GDP is close to 10x that of Botswana, and in the last year has grown 10 percent over that of 2022. | | |
| ▲ | valval 5 days ago | parent [-] | | Try GDP per capita PPP, the measure that matters for average living conditions | | |
| ▲ | aguaviva 5 days ago | parent [-] | | When your first attempt at dropping a random statistic gets blown out of the water -- try shifting the goalposts. | | |
| ▲ | valval 4 days ago | parent [-] | | I bet you had to look it up as well. I bet you had to go out there, and confirm that Ukraine, a country with 15x the population of Botswana, does indeed have a higher GDP. To make your discussions easier and less embarrassing in the future, assume that 100 % of the time when someone speaks of GDP, they're speaking of GDP at purchasing power parity per capita. | | |
| ▲ | aguaviva 4 days ago | parent [-] | | Assume that 100 % of the time when someone speaks of GDP, they're speaking of GDP at purchasing power parity per capita. And you can assume that 100 % of the time when someone speaks of the size of their gas tank, they're really talking about MPG while in cruise mode. | | |
| ▲ | valval 4 days ago | parent [-] | | I’m serious. Please don’t assume anyone is ever speaking or absolute GDP unless they make it explicitly known. That would be utterly silly. | | |
| ▲ | aguaviva 4 days ago | parent [-] | | I'm serious, too. But given the wildly untenable opinion statement of yours that this now long-flagged thread started off with -- and the obvious irrelevance of any economic performance measures to the Russo-Ukraine conflict -- we see that the entire thread has been utterly silly, from the get-go. | | |
| ▲ | valval 3 days ago | parent [-] | | I'm a bit lazy to type right now so Claude can type the message in my stead: "
Think about comparing two families: the Smiths have 5 people and earn $100,000 per year, while Jones is just a couple earning $70,000. If you only looked at total household income, you'd think the Smiths were doing better. But when you realize the Smiths have to split that money five ways ($20,000 per person) while the Joneses get $35,000 each, the picture changes completely. That's exactly what happens when we compare countries by total GDP. China's total GDP might dwarf Denmark's, but China has to spread that wealth across 1.4 billion people, while Denmark only needs to support 6 million. It's like comparing a pizza between a huge family reunion and a dinner date - the total amount of pizza matters less than how many slices each person gets. This is why economists prefer to use GDP per capita - it's like looking at how much pizza each person at the table gets, rather than just admiring the size of the whole pie.
" I presented some hard to digest (for some) facts in my opening comment here. You'll only need to read European, Ukrainian, and Russian history for 30 minutes to know that. Of course you wouldn't, you're just a parrot repeating propaganda. You have no interest in the truth. | | |
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| ▲ | groby_b 5 days ago | parent | prev [-] |
| Yes, we are. Outside of Poland, everybody's closing their eyes to it, but war is coming. We might be able to stop it before it becomes a hot war, but the ambition is there, the indicators are there, the opportunity is there. Assume it's a war. (Unless you're German. I guess our national sport is now making excuses for Russia) |
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| ▲ | K0balt 5 days ago | parent | next [-] | | I grew up in Fairbanks, Alaska, near a strategic Cold War military base. I still remember seeing the TU-95 “bear” bombers flying overhead being escorted and turned around by our fighter jets. It makes it pretty real when 7 year old me is wondering if this one has any nukes on board, and if this will be the day that they drop. Russia is not to be trusted, imho. They do not honor their international commitments in good faith, and they will expand their territorial claims if they are allowed to do so. Europe, like a frog in a pot, is in peril and they need to take steps to make sure that Russian war fighting capabilities are destroyed through exhaustion in Ukraine. This of course is tragic for Ukraine, because it means that she will be utterly razed in the process. But if Russia prevails or backs down with strength, it will happen again. And again. Russias ability to project force in a strategic way must be destroyed. They are not trustworthy stewards of coercive force. | | |
| ▲ | nradov 5 days ago | parent [-] | | I don't trust Russia either, but are you certain that's a real memory? I'm not aware of any confirmed incidents in which USSR bombers actually flew within sight of Fairbanks. They routinely tested our defenses but they didn't penetrate that far into US airspace. | | |
| ▲ | K0balt 5 days ago | parent [-] | | I wish I had a photograph. I’ve been told before that this was impossible by others. I’ve also been told by others that were there that yes, it happened. It may not have been , however, an aggressive incursion, I have no way of knowing that part for sure. Having fighters scramble from Eilison was not unusual at all, and when hunting out in that area with my father we saw a few of those. It was pretty distinct from the training and combat training they did, so it wasn’t that hard to distinguish the intentionality and risk tolerance that was reserved for that kind of urgency. Anecdotally, I’m pretty darn sure that I saw a bear flying overhead just a few miles east-southeast of Fairbanks. I watched it be turned by 3 F4 phantoms. I was with my father and a few of his friends, as well as my brother that would have been 13 at the time. Everyone there remembers the event, and it was talked about for days in Fairbanks, we even had a subsequent training the next week in my elementary school on survival in the event of a nuclear attack lol. Perhaps it was some kind of clandestine fuckery, perhaps it was an authorized flight, or perhaps it would have been to embarrassing / inflammatory to make it an event of record? I’m sure the answers are quietly sitting somewhere in a musty filing box. |
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| ▲ | zelphirkalt 5 days ago | parent | prev [-] | | Sadly as a German I must agree. AfD (financed by Russia) and BSW (probably also financed by Russia, or simply hopelessly naive) will fall over themselves making those excuses. Poor Putin, if only someone _talked_ to him ... while Russia is sabotaging of critical infrastructure like train service, hospitals, Internet, politics, and probably more. Russia is like this annoying bench neighbor, who under the table pokes you in the side during class, until they get shoved hard and then act all hurt. Kinda makes AfD and BSW traitors of their own country. I for one am in favor of giving Wagenknecht a list of must haves for a ceasefire and peace treaty, which obviously will contain giving back all territory to Ukraine, costly reparation for many years to come, and denazification in Russia. With that list we send her to Russia to negotiate. She is only allowed to return, when the points on that list are achieved. She will be the negotiator, the change she will be the change she wants to see. (If it is not obvious to someone, this is rather a joke, since she cannot be trusted to have meaningful negotiations with her idol.) |
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