Ukraine (Mod Note & Threadbanned Users in OP)

Yurt2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118670659#Comment_118670659

Yeah that's what counts in your world, media headlines. There are 1.5 million people internally displaced in Ukraine already from the Russian conceived and sponsored Donbass conflict. I have to say, I think your posting is scumbaggery with no values. Waving your little Russian flag like this is a football game and that millions already haven't lost their home and many more are set to become refugees. Great craic altogether.

And before you mention another country as a diversion, take a look at the thread title.

Ahherelads2022

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118670667#Comment_118670667

How you feel now is how I felt when NATO went into Libya ect. So ive been desensitized by any aggression to counter them.

Notmything

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118670462#Comment_118670462

Genuinely have no idea what you are saying. If by "us" you mean Ireland, we are involved brcause we are in the EU. As for "our backyard" no idea.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118670659#Comment_118670659

Of course you hear about them. How else would you know about them. Normal life does not go on.

None of this had anything to do with Ukraine.

Flinty997

Can we not derail this thread away from the Ukraine.

Ahherelads2022

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118670720#Comment_118670720

So why should the EU sanction Russia and not Israel or Turkey?

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118670746#Comment_118670746

Why do you want to talk about them and not Ukraine. Why not start a new thread on those issues.

Ahherelads2022

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118670755#Comment_118670755

Sanction them all or sanction none. Ukraine just needs to renounce NATO membership or go to war. Both bad, but they have no alternative.

Flinty997

A war and sanctions are all not good outcomes for Russia. Ukraine is caught in the grinder. But then it always has been.

None of this is the interesting. What the economic implications for energy in Europe are.

Tell me how

Can anyone else remember a time when a US major network was so overtly broadcasting Russian propaganda?

https://twitter.com/RonFilipkowski/status/1495932356632494096

Larbre34

Yesterday. And the day before, and....

Manic Moran

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118669233#Comment_118669233

Specifically taking troops off the table was a mistake. Even if the US wasn't prepared to fight for Ukraine, specifically announcing it cleared the path to the current moves, and was called out at the time. The US very clearly signalled it was going to leave Ukraine to hang out to dry, the only thing it didn't do was gift-wrap the place. There wasn't even a shred of ambiguity for the Russians to consider.

Retaining a tripwire force might at least have made Putin think twice, if for no other reason than to avoid accidentally killing Americans which might then trigger a response.

Atlantic Dawn

Tanks rolling in to Donetsk now according to Reuters...

https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-crisis-tanks-and-armoured-personnel-carriers-near-donetsk-reuters-witness-12548426

paul71

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118670687#Comment_118670687

What about this what about what about the price of turnips. Completely irrelevant.

paul71

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118670746#Comment_118670746

What about this what about what about the price of turnips. Completely irrelevant.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118671091#Comment_118671091

I think Russia rolling into Ukraine suits US long term interests better than US trying to pretend it can hold off Russia on Russia's doorstep where Russia has all the strategic and tactical advantages.

Sucks for Ukraine sure. Im not sure the Ukraine played this very smart though.

Ahherelads2022

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118671360#Comment_118671360

Long term people will keep being killed. Untill Ukraine and Russia are allowed make a deal the prognosis is bad for Ukraine. Sure ya its little cost to the US, Ukraine could of bitten off the hand (crimea, Dpr,LPR) and moved into the EU slash Nato a few years ago. The only way to reclaim those was via a war it couldn't fight. Now the chance it gone.

johnnyskeleton

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118671091#Comment_118671091

The US is probably looking not just at Ukraine, but at its role in the world generally. If they were saying they would support the Ukraine fully and then failed, in the end, to commit troops when Russia invaded, then they would seem like an unreliable ally to everyone else. So the decision was taken early on that the US would not give direct military support to Ukraine and that they would not even rely on the "veil of uncertainty" when negotiating with Russia. This is obviously bad for Ukraine, but it means that other US allies looking on won't start to think "the US said it supported Ukraine but when it came down to it they didn't do anything".

Leaving a tripwire force runs the risk that in an invasion the US/NATO would get sucked into the war. The reality is that while neither the US or NATO want to see a full kinetic war in the Ukraine, they are not prepared to fully commit themselves to its defence. The Tucker Carlson clip above is obviously just the standard Fox news / anti Democrat / anti Biden nonsense, but there is a kernel of truth in it. Ukraine is a democracy, but it is very corrupt and there is a large amount of Russian people and influence there. The US/NATO response is proportionate - they will provide economic aid and military equipment, but they won't go to war with Russia over Ukraine.

In fact, if you wanted to be very cynical about it, or even consider Putin's world view, you could argue that the US/NATO position does see the Ukraine as more like Russia than themselves, and that a large scale and bloody war between Russia and Ukraine would be like a Russian civil war. The response therefore is to shore up the Ukraine as much as possible to make an invasion as difficult and costly as could be. I could see how a certain part of the US establishment would even welcome Russia getting embroiled in an Afghanistan style "Forever war", and it would be even better for them if the Russian army failed to demonstrate that it was the modernised professional war machine that they are claiming to be. If Russia invades while the US is making very public noises against Russia, and it ends up driving a wedge between Russia and Germany economically, then its all a win for the US.

So I can see how the US could reach the view that Ukraine is not a hill they want to die on. The EU is in a very different position, but the EU is not united enough nor militarily strong enough to go it alone without the US.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118671091#Comment_118671091

I tend to agree.

Removing the threat on military intervention was a mistake.

I was thinking that they should have held the security meeting in Kiev rather than Munich for similar reasons - Would Putin have rolled in with a bunch of world leaders sitting in the Capital?

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118671495#Comment_118671495

Who's stopping them from making a deal?

It's only chance of keeping Russia out was appeasing Russia/Putin. If that was ever possible.

EltonJohn69

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118671002#Comment_118671002

Tucker is just a scumbag troll…. It’s bizzare that he is the mainstream media in America

boetstark

It may have been posted elsewhere, but Ukraine has a very stark options list. Reject membership of NATO or go to war.

I have no sympathy with putin but Ukraine being a member of NATO places NATO weapons 500 miles from Moscow. If the shoe was on the other foot I could not see the US allowing such a scenario.

Little boys comparing Willie's is more mature than this fiasco

If

Gatling

For the last week we've seen US global hawk Drone's patrolling over ukraine along with other surveillance aircraft , they didn't enter Ukrainian airspace yesterday and are not there today ,

Surveillance aircraft over Poland flying to lativa and Lithuania

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118671717#Comment_118671717

Well they could have stayed away from both Nato and Russia, and be pseudo Neutral.

Quin_Dub

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118672311#Comment_118672311

Would that be before or after Putin rolled into the Crimea?

Putin does not want Ukraine to exist as a standalone entity unless he can install a puppet government a la Belarus.

Neutrality isn't really an option for the Ukraine , it's either complete subservience to Putin or leverage NATO to remain independent - There is no middle pathway sadly.

Flinty997

Germany to halt Nord Stream 2 project.

Was always a bad idea.

Brussels Sprout

https://twitter.com/philipoltermann/status/1496078379426136064

Nice. Germany pulling the plug on the alternative pipeline from Russian. That's bad news for the Kremlin. Had that opened they could easily have shut off all energy to Ukraine which is currently the main conduit to Europe.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118672345#Comment_118672345

True. Well its all a situation of Putin making. I think it will cost him more economically in the long run through.

Flinty997

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118672354#Comment_118672354

The Pipe line was actually the best think Putin could have done. He's burnt his bridges on it now.