Russia - threadbanned users in OP

Once you move away from the big cities in Russia, and hit the rural areas, the differences between them are vast. But the whole Country is a tapestry of different ethnicities, religions, clans etc. You could ask "Will the real Russian please stand up?"

Russia has just invaded Ukraine (over false pretenses), other countries are now feeling threatened, e.g. Finland. Therefore they are considering joining NATO.

You see the issue there?

An aggressive Russia has always been the issue.

Kherson down the south seems to have fully fallen to Russia, and Mariupol is in extreme trouble

Or you know people are just seeing children being cluster bombed to bits by Putin and his death squads and after a week of witnessing constant sustained and escalating war crimes their empathy and horror at this moment in time supersedes your desire to change the narrative to "Yeah Putin is bad but.....".

From what I can see the sustained world wide horror on all media channels has undoubtedly and fundamentally helped Ukraine.

Your chance to parrot Russell Brands talking points will come, maybe leave it while though eh?

With respect, I don't think you get it. If Russia takes Ukraine, they then have NATO countries bordering them. So the idea of taking a non-NATO country out, just to end up bordering NATO countries is absurd. This is especially the case when Ukraine weren't anywhere near joining NATO.

The NATO thing is a ruse for Russian expansionism. Putin is known to have admired the USSR and he feels (as many Russians do) that the USSR was 'unfairly' broken up and that the glory days should return. He doesn't think Ukraine is a real country. He thinks it belongs within Russia.

Depends very much on how much resistance Russian forces are meeting, their moral and the attitude of much of the rest of world to genocide on the doorstep of Europe in 2022. They won't be able to declare victory in one part of Ukraine and just walk away without a counter offensive from unoccupied parts. Sanctions and other measures somewhat like Covid supports - needed emergency to bring them in but hard to withdraw. The ability of Russia to fund itself will be in question.

Just go talk to your mates in the Russian embassy here - you'll get a better hearing.

But to answer your question - if our existence was threatened by an imperialist expansionist neighbour, we'd welcome NATO and any defensive support on offer.

yeah seems to be a lot of propaganda coming out of ukraine ,9000 russians dead ? surely nobody with a brain beleives that

@gandalf wrote:

A new policy of appeasement at this stage is merely storing up a new "crisis" further down the line. Agreeing to a scenario where Russia gets rewarded for invading another nation with redrawn borders or new autonomous puppet states is unacceptable.

Russia needs to be pushed back to Russia and driven into the ground. The sanctions lift when Russia formally agrees that it recognises the sovereignty of every nation along its borders and cannot object to any of them seeking membership of NATO or the EU at any time.

A lasting legacy of nuclear weapons that has come into stark focus here is that once a country has them, they basically have a blank cheque to violate other countries because the world does not want to spark a nuclear war.

Arising out of this should come a general agreement between all nuclear nations to dismantle their stockpiles with ongoing independent oversight and auditing. The doctrine of MAD quite clearly doesn't keep the peace. Now it's a get out of jail free card allowing nuclear powers to do whatever the **** they want, safe in the knowledge that the only countries who can stop them, won't.

While I am sure there is some tactical value in having nukes, limiting countries to (say) 20 weapons with a combined yield no greater than 50kT, is more than enough nuclear weapons to be able to wave your dick around without putting the existence of our species at risk.

Any country that doesn't agree to it, gets sanctioned out of existence. One can dream...

Serious bang of Neville Chamberlain of ya Wibbs.......