Russia-Ukraine War (continuing)

luckily for me I managed to avoid these threads for the first 2.5 years of the 3 day war…..

Ukraine might not be smelling of roses, but Russia…, Russia smells like a sewer that’s been blocked by 25 years of ****. And the guy who’s job it is to clean it won’t clean it because he doesn’t get paid enough and he’s at the bottom of a bottle of vodka every other hour…

what were Russian Ice Skaters doing in the US of that is true? I thought that this kind of thing was part of the ‘sanctions’ equivalent . The US took exception to Russians being involved in the Olympics - so , what’s the difference?. I will hold my breath on this one in case someone is trolling. Hard to know what to believe these days. Now have to contend with the reported Obama family issue

Have you ever bothered engaging with other posters? At this stage your posts are little more than propaganda feeds, which is surely against the spirit of using a public discussion board?

You think the current Ukrainian leadership - led of course by someone with no military/ secret service/ nationalist/ partisan-political background - is ideologically incapable of negotiations, yet you make zero reference (once again) to the Russian leadership. You think the EU is incapable of negotiations, despite being entirely built on the basis of negotiation rather than use of force and having recently concluded one of the worlds most complex political negotiations in modern times (Brexit)?

And you expect people to take your output of what can only be described as Moscow-originated propaganda, seriously?

Do you not think that at this stage you're simply trolling and spamming the thread?

if you get it, you get it

Speaking of distractions, it feels like Ukraine are taking advantage of the new White House administration being distracted (getting MAGA loons into every high office) to ignore any fears of "escalation" that were frequently expressed by the previous incumbents. They've really been hammering Russia's oil/gas industry these last couple of weeks, and not a peep out of "the West". Two major refineries now completely off line for an undetermined period, and is it two or three pumping stations no longer feeding the European network since last night?

Previously, I was of the view that Ukraine might put on a bit of a show to emphasise for Trump how they were "winners" rather than "losers"; now I think they've moved past that, don't really give two fkks what Trump thinks and are just enjoying the breathing space that his election has granted them to lay into the Russians in any way they want.

Sure. Like any poster if I see an interesting post or contribution then I followup on it. Depends on if I have time or not.

Seeing as you raise it, I'm referring to news and analysis of the conflict from places like Forbes, Kyiv Independent and the Economist. This is mainstream, extremely pro-NATO media. Trying to say an outlet like Forbes is "Moscow-originated propaganda" is objectively incorrect. Its NATO and Ukrainian sources talking about the course of the conflict itself. You mightn't like what they're reporting, but that's something different.

As for the Ukrainian leadership being ideologically incapable of negotiations, that's an opinion I hold based on the evidence, not least of which is the legislation the leadership introduced to ban negotiations with Russia to appease their idealogical base. Was Zelensky at one time separate from the idealogical class? Sure. But now he is completely indistinguishable from those idealogical groups. It's not particular to Zelensky either. Often Zaluzhnyi is touted as a potential rival to Zelensky (hence his removal), but he is and always has been a true believer in the idealogy so he's not able to negotiate either.

As for the EU (and the UK) - they are completely incapable of negotiation. Their entire policy for the last 3-4 years has been no negotiations. They nearly lost their minds when Orban just went and spoke to both Zelensky and Putin to at least try understand what both sides wanted from negotiations. So again, the EU is ideologically incapable of negotiations.

I've said earlier that if Trump was smart, he would a) walk away from Biden's war, or b) to whatever extent he does negotiate, talk directly to Russia and cut Ukraine and the EU out of the talks - they would only enter them with the aim of sabotaging the talks. All that said, I don't think a negotiated peace will happen - the two sides (Russia and NATO) are simply too far apart. And its apparent by now Trump has no real idea what to do so they may never even happen.

If NATO were in this war, it would actually have ended in 3 days.

And it's not "Biden's war". It's not the "war in Ukraine".

It is the illegal Russian invasion of Ukraine, a war crime, conducted with war crimes and atrocities.

Imagine being Ukrainian and reading the sh1te hat Sand comes out with. How insulting must it feel that your country isn't considered a side in a war when it has been invaded by a numerically superior neighbour and managed to hold them off for almost 3 (or almost 11) years?

Dismissing the existence of Ukraine in any aspect of this is 100% Kremlin propaganda

Well, if we apply your logic, the US and European nations should just mount up and smash through Russian lines all the way to Moscow, dismantle the current Putin sham of a regime and then decide what resources it feels like grabbing for themselves.

That's what Russia has done here. And you seem hell bent on interpreting everything in as pro-Russian a slant as possible, so presumably you'd have no issue with "The West" adopting similar strong arm tactics and wringing their hands that the Russians won't negotiate peace.

It's just so farcical.

Ukraine was an independent, democratic nation. It was perfectly entitled to chose whatever path it wanted in terms of which economic blocs it wanted to align with. It posed no military threat to Russia. Both Russia and Ukraine were enjoying perfectly good economic prosperity up to 2022. The invasion was 100% the brainchild of one man. Everything else is just a sideshow… nations are always going to get pissed off when some country starts to cosy up to a nation it sees as competition. It happens all the time around the globe. It does NOT justify a military invasion that must have cost the lives of at least half a million people at this stage. All while Putin and his oligarch elites are tucked up safe in their lavish compounds with the comfort of their billions in off shore cash.

Your posts speak to none of that, but go off on imagined tangents about pro-NATO news outlets and perceived intransigence of the Ukrainian leadership.

Or force them into extreme poverty, so they they need loans at usurious interest rates, which in turn force them to sign military contract's.

And so it goes…

Hardly surprising that the orcs have about as little respect for each other as they do for the Ukrainians. Scum of the earth, Ukraine can never give up until every one of these degenerates are removed from their territory.

I always saw the Mad Max films as being prophetic.