I mean my god they seem absolutely committed to driving us all off a cliff to hang on to their already-collapsing hegemony. Is there literally anything short of getting their teeth kicked in by a nuclear launch that could convince the leaders of "the free world" to once, just fucking once, willingly take the L?
I don't want to die in the opening cutscene of a Fallout game because whoever the hell is in charge of Germany these days decided to get into a pissing match with fucking Putin of all people.
Technically they gave up in Korea and Vietnam without using nukes, so it's possible. But we've done a lot of speculating that the current leadership are the failsons of the failsons of the people who actually put the empire together, so who knows?
Only because they got Indonesia, which was the much bigger W. So maybe they'll only drop Ukraine if they topple China
"Listen Jack, we're the freest country in the world, which means I'm free to call this a W" - :biden-point:
Honestly if that's what it takes, sure. Let him parade around the country with a big old :mission-accomplished-1::mission-accomplished-2:
He stopped Russia from annexing all of Ukraine! And that was definitely Russia's goal in the first place, so that means Russia loses and we win!
It'll take large anti-war protests in Europe imo, probably caused by energy shortages and a financial crisis. I think if Europe firmly steps down the US will too, and by this point the US will likely also be dealing with a very clear recession
Even a nuclear exchange can't convince some people. They are saying that the destruction is over-hyped or something on those lines
A few months ago the cope was "Russia's nukes are old and bad and Russia is incompetent, so they probably wouldn't even work".
still is. reddit is fucking chilling just people in complete denial or enthusiastically encouraging war
"So what, we're supposed to let Putin do whatever he wants because he has nukes and threatens to use them like a bully?!"
Well yeah, when somebody breaks into your home and puts a gun to your child's head you don't dare them to shoot. They already won by reaching a position to administer that threat.
Depends on what it means to take the L. The fight is now centered entirely on Europe's relationship with Russia and China vs. it's relationship with the US. The US will keep maximum pressure to split economic ties between Europe and China and Europe and Russia. Right now, that is in the form of sanctions and keeping the war going and blowing up pipelines. They're doing their best to work the isolation of China into the mix, screwing with shipping infrastructure and trying to create sanctions on anyone trading with Russia (which is why the solidarity of BRICS is so important).
The endgame is either the isolation of Russia from Europe (US' goal) or Russian economic integration with Europe (Russia's defensive position). The war and its horrors are a result of those goals, and the attempts to resolve or escalate revolve around what those goals permit each actor to contemplate and act on. Fucking around on Russia's border was an attempt to provoke a reaction, and Russia obliged. And of course, we're dealing with people and ideologies and the fog of war and diplomacy, so figuring out what is good strategy for the goal vs. bullshit propaganda vs. ideological nonsense is difficult.
Russian economic integration with Europe
lmao Russia controlled EU? That would be a funny outcome.
I mean something more like how China is economically integrated with so many countries: lots of trade and interdependencies, but part of an equation that is favorable to the development and power of China. Europe's dependency on Russian fossil fuels is one example of this and it's why the US is intent on disrupting Russian infrastructure to deliver fossil fuels. Russia wants even more integration, or at least that was a clear goal.
The War in Ukraine changes the calculus a lot. Russia basically hit the "fuck it" button, deciding that (1) they were targeted for death already by the US and its increasing sanctions and military brinkmanship and it was going to close those avenues entirely, eventually, and (2) speeding up the inevitable dedollarization and fight over the isolation of Russia. We're currently finding out whether that calculus was correct, that this was timed beneficially for Russian interests in dedollarization.
So far, I think the results are favorable for Russia's logic, though the entire situation is at the cost of working people everywhere, and particularly those in Ukraine.
Absolutely! I might phrase it as this: the world will either find some significant dedollarized steady-state or it will redollarize. The former will result in the downfall of the US' current imperialist strategies and the best case scenario for the US is that it carves out a section of the planet for its personal exploitation (Europe is getting a little taste of that). The latter case will result in the downfall of BRICS and similar countries losing their autonomy and returning to typical third world imperialized statuses. The current situation is unstable and uncertain, whereas those two outcomes are comparably stable, but represent very different outcomes.
Russia is pushing towards the former in its own weird ways. The US is using basically old-school cold war tactics, just in the financial space: isolate the rooskies, turn the states that dated to work with them into dependencies. Maximum pressure on all parties. The financialized aspect makes this version fully neoliberal and less overtly CIA, but we will probably get there as well if there is any (fairly unlikely) left resurgence in Europe. Greece and Serbia may find themselves in that situation.
Anyways I agree that dedollarization is not inevitable, but the conflict over it is: major non-US players know they will be targeted for destruction unless they can dedollarized. The US proves it every few years when it screws with an "ally" that got too cocky using purely "rules-based" currency fuckery.
Yep! Big fan of Hudson.
I wish there was a big red "help dedollarize" button in the imperial core. The best I have is sending money to smaller-scale autonomy movements + organizing in solidarity with them so that they can become established enough to form relationships with China et al. So much of the organizing opportunities in the imperial core is just social imperialism, it's maddening.
At the moment, I'm trying to get "the most progressive union in town" to not endorse a warmonger Dem and it's an uphill battle. That's how low the bar is set.
I feel like dedollarization will happen but also that the dollar will still hold significant sway. It'll be one of the few main currencies widely used in the multipolar world.
The only thing that would stop them is a better opportunity for war somewhere else. Notice how quickly this happened after the US pulled out of Afghanistan (and ofc the saber rattling with China in between). The US needs its bombs to go somewhere to justify the expense of making them. We are still stuck in the Forever War and it will continue until the US fundamentally changes.
Yes. If it starts to look like China is outflanking them, they will deprioritize Russia to contain them.
They are all absolutely terrified of what the consequences will be if they take the L.
There is no predictability for what happens domestically in literally any of these countries afterwards. They won't take the option without a clear idea of what will happen as a result of it.
Honestly I don’t understand these takes, I don’t comment a lot but why is Russia and her population not targeted to stop their imperialist leader. Fuck the US and EU but fuck Putin and his cronies too. But any war is terrible and whoever starts that shit is the most terrible
edit:Targeted meaning in targeted by these types of posts, not killing or hurting them
This isn't a pro-Putin post, it's a "please European and US leaders actually engage in rational geopolitics for once instead of playing nuclear chicken with a cornered and increasingly-desperate regional power" post.
If Putin is going to behave like a child then we have the right to behave like a child in return
destroys the world :xok:
Fuck Putin but if you think this war is about Russian "imperialism," or that regime change and the collapse and subsequent looting of the Russian state is a good thing, then I suggest lurking more.
Of course not, just that there is more than the nato aggression at play here and Russians are the only people who could take action in the part their government is playing. Anti war protests and sabotage should not be limited to EU/US
why is Russia and her population not targeted to stop their imperialist leader.
Putin has been seeking a diplomatic resolution to this problem almost since he seized power in 2000. Every attempt at diplomacy by the Russians has been flatly rejected and NATO has continued to relentlessly encroach on the Russian border. Putin has made many, many attempts at diplomacy since the coup in 2014 and all of them, including the ones brokered by France, have been shut down hard by Ukraine and their masters in NATO.
Russia can't stop this war because Russia didn't start the war. Pillaging and looting Russia has been a goal of the West since at least the formation of NATO in 1949. NATO, and by extension the US, are getting what they want. Russia is being weakened. Europe is facing total economic collapse that will make it even more of a helpless vassal of the US. So far the sanctions regime has only really hurt Europe, leaving Russia largely unscathed. Dedollarization is still in the works but Washington doesn't seem to care that much.
And of course in this late-capitalist world where everything that can be stolen has been stolen and everything that can be exploited has been exploited, the only way left to turn a profit to to destroy massive amounts of capital through industrial warfare, so in addition to everything else Washington is getting an excuse to feed tremendous amounts of money in to the Military Industrial Complex.
This was all planned out by NATO and the US decades ago. It's been their strategic goal probably since the USSR was dismantled. Every single diplomat and strategist active in the last thirty years was 100% aware that attempting to expand NATO in to Ukraine would, one way or another, lead to a direct conflict if not open warfare. Joe Biden literally said it himself.
We're hear because NATO and the US want us to be here. Only NATO and the US can stop this. And they don't want to stop this.
But Russia sent in troops so that's a whole new war and we don't have to consider context. Like how communists get credit for starting both the Korean and Vietnam wars.
It was completely unprovoked and if we keep saying that people will start to believe it.
like i will go over my reasoning here like the way i see it most of this situation is on nato, THEY KNEW that russia would not allow their ukrainian move, and they thought that they were enough of a deterent, and they were not and the whole region is paying for it, i think the whole war is dumb but if you have to end this war there will have to be concessions unless you really win it and the closer you get to really winning it on this situation, the closer you are to actual nukes going around which is an absolute loss, so it is fucked like we don't like putin, but like letting it escalate more and more and more is kinda of a dumb move, and i don't think the russian population has much control over any of this in the same way i don't think american population has like what they are gonna do, really?
Who else though? Do we just pick a champion who will make these decisions that ends up causing a lot of suffering and then say: ‘I’m not him so not my fault’. You either are partially responsible for picking them, or for not getting rid of them when it turned sour
and her population
Should you be targeted for the actions of your government of which you have absolutely zero power to do anything about? What atrocities has your government performed in the past and in what way do you think you should be justifiably targeted for those atrocities? You have no power, you have no ability to do anything about what your bourgeoise government does. No amount of targeting you will change that. Right?
Serious question, I'll engage with you in good-faith. Empathy is the basic starting point. Reverse the scenario and make yourself the target and I think you'll realise the problem. You aren't any different to any of the russian population.
I think targeted was not the right word, but considering that the only people able to change their country in a positive way are the people who live there, work there and love there. If my country would do this shit I would vote (lol), protest and sabotage any war effort I don’t see myself different as anyone, but doing nothing because I have limited (if any) power means accepting this hell world and I won’t do that
This is a fundamental misunderstanding of bourgeoise democracy.
The people have zero power in a bourgeoise democracy. The only people with power are the bourgeoisie and the only people that can change anything are the bourgeoisie. Short of a full blown revolution, which is absolutely not even feasible, that shit is just a vindictive attack against the people.
If other countries in the world did that shit to your country the outcome would be that the people turtle, become massively hostile to the enemy countries attacking them, and blame them for all of their problems.
This is all extremely un-marxist. Cuba, Venezuela and the DPRK are already extremely clear indications of what happens when you try to sanction a country into oblivion, it motivates the population against the enemy states performing the sanctions and all it does is harm the average person's living standards. Sanctions are evil. They are warfare targeted against the average person with every bit of evidence showing they do not work and only function to harm. The people recognise YOU as the asshole causing their pain and turn into "fuck you we'll survive this out of pure spite" mode.
Anyway I personally find the fact that you want to harm proles for the actions of the bourgeoisie really sus. Those are us. Don't other your own class based on national borders.
Thanks for explaining that! I used my words incorrectly, targeting in the sense of creating posts not harming anyone. That’s the main thing I don’t understand here: that violence seems to be ok as long as its leftists doing it, sure revolutions are bloody but a lot of Ukranians are innocent in this and these actions seem to motivate more hate for Russia/Communism
I understand you, but im not a pacifist. Some empires need to die. Sometimes you are the Karma that swings around. I don't have to like Russia, but I can respect that in this moment their nationalist objectives line up with the end of the anglo-american financial empire. Marx would have agreed considering his own position on the Franco-Prussian war which created Germany.
The Ukranian people, if they win, will only set the global left back. Russia has to win and I'm not afraid to say it.
I get that point, but I personally see only China’s way of furthering the global left as actually working. Russia’s aggression does nothing except feed the red scare bullshit
and her population
fuck you you collective punishment fascist piece of shit.
lmao pacifist if anything you fucker, I don’t think they should be held responsible in nany physical meaning. But if there is power to stop killing it must come from the people, be it Russians or Europeans/Americans
nah, way too many people defend sanctions for us to assume you didn't mean that. eat shit, backpedaler.
schrodinger's douchebag lookin ass.
Holy shit what the fuck is wrong with you? You can’t fucking understand I was talking about targets for these posts? Are you american or just ignorant about people having different concepts for the same words? Especially a second language.
Why are you so bitter?
Because her population except for few libs could see that the US and EU want to pillage whatever left of their country after pillaging the corpse of USSR, and turn most of former USSR state into Nazi? Not hard to see Russian support Putin over the west. You act like the 8 past years doesn't happen, and many Russian act happy happy with Ukraine?
but why is Russia and her population not targeted to stop
If there's any takes I don't understand it's this kind right here, Russia has been targeted for thirty years, that's kinda of the whole problem
Also, the war started in 2014 and as per the Minsk agreement it sure as shit wasn't Russia who started it
Really getting sick of this mindless media generated 2003 Iraq war mindset "SadDam iS bAD gUy" where even basic facts don't penetrate western skulls, there are goddamn neocons in academia who know better, shit even liberal professors aren't all falling for it
Kind of amazing how, in 2022, folks in western countries just sorta uncritically accept the the 17th century notion that a king/executive should have ultimate authority for war; that it's far too important to leave up to the people. Why, if people could vote we'd probably have a lot less wars. And wars are very profitable. I doubt if the people had a say, this war would end tomorrow.
But the US/NATO haven't lost at all? They've gotten the best possible outcome they could hope for, effectively getting a third party to fight a war for them while actively humiliating Russia, and getting the EU to increase its military spending while becoming more economically dependent on the US. The longer this goes on as it currently is, the better it is for US hegemony.
I don't think this actually has anything to do with Ukraine. At least, not at this point.
At this point, it's about being able to fight a proxy war with Russia in a way they have never been able to before.
