Do ordinary Russians support the Ukraine war? No one can say for sure, but a best guess is that most of them do. Why is this?
It's not so hard to figure out. First off, as background, Russians spent centuries resenting the cultural and economic dominance of the West. They especially resented it because it was true. Then they fought two world wars against Germany, followed by 40 years fighting a Cold War in which the broader West was their enemy.
Then, thanks to Western pressure, their country disintegrated in 1991. This is not an easy thing to take. And what happens next?
The Americans send in teams of economists to make Russia a nice, capitalist country. The result is disastrous. Per capita GDP falls by half and the economy collapses. Huge companies are all but given away to oligarchs. The West takes advantage of Russia's momentary weakness to expand NATO right up to their borders, which looks like a permanent threat to Russian sovereignty and its legitimate sphere of influence.
Is it any wonder that the average Russian, living through all this, would feel like they've been treated criminally by an implacable enemy determined to keep them small and helpless?
But then Vladimir Putin becomes president. Make Russia Great Again! he says, and people see a glimmer of hope. What's more, Putin presides over a return to economic growth:
That's more like it. It shows what can happen when a real Russian is in charge who refuses to kowtow to the Americans.
And many Russians, just like many Americans, are cultural conservatives and strong nationalists. They like Putin for those reasons. They like the fact that he showed the Georgians who's boss. They like the fact that of course he permanently annexed Crimea instead of paying a lease until Ukraine eventually decided to kick them out. There's no way Russia was ever going to lose such a strategic asset, especially when the population is heavily pro-Russian.
Finally, a few months ago the United States agreed to support Ukraine's eventual membership in NATO, something that Putin has long made clear was intolerable to Russia—and probably to most Russians. It was just one more way that the Americans were gratuitously insulting Russia in its own backyard.
These are all real things. Now toss in an increasingly controlled media that makes Fox News look tame and it's hardly a surprise that most Russians view the West—and the US in particular—as enemies who won't rest until Russia is fully under their thumb. Do they believe that Ukraine is committing genocide against ethnic Russians? Or that Ukraine was getting ready to attack Russia? Why wouldn't they? They're primed to believe exactly that, and it's what Putin is telling them. Why would he be lying? And anyway, the average Russian probably believes that Ukraine is historically part of Russia as much as Alaska is historically part of the US.
But naturally the West has taken this opportunity to crush Russia further. Putin calls our economic sanctions an act of war, and who can argue with that? If anyone did to us what we're doing to them, we'd sure consider it an act of war.
In any case, this is the nickel version of what's going on. Russians have plenty of real reasons to resent the West, and that makes them perfect vessels for propaganda that cranks the resentment up to 11. Most of them probably think the invasion of Ukraine is a righteous war indeed.
Your second chart seems to be missing the last decade of the "Putin Era" of Russia. Why?
For that matter, given the line seems to be already on the way down at the start of the so-called "American Era" why does the chart not go back to say 1980 or 1970? Presumably, if the line for those decades does not show decline, it would support the assertion it was the Americans wot did it... Of course, if the line shows there was already decline leading up to 1990...
What part of "this is how the Russians are viewing things" did you not understand?
Except that isn't how Russians see things. This is what Kevin thinks is how Russians see things.
Is he right? Who knows, but cherry picking data like he did here with the chart, doesn't exactly make his case stronger.
Precisely.
Solar
Yeah KD's post a LOT of surmising IMHO
With Putin controlling the media we have no idea exactly HOW the people feel
The ruble is in ruins
Non-Russian businesses are pulling out
Aeroflot has cancelled just about all domestic flights
The fact that Putin is putting a lid on the internet there tells me his narrative is losing it's impotence there.
His bravado was his OWN undoing. I am very disappointed in the performance of the Army. Were they NOT up to the task? Were they poorly supplied and commanded? (Their Intel was certainly bad)
Overall this seems like a blot on his leadership rating and he doesn't like that.
Slightly OT. I have been reading about the proposal to stop imports of Russian oil and gas. Biden seems to want to hold off for now to keep some powder dry. The republicans want to impose the ban now.
I think a compromise could be worked out to say that we support the IDEA to ban imports at some point in the near future to give Biden the backing he needs should he decide it's warranted. Biden knows pump prices would skyrocket (as do the republicans) which would hurt the American consumer albeit temporarily.
But Putin grossly underestimated NATO/EU/U.S.'s resolve on this one - ON TOP OF underestimating the Ukraine's ability to fight
This is one curious situation...........
Disappointed? As in you were hoping the Russian Army would have performed better??
Has Pelosi walked back her previous support? https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-vladimir-putin-joe-biden-business-europe-d30c144383033e2fc9bce6f3d5cfeb0b which includes:
Rick-
As retired Army I was hoping for a quick
knockout punch. If the media is correct, this is exactly what Putin had in mind. A long protracted fight means MORE civilians die
A quick takeover then the sanctions would basically stop at that point
Putin lost on BOTH counts
I am NOT against stopping the oil and gas imports from Russia. I just want to give the administration more ammo to use - which is why I phrased it as I did - to pass a resolution SUPPORTING the Administration's decision to stop the import when THEY see fit to do so. Not congress, the administration,
Put the ball in Joe's hands and let him set the play
You don't empty the armory with the first salvo - and I think we are still early in this one.
In the import case - after many years of people NOT being presidential (Trump especially) it's time we got back to that. Let Joe make the call - if it's wrong he won't blame anyone else - he will act presidential. If he succeeds then give him the credit.
It’s hard to know how this will play out but if NATO starts sending fighters, combined with continuing to supply huge amounts of surface to air weapons and drones, it’s possible (not likely, I agree, but possible) that it’s Ukraine that could wind up with air superiority. That would put the Russians under tremendous pressure.
It’s absolutely astonishing to me that the Ukrainian Air Force is still in the air. And apparently holding its own. Two weeks ago, I wouldn’t have taken 10k to 1 odds.
Russian logistics are evidently crappy. They have huge convoys that run out of gas. If the US send the correct aircraft in sufficient numbers, those stalled columns could go from a joke to a death trap.
A lot will depend on outside support and the reality is that the Russians can and will reduce Ukrainian cities to rubble. But the reality is the the Russian military is not very good. If the west sends enough planes and supplies of all kinds, the possibility of a Winter War rerun is still a very long shot but it does seem to be coming up fast on the rail.
"They have huge convoys that run out of gas."
This is so incredible - remember John McCain's famous epigram, "Russia is a gas station masquerading as a country." Is it also masquerading as a gas station?
Perhaps it's not true - fog of war.
I have no idea what explains the situation but one possibility is a combination of extreme secrecy combined with a series of assumptions that the Ukrainians would not but up much resistance and would basically collapse after a couple of days so all that was needed was to send some troops to occupy the country. But there weren’t any extensive preparations to actually fight anyone. That might explain why most soldiers didn’t know they were part of an invasion and why there were inadequate preparations in terms of logistics, military intelligence, and planning for an air campaign.
The other explanation is that all the money Putin’s lavished on his new military was wasted. His army and air force look good dropping bombs on cities or killing defenseless civilians but between the corruption and gross incompetence they just aren’t capable of fighting.
+1
It's a good question. In the Adam Tooze interview by Ezra Klein posted this week (I mentioned this in another comment), the implication was that since 2010 or so the economy has gone sideways and that's part of the reason Putin has gotten so authoritarian of late, changing the rules so he could run again, making political competition illegal or dead, taking control of the media etc. However, Tooze didn't provide the exact GDP figures to back that up.
Also, Putin is pushing 70, and sees the time window for his rebuilding of the old Soviet empire narrowing.
At this point, the collapse of Gorbachev's government is closer to the Cuban Missile Crisis than to today.
The window on the USSR closed long ago.
+10
I assume for the reason that the data doesn't support his thesis.
https://www.chromapure.com/Capture.JPG
This isn't like Kevin. It is kind of disappointing.
I’d like to see an oil price index on the same chart.
Adam Tooze referred to this (that Putin turned the economy around) in his podcast interview earlier this week with Ezra Klein, but Tooze didn't provide the details, so I am glad to see that GDP per capita chart. It tells quite a story. We should have had a Marshall Plan for Russia in the 90s. Instead we had a party for ourselves.
The West didn't cause the kleptocracy that turned Russia into a gangster's paradise, that was entirely Russian.
When NATO expanded it was only after it was obvious that Russia was never going to turn into anything else and would continue to be an obvious threat to everyone around them.
Most Russians have grown up acculturated to believe whatever the tv and strong authority figures tell them, and that's why they support attacking Ukraine, because the tv tells them to and provides a wholly imaginary view of it.
Viewing their enforced delusion with credulity is really an international form of bothsiderism.
"When NATO expanded it was only after it was obvious that Russia was never going to turn into anything else and would continue to be an obvious threat to everyone around them."
Wow, yeah, waited for (checks notes) less than a decade before expanding -- that's plenty of time to decide that Russia was never going to change.
A mass of gangsterism organized by ex-KGB in a country with absolutely no history of any other kind of government and every precedent known to man of autocracy, corruption and brutality.
What can you imagine would be the options for changing it, or influencing it in any way at all, aside from leaving it to it's own devices until it eventually burns itself into a smoldering ruin, which is exactly what it's finally gotten around to doing.
That the West even made the effort is remarkable.
Ah, so it was really predetermined, wasn’t it? There wasn’t a wait, NATO just decided that Russia would always be Russia? Good to know.
Four inch wide bleeding mole? Nothing to worry about! Could be anything.
Ignore the troll.
Exactly.
The state industries were parcelled out to favorites of the regime as Gorbachev was exiting scenting late 1991 & the survivors were getting out with what they could.
When the Neoliberal Korporatist Jim Crow Arkansas Democrats of the incoming Clinton despotism in early 1993 sent people like ( ( ( Rubin ) ) ) over to Moscow, they were left to fit a market economy on an already entrenched oligarchy.
*exiting scene in 1991, NOT exiting scenting
oh...I thought they were marking their territory...
In disintegrating Soviet Russia, bear pees on natural resources ministry.
One can argue American businessmen enabled the kleptocracy. It's what happens when you turn a bunch of hedge fund managers loose in a country with no functioning legal system. The local oligarch's learned from the American would be oligarchs and then strong armed them out of the way.
It's enjoyable to assert that all evil in the world is ultimately traceable to things that we did (or didn't do, or didn't do correctly) because such thinking offers the benefits of (a) moral purity/commitment to owning one's own failures, and (b) quietly assuming that we're the first mover in all things which in a nice, comforting way explains the world on our terms without requiring us to think too much about other people.
Sometimes--too often!--other people are victims of failed/bad/malicious U.S. actions. But while one can argue that American businessmen enabled the kleptocracy, one can also argue that Russian people have agency. We sent policy school wonks, economists, corporate lawyers, and finance experts to Russia; we didn't send the mob.
And, for what it's worth, we didn't send them for very long, and that was well over a quarter century ago; Russians have played a big role--maybe even a bigger role than the handful of American advisors--in shaping their country since 1991.
Agreed.
Couldn’t agree more, especially with b). The belief that the West/the US is the root of all evil is just the lefty version of the ‘white man’s burden’ - that we have a special responsibility to understand others, to accommodate to their traditions or culture, even to weight their interests above our own. DFPaul above says we should have had a Marshall Plan for Russia. We might have done, out of enlightened self-interest, but we certainly didn’t owe it to them. On the contrary, Russia owed development assistance to its former satellites; Russia just had no capacity to provide it.
Russians have played a big role--maybe even a bigger role than the handful of American advisors--in shaping their country since 1991.
You could change "Russians" to the vast majority of nationalities and the sentence would still be correct. The US isn't nearly the puppeteer many Americans think. It's a very big world out there!
US policies play an oversized role in shaping human society globally. That's true. But these policies seldom actually play a bigger role than domestic conditions.
Russia takes Britney Griner hostage,
https://www.businessinsider.com/american-basketball-player-wnba-brittney-griner-russian-custody-drug-charges-2022-3?r=US&IR=T
Well, took, no? She was arrested/detained/whatnot before the outbreak of hostilities.
Even with the extenuated takeover of Ukraine -- Putin was thinking this invasion would be his Panama, with ( ( ( Zelenskyy ) ) ) the new Noriega -- he was already looking for any edge available. Arresting the US basketball star for having CBD oil in a vape pen is just good contingency planning.
It might sound like splitting hair, but what she had wasn't CBD oil, but hash oil, which is basically a THC concentrate without much CBD.
I'm not seeing an actual date for her arrest anywhere except that it was in February.
And they're 'investigating her for large-scale transportation of narcotics'.
I saw something about earlier in February, but cannot find it now. If it wasn't actually before hostilities began, one would have to seriously question the wisdom of traveling there, given some of what was included in https://www.espn.com/wnba/story/_/id/33429212/basketball-player-brittney-griner-reportedly-detained-russia-wnba-representatives-working-get-home It would be right up there with hiking new the Iran/Iraq border in 2009...
Figures the one source I can find at the moment is the New York Post. Sigh: https://nypost.com/2022/03/05/all-star-brittney-griner-arrested-in-russia-on-drug-charges/
https://twitter.com/damienwoody/status/1500148206608465923
You may be right, they nabbed her as a celebrity target of convenience.
Admittedly I don’t get around much, but until this I’d never heard of her.
She's only the most famous lesbian athlete from Baylor University. A 6"9" dunking legend from Waco.
https://twitter.com/Khristina/status/1500138503866363907
She's a known spousal abuser.
I see no need to bring her back in any hurry.
Certainly not as a prisoner exchange for am actual threat to international order/peace.
*an actual threat, NOT am actual threat
The very definition of Russian whore? Ok... that's pretty harsh. They probably aren't smart enough to know they sold their soul by working in Russia. They just want to play games!
I wish them well, of course, but my goodness. The lack of judgement is astonishing.
They don't get paid enough so go for the money and they do get paid but it's done for the purposes of money laundering (not by the players).
I think this is an extreme oversimplification.
In my experience talking with some Russians (I know a few who live there, through an online game), this might be a generational or urban/rural split as well. Those I've talked to take great pains to say "not all Russians support this" and implying that they don't either. They may feel Ukraine shouldn't be in NATO, but they certainly think the war is an atrocity and paint the picture that the prevailing attitudes are nowhere near clear cut. Anecdotal, I know, but there's not really any reason for me to distrust their take on the political climate there.
Maybe Kevin doesn't get the idea of economic sanctions. It is to make things get bad again, and to get Russians to blame Putin for it. They could see that Putin's earlier invasions of Georgia and Crimea were in support of Russian majorities there, but what would be their problem with Ukraine? Do they really believe that Ukraine is controlled by "Nazis" and even if it were what concern is it of theirs? Russians have had long experience with the difference between what the state media say and reality and will not necessarily be too credulous of Putin's stories.
Sanctions will take some time to bite and may not be too successful if the oil and gas trade is not stopped. Russians are not likely to rise up and get rid of Putin before the invasion of Ukraine is complete. But maybe influential people there will wonder what could be gained by further invasions. Maybe Russians in general will not like to sacrifice their economic gains in service of imperialist dreams.
Putin has been blaming "the West" for his failures. Sanctions help that. I'm guessing he didn't figure on sanctions being fully enforced nor any issues with SWIFT or sovereign wealth.
The problem now is ....where's the off ramp???
Maybe it's time to stock up on canned goods.
If Putin just pulled out entirely tomorrow does everything just go back to normal?
new normal. Not sure what that would be, but no more lock out from SWIFT nor blocking use of sovereign wealth fund. Seized assets? Depends on negotiations.
I think they'd be on the hook for the losses of lives and property caused by this "special operation."
Vladimir wanted ***only*** baseline commercial sales to take a hit. His citizens would be in his corner for that, blaming joebiden, Macron, Scholz, et. al., for the shambles of Russian economy.
When the ( ( ( banks ) ) ) acquiesced to America's aggressive posture, he started to lash out less strategically.
The off ramp is that Putin pulls out of ALL of occupied Ukraine, including Crimea, hands over war criminals, and pays reparations.
If he doesn't then keep ratcheting up the sanctions. Let Russia become the next North Korea.
Wait should happen and what needs to happen to end this may not be the same.
I don’t think there’s an off-ramp that doesn’t have Putin dead. His assumption seems to be that he will eventually get all of Ukraine—maybe as a puppet state, maybe as a part of Russia. And by the time he’s digested it, the west will get tired of sanctions. The companies that pulled out will return on his terms, the oligarchs stuff will be returned, and he will again be free to vacation in his estates in the south of France.
These seem like like plausible assumptions and they are difficult to disprove only if it is clear that public pressure will remain on the companies that left Russia and that the oligarchs stuff will continue to be seized and, most crucially, will be sold to pay for the west support of Ukraine. I believe that once the oligarchs and the military understand this (that the pressure will be unrelenting and will continue long after the fighting in Ukraine subsides) that it will become clear that the only path forward for Russia and for the oligarchs is to remove Putin permanently.
Russia will never totally get the Ukraine. You simply don't get it.
Maybe Kevin doesn't get the idea of economic sanctions. It is to make things get bad again, and to get Russians to blame Putin for it.
This is certainly part of it. Western countries have now (I think) resigned themselves to the reality that the only long term solution is regime change. But that only comes about via domestic discontent, which means weakening Russia's economy. It's a long shot, though, given the track record of even quite harsh sanctions elsewhere. And Russia can provide for its own food and energy needs.
Another big part in my view is Taiwan. An attempt by China to take over that island is a far graver threat to US interests than even a full annexation of Ukraine by Russia. Washington desperately wants to set an example, for Beijing's benefit, of Russia.
So, Kevin's grand argument for the assertion that "most Russians support the war in Ukraine" is ... "GDP went up under most of Vladimir Putin's reign, and the entire history of the 20th century means Russians think America is the enemy."
It doesn't take into account the immense distrust the oldest generation has for anything the government says, or that younger Russians are a lot more Westernized than their parents, or (as rick_jones points out) the dismal economy of the last decade, or the cultural, personal, and family ties across the Russian-Ukrainian border, or the marked difference in the situation in Ukraine and government messaging on it between the 2014 Crimea crisis and this war. It doesn't offer a single conversation with a Russian person for support, or demonstrate any understanding of Russia, Russian people, or Russian culture.
No, Kevin's argument boils down to "here's a broad economic trend that coincides with my gut feeling, plus a vague hand-wave about history" and concludes that "based on how I think Russians should feel as a result, they probably do feel this way."
I don't have an answer to "do most Russians support this war?" I don't know. Polling is probably pretty hard to do in Russia, and anecdote is easy to overinterpret (but not useless - cmayo's anecdotes can't speak to the breadth of support, but they are proof that at least some Russians don't support the war). Kevin may be right, but there's absolutely nothing in this post to make a convincing case.
Probably shouldn't ignore the last 12 years of economic stagnation in Russia or the fact that other former Warsaw Pact countries have far outgrown Russia over the last 10-20 years. I dont know any Russians who still live in Russia, but if we are using data to make up stories about them, we should probably include the last decade of data.
Imagine explaining the 2016 election based on the booming economy and labor market of the mid 90s.
El Jefe Maximo & El Santo Socialista definitely played up NAFTA as the root of J.D. ANTIVAXXX's mom's drug problem.
On my visits to Poland and Russia, mostly in the days of the Iron Curtain, I was surprised how historically oriented people were. They didn't just know history better than us westerners. They also saw the present within its light.
Putin, I think, wants to enter the history books as the man who reunited Russia and Ukraine. He won't back down because of Western sanctions or Ukrainian resistance. The only thing that could make him change his mind is other Russians. Those, I think, are not always victims of propaganda. Many, perhaps most, share his view that this is a historically decisive moment: the moment when Ukraine is either lost forever or regained forever.
It keeps being said that Ukrainians are fighting for their own country and Russians are not. True, but on the other hand, the West and especially Europe wants Ukraine but not nearly as much as Russia does.
If economic issues were (near) everything, then there would never be another Republican president elected here in the USA. Krugman has shown the stats in which, decade after decade, administration after administration, the economy, business, individuals, and families do better when there's a Democrat in the White House.
People are probably about the same, back in the USSR ("don't know how lucky you are").
The rationale Putin used to invade Ukraine sounds an awful lot like Bush's excuses to invade Iraq.
The Russian Army is shelling the nuclear power plant in an effort to find the WMD.
And like with Bush it was bullshit. What's your point?
"Then, thanks to Western pressure, their country disintegrated in 1991."
I don't think this is accurate. Contrary to hysterical representations in the US, the CCCP was well on its way down in the late 70s, early 80s. Every nation that was colonized by the Russians broke away at its earliest opportunity.
Have any nations who were part of the CCCP asked to be let back in?
+1 Weekend at Brezhnev's
Well, maybe. 75-84 was the worst economic crisis of the Soviet era that was nonwar. Things then reboosted from 85-90. It's why the coo in 91 happened.
I’m of the opinion that history is a mostly domestic product. Americans like to think that the dissolution of the USSR was the result of our ‘winning the Cold War’; some like to credit Ronald Reagan, but it wouldn’t have happened without Gorbachev. Not that he intended the breakup; he took a chance that the system could adapt to decentralization, openness, and relaxation of restrictions; it could not.
Maybe, but Russian GDP per capita had risen higher than 1974. It wasn't like they were struggling. Then came the Yeltsin era collapse. Further cementing into Russia the USSR was in the right track. The dissolution they favored in 1985, a mistake.
Competition always has been a fraud. Will and culture are a far greater thing
+1
Poland's GDP almost 1.5x of Russia's (per capita); Ukraine's less than half. Romania doing better than Russia now. No wonder Ukrainians want to open up to the west.
Further, any growth in Russian GDP under Putin has exactly fuck-all to do with it being a well-run economy--Gazprom selling oil abroad and funneling the receipts to Putin's palace does exactly zero for the average Russian while showing up as GDP growth.
Ukraine it's a petrostate; its economic growth comes from its people actually being productive. And with one of the lowest gini coefficients in the world (Ukraine is ranked right between Iceland and Belgium!), its people are less likely to be enamored of a system in which a handful of asshole oligarchs waste the nation's wealth on superyachts and gilded personal martial arts dojos.
+1
And another thing, actually the thing I meant to say first, isn't the usual case that the people of [any country] supports its country's military actions against [just about any other country] because every nation indoctrinates its people with OUR BRAVE TROOPS! propaganda 24/7/365.25.
Slightly more than 50% of any population is capable of supporting the troops without supporting the wars that those troops may be involved in.
Putin is done. His military can't contain the Ukraine and all that GDP per capita will be gone. Soldiers of fortune are now helping Ukrainian forces.
Bitterness against the west is one thing.
Support for the war against their own brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, and friends is completely different.
There is an outsized attempt to block all non-sanctioned media, news, and sources. People of Russia simply have no idea of what's really going on. Ukraine just put online a searchable database of Russian captives -- https://invaders-rf.com/
Ideally, Russia parents could find their sons. But it would seem more likely that the IP will be blocked by Russia.
Maybe low-information Russians go along with this. Better-informed Russians may be aware that the eastward expansion of NATO took place at the request of almost all the former satellites and newly-independent former republics of the USSR, of course. Russia’s interests do not take precedence over those of its neighbors.
The whole concept of ‘spheres of influence’ needs to be downsized for the 21st century - influence built on intimidation and threats leads to the dangerous situation we are in today. The only legitimate influence is that built on assistance and fairly-negotiated trade.
I was in Unification Plaza in November 2002 when ex-Communist Romanian President Ion Iliescu appeared with George W. Bush after the NATO summit where Romania's application for membership was affirmed. They didn't fully join until 2004, but the newsmedia broadcasting the event still overlaid "Eye of the Tiger" on Air Force One's approach into Otopeni.
Remember when James Jesus Angleton went insane searching for Russian moles?
I think Vladimir Putin spent way too much time thinking about Donald Trump --and he fucking well caught the virus.
Susceptible, authoritarian, social conservative, power mad, concocting dark conspiracies himself so he sees them in everyone else and everywhere else, and inevitably comes to believe the imaginary conspiracies that best assist with promoting his own crooked schemes.
Like a heroin dealer who ultimately succumbs to his own product, just a few minutes with Donald Trump, a couple long phone calls, and he's off the rails.
Truly, this was rope a dope like no other.
Reading something like this you have to wonder how stupid, ignorant, and self absorbed the writer is.
I suppose you think Putin was a nice guy before 2017?
I can't imagine what you think you're thinking about.
Was Rudolph Giuliani a nice guy before he met Trump?
If it isn't obvious to you that bad people are inspired by other bad people, how ignorant, self-absorbed and stupid are you?
It's Trump's unique high pitch of walled off psychosis that has spread through the entire Republican party inspiring every kind of thoughtless, infantile aggression and disregard for others, norms or circumstances.
How is it now that Putin and those around him are echoing exactly the same phrases and twisted attempts to turn reality backward, 'fake news', 'cancel culture', where everything becomes a huge conspiracy of malign dark forces, of the Deep State or NATO, that are out to destroy them specifically because doing that is the most important thing in the world, and they're only defending themselves?
Putin was an evil man before this but he was careful and didn't overdo it. Then Donald Trump falls into his lap. Could you ask for a bigger lump of heroin for Putin? And he falls for it, exactly like every wingnut in America.
I think you are probably right.
Because they wrote the scripts the GOP used to spew them
Yeah... most eastern Europeans make Trump loving Americans look like bleeding heart liberals. I find some of these pundits who say "don't punish the Russian people" to be really annoying. Of course we should punish the Russian people just like they are punishing and killing little children in Ukraine. We don't have access to justice. Collective punishment is all we got.
Yes - there are always nice decent people even in Russia. Life is rough. They need to go with Putin. The entire country is guilty of a horrible crime against humanity. I have no sympathy left for hateful war mongers and their enablers. Which, unfortunately, includes most of humanity.
Fascinating story of a Swedish village in Ukraine,
https://old.reddit.com/r/HistoryPorn/comments/t6gvv0/a_ukrainian_refugee_and_her_child_in_sweden_in/
What I've read that counters Drum is that there is a very big split in Russia, similar to the US, between urban and rural. The majority of the former likely against and a majority of the latter for the invasion. Still likely overall a majority for but not clear how big that majority is.
I have a fair number of business relationships with people in Russia. These are obviously educated well off English speakers so not representative... but still gives me more perspective than I think Kevin has.
1. No one in Russia except pensioners moaning about the good old days spends a lot of time worrying about the economy from twenty years ago.
2. People I know have difference attitudes on countries like Ukraine ranging from "Let them go their own way" to "They should come back to their senses and rejoin us." but the attitude to this war is universal disgust, anger, and disappointment. Even the revanchists who support a Greater Russia think this is madness. They see this as a nail in the coffin for their dream. They ask how Putin thinks he will rule Ukraine in five years or ten and how he will find an off ramp for Western sanctions.
3. Similarly, people have different attitudes towards NATO ranging from that it won't bother Russia if Russia does not bother them to that it is an expanding anti-Russia alliance, but again, attitudes on the war are all against. They can see that this is strengthening NATO, that Finland and Sweden are now likely to join - who wants to be outside the cabin when the Russian bear comes prowling - and that NATO will now become an anti-Russian alliance even if it was not before.
4. They are all hurting financially and upset about that. They feel it is unfair to them - very few of them support Putin - but also recognize that bombs aren't fair to the Ukrainian people.
5. What they generally hint at is things like "a 9mm solution", "change of management", "some courage and execution of a difficult course by people who have shown little courage or ability to do more than suck at the teat of the state until now", or superficially off-topic chat about Beria. They see no prospect of Putin voluntarily changing course. He will double down and double down again until he wins, provokes an unwinnable war with NATO (and then how far will he go?), or until someone, most likely a general or an oligarch, puts a bullet through his head.
The best thing we can do for Ukraine, the Russian people, and ourselves is to hurry this process along. Implement a no-fly zone, smash Putin's military. If we defeat him in Ukraine he will be weakened and someone will kill him in Russia. Russia's next leader may be as evil as Putin is but is unlikely to be as competent and effective.
Or, let him win in Ukraine. Since the sanctions will not end, he will increase military pressure so he has something to trade for ending the sanctions. Expect Finland and Sweden to be next. They also are not NATO members. Then will come pressure on actual NATO members like a demand for a land bridge to Kalinn.
It is very clear that we will need to fight Putin one day. Better to do so in the skies of Ukraine than those of Finland or Estonia.
Except we don’t end up fighting Putin. We fight several 10s of million who are in the military and enable that force. We fight the workers in factories making weapons and we fight their families too. And we fight, perhaps, people like you who have “business relationships” with Russians. Look - I don’t blame you for doing business. That’s the way of the world. I’ve sat in rooms with people from Belarus and Russia too. My employer has a presence in both Russia and Ukraine. I hope I never have to sit in a room with one of those bureaucrats ever again… no… I won’t do it. They will have to find someone else.
I hope I never forget how I feel this week. It’s not exactly like I felt the week after 9/11… I’m older and wiser now. But still… I’m pretty pissed off at the whole Russian population and all kinds of people who collaborated with them.
Shrug... so we fight everyone we have to.
You won't have to fight me.
1. I support kicking Russia out of Ukraine by all means necessary.
2. I no longer have business with Russia - you can't do business with people who can't pay you.
Being pissed at most Russians is silly. Most of them have no ability to get rid of Putin. It's like being pissed at ordinary North Koreans. The vast majority of Russian soldiers have also done nothing wrong. Doesn't matter. We still need to kill a bunch of them.
I can be pissed off at trump and other republican politicians or Fox News, but these last years have taught me a different lesson. I should be angry with my neighbor. They enable it all. So I’m going to hate on every fucking Russian pig. Just like I’m going to hate on every low life American pig who loves trump.
The 1950s and 1960s were booming in America- no one worried about the Depression twenty years ago... except a lot of people did, not to mention the way the country was changing. They formed the Silent Majority and swept Nixon into power. Well-educated people who did business with foreigners probably had a different view.
"Implement a no-fly zone, smash Putin's military."
A no-fly zone is an act of war. Unlike Afghanistan or Iraq, Russia has the means to fight back. To "smash Putin's military" would take the deaths of tens of thousands of Americans and Europeans.
"Unlike Afghanistan or Iraq, Russia has the means to fight back. To "smash Putin's military" would take the deaths of tens of thousands of Americans and Europeans."
Russia has nukes, and if willing can end the world, that's it. That's the whole danger Russia posses right now. A huge one considering they are ruled by a madman, which is why NATO has been very careful with their response and support for Ukraine, but this past week should have taught the world that in terms of conventional military, Russia is a pushover.
People have been scared of them for what they represented decades ago, thinking they were indeed a power house, but it's been a very long time since they had to face an actual army in battle (and by every measure Ukraine's is a small one). This was supposed to be the Yankess vs a JV high school team, and it turns out Russia is more Washington Generals than Harlem Globe Trotters. Given that miserable performance so far, if Russia had no nukes and NATO were to intervene militarily, Russia's entire force in Ukraine would be wiped out in no time.
I think that is one of the main reason Putin started boasting about Russia's nuclear threat almost from the start, because he realized that whatever military improvements and upgrades he made (which Kevin was praising just a few days ago) seem to have been for naught given the success of Ukraine's forces against them, so he is now certain that if having to face NATO militarily he has zero chance of being able to stop them, thus the threats to make sure they don't get involved with actual troops.
but still gives me more perspective than I think Kevin has.
Filed under "zero probability events."
...the best thing we can do for Ukraine, the Russian people, and ourselves is to hurry this process along. Implement a no-fly zone, smash Putin's military.
Filed under "zero probability events because thankfully people with working brain cells and not Michael Friedman run US national security policy."
I don't think the Michael Friedmans of this world realize how easily Dr. Strangelove could become a reality
The most obvious piece of bullshit in the foundation to this article is that giving companies to Russian Oligarchs doesn't directly affect GDP per capita. If you looked at median gdp, that would be more interesting.
There was a huge decrease in the military budget as a percentage of GDP during the 90s, and there has been a steady increase since then. Did everyday Russians see a benefit form that decrease? Was it used to fund investments and infrastructure? Or was it redirected to the pockets of the Oligarchs?
In the days of empire, was there a net flow of tribute into Russia, or was their a net outflow to support other republics? How was the median Russian affected by those changes?
One could get a much better idea of the lived experience of Russians by looking at disaggregated data, like income by decile.
But the decline in aggregate GDP per capita was almost certainly inevitable, with or without American economists. In the wake of the Wende, many East German factories were found to be so outdated as to be beyond rehabilitation. Closures and layoffs were more extensive than anticipated. I don’t imagine the USSR was in better shape, after 70 years of being protected from competition.
They were out of date because Russia out no interest in them despite being under its financial control. It was just a buffer. Russia has always been decades behind outside of the 2 5 year plans attempts.
Of course a lot of it is bullshit- it represents the beliefs of many Russians. just like the beliefs of many Americans that swarms of illegal immigrants are crossing the southern border and a wall should be built to keep them out.
Looks like Putin/Oligarchs were behind the "migrant surge" . It was psyops. Biden threatened the Oligarchs and indeed, it reversed. Yet, not one media center noticed this??? I think anti-Russia progtards don't realize how far down the rabbit hole goes. Stop believing literally what Republicans say. It's their newspeak that is psyops. Instead expose the lie: Republicans love migrant illegals. Pure and simple
Didn’t some of this same stuff happen to all Eastern European countries, including Germany? And to Japan when the Americans rebuilt it in a completely different image than what it was before? And yet none of those countries are invading anybody today, despite suffering humiliation and deprivation from the Americans.
Most every former colonized country has suffered at the hands of foreigners, but grievance-mongering is a policy choice. Robert Mugabe used it to maintain himself in power nearly forty years; other national leaders put their efforts into what they could actually change.
Once the fog of war clears we will find out.
Can a first or second world country of 40 million be conquered with unlimited foreign aid on its side?
Police actions, are one thing this is shaping up as another, quite different situation.
There's no information about where these trucks are or what they're doing or when the picture was taken, but can anyone say if they're actually Russian?
https://imgur.com/EGE0KRZ
And what are they doing?
Protecting their radiators. Hard to keep anti-freeze in when full of (bullet) holes. I'm guessing they've left some space for air circulation.
That is what I thought but I can hardly believe they're using logs and a hunk of rusty old junk just strapped on there.
That's what they have to hand.
Not sure if the actual vehicles are Russian made, but the V symbol painted on them is used by Russia's military that was stationed in and invaded from Belarus. Those that invaded from the East, are marked with a Z.
Kevin's point is "try to understand someone else's point of view". This is a thing humans can do, but don't always.
And, I think the best response to what the Russians are doing now was given by Kenya's ambassador to the UN: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofijY6M-OA8
Thanks for that link to a brilliant speech. The acceptance of arbitrary borders for the sake of peace among African nations exemplifies the best of human civilization.
The USSR dissolved peacefully because many of its former constituent republics chose to become independent, accepting the borders they had as parts of the Union. For the sake of peace in Europe, no nation must ever again attempt to alter borders by force, and this is why we can never accept Russia‘s aggression in Ukraine.
Trying to understand the beliefs of another is not to condone them. The average conservative Han Chinese, if they think about Uighurs at all, are likely to see them as uneducated unemployed gangbangers hanging out on street corners committing crimes, while their women back home breed like rats. That view is as false as the view the average MAGA supporter has of of Blacks and Latinos- but it their belief. I don't doubt that many conservative Russians have the view of recent history that Kevin laid out as representing them. We may violently disagree with Putin, Trump, Xi, Orban, but they represent a lot of people's opinions.
Dude, "Maga" has a false view of white history, much less their views of "darkies" false view of white history. Maga as a word will be dead soon enough. Little they care about America, but one world government they really want.
"The West takes advantage of Russia's momentary weakness to expand NATO right up to their borders, which looks like a permanent threat to Russian sovereignty and its legitimate sphere of influence."
This kind of nonsense should really end and should have no place in anyone who actually values democracy. The West did not go out handing out invitations for countries to join NATO. The countries that joined did so because they asked to be let in. People defending or giving value to this argument are actually saying that some countries should be less free than others to decide their own future.
Russia's sovereignty ends at their borders, so whatever its neighbors want to do should be up to its neighbors regardless of whatever Russia thinks.
The whole idea that one of the reasons Putin is doing this is because of seeing NATO on its border as a threat also seems like nonsense to me. Before invading Ukraine, which was not in the process of joining NATO, Russia already had two NATO nations at its borders, Estonia and Latvia. So if he was afraid of Ukraine becoming the third, how would taking over Ukraine help with that? So if Putin reclaims Ukraine, bringing them back into Russia's borders, now he would not only share a border with two NATO members, but with six, since Russia's new Western border would now be shared with Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania. It just makes no sense.
It's like someone being afraid of drowning while standing at the shallow end of the pool deciding that moving into the deeper end of the pool would reduce the chances of drowning.