Ukraine Megathread: Crimea River Part Deux

[Bratislavskaya]

RT is on the ball. They've already published a story about the possible missile fragments that the BBC reported a few hours back. According to RT "Investigators probing the downing of MH17 flight told RT that they cannot confirm that fragments found in eastern Ukraine are from a Buk missile system, refuting media reports that the parts belong to a Russian surface-to-air complex".

[Padnak]

I love how because the missile was Russian is has to have been fired by the Russians

its not like every faction in the region uses Russian equipment or anything

[Estruia]

You must have short term memory, because last I check Russia was doing far worse in the 90's before Putin cane around. 2015 is nothing compared to 1995

Yes, that is why I corrected myself. I said the Modern Russian State, meaning Russia within the last 10-15 years.

[Estruia]

RT is on the ball. They've already published a story about the possible missile fragments that the BBC reported a few hours back. According to RT "Investigators probing the downing of MH17 flight told RT that they cannot confirm that fragments found in eastern Ukraine are from a Buk missile system, refuting media reports that the parts belong to a Russian surface-to-air complex".

Yes, because RT can be trusted as a reputable news source.

[Byzantium Imperial]

You must have short term memory, because last I check Russia was doing far worse in the 90's before Putin cane around. 2015 is nothing compared to 1995

Yes, that is why I corrected myself, I said the Modern Russian State, meaning Russia within the last 10-15 years.

I would argue that Yeltsin's post soviet government after 1993 (the tank dispute) is the start date of the modern russian state.

Besdies, 12 years of fantastic growth (one dip for great recession, quickly recovered) end up creating a substantial net positive even after 1.5 years of stagnation/recession.

Mond you, still better then Europe outside of Germany and Britain, given everyone else had 7 ok years of growth followed by 2 terrible years and another 6 years of stagnation.

[Estruia]

Yes, that is why I corrected myself, I said the Modern Russian State, meaning Russia within the last 10-15 years.

I would argue that Yeltsin's post soviet government after 1993 (the tank dispute) is the start date of the modern russian state.

Besdies, 12 years of fantastic growth (one dip for great recession, quickly recovered) end up creating a substantial net positive even after 1.5 years of stagnation/recession.

Mond you, still better then Europe outside of Germany and Britain, given everyone else had 7 ok years of growth followed by 2 terrible years and another 6 years of stagnation.

You can argue that all you wish, but that is not what I personally consider the start of the modern Russian State. Besides, no one in their right mind would consider Yeltsin's Russia "Modern."

As for the growth, that is great. I'm not surprised that a nation with vast mineral resources and over 120 million citizens (and a decently-sized labor force to boot) outpaced places like France, Italy and Spain. Two of the three listed countries boast less than half of Russia's population and don't come anywhere near Russia in terms of mineral resources.

I'm quite surprised that Russia, who is considered to be a "World power," by many in this thread, isn't doing better than all of Europe. I'm surprised that they are lagging so far behind in terms of nominal GDP per capita. I'm surprised that their standard of living, given Putin's oh-so-greatness, is less than that of the average German, Brit, Latvian, Estonian, Lithuanian, Czech, Slovakian, etc. Why is it that all of those countries who Russia outpaced, have higher standards of living?

Why hasn't Russia's Dear Leader used his Iron Will to make Russia's HDI ranking higher than say, Belarus? Or Estonia? Or Latvia?

[Byzantium Imperial]

When the hole is deep after 70-200 years of economic mismanagement, you might excuse Putin for not radically turning the tables on Western Europe overnight. Natural resources isnt everything :cough Africa: nor is population immedietly equivalent to ecobomic prosperity (India anyone?).

Putin engineered an economic miracle, but he isnt the Messiah

[Korva]

Rebels attack a Ukrainian position, lose two of their BTR's, and retreat.

[The Krogan]

Rebels attack a Ukrainian position, lose two of their BTR's, and retreat.

Looks like a time and a half

[Vassenor]

When the hole is deep after 70-200 years of economic mismanagement, you might excuse Putin for not radically turning the tables on Western Europe overnight. Natural resources isnt everything :cough Africa: nor is population immedietly equivalent to ecobomic prosperity (India anyone?).

Putin engineered an economic miracle, but he isnt the Messiah

So why does everyone act like he is?

[The Krogan]

When the hole is deep after 70-200 years of economic mismanagement, you might excuse Putin for not radically turning the tables on Western Europe overnight. Natural resources isnt everything :cough Africa: nor is population immedietly equivalent to ecobomic prosperity (India anyone?).

Putin engineered an economic miracle, but he isnt the Messiah

So why does everyone act like he is?

If they don't they end up at the bottom of a river.

[Estruia]

When the hole is deep after 70-200 years of economic mismanagement, you might excuse Putin for not radically turning the tables on Western Europe overnight. Natural resources isnt everything :cough Africa: nor is population immedietly equivalent to ecobomic prosperity (India anyone?).

Putin engineered an economic miracle, but he isnt the Messiah

When you have a relatively well-developed nation like Russia, natural resources ARE everything.

As for Putin being unable to turn the tables: Poland, the Czech Republic, Germany, Slovenia, Slovakia, the Baltics and a fair portion of Eastern Europe has been able to do so. They've gone from being relative shit-holes in terms of Human Development, to surpassing Russia (who used to surpass them.)

When Russia does well, it's because of Putin. However, when Russia doesn't surpass its neighbors (aside from the Caucasus mountains, Kazakhstan and Ukraine), there are a million and one excuses. Anything to make Putin look better, amirite?

[Byzantium Imperial]

So why does everyone act like he is?

If they don't they end up at the bottom of a river.

A pretty legit reason

[Rimaea]

Rebels attack a Ukrainian position, lose two of their BTR's, and retreat.

That video is from 2014, back when the Ukranian army had encircled Lugansk. It was filmed about a mile to the west of Vydno-Sofiivka, which is nowhere near the current Ukraine/Novorossiya border.

[The balkens]

Rebels attack a Ukrainian position, lose two of their BTR's, and retreat.

That video is from 2014, back when the Ukranian army had encircled Lugansk. It was filmed about a mile to the west of Vydno-Sofiivka, which is nowhere near the current Ukraine/Novorossiya border.

So why post the video now?

[The Krogan]

That video is from 2014, back when the Ukranian army had encircled Lugansk. It was filmed about a mile to the west of Vydno-Sofiivka, which is nowhere near the current Ukraine/Novorossiya border.

So why post the video now?

It does say it was uploaded today.

[The balkens]

So why post the video now?

It does say it was uploaded today.

Is Russian internet so shitty that it took a year to upload?

[The Krogan]

It does say it was uploaded today.

Is Russian internet so shitty that it took a year to upload?

Who knows, they get their dash-cam videos up pretty fast though.

Well how does Rimaea know it's from last year?

[Costa Fierro]

RT is on the ball.

RT's never been on the ball. It's why two of their TV reporters resigned live on air. Impartiality is basically non-existent.

[United Marxist Nations]

It does say it was uploaded today.

Is Russian internet so shitty that it took a year to upload?

It could be that the video had been uploaded elsewhere previously.

[Shofercia]

MH17: 'Russian missile system fragments' at crash site

Fragments of a suspected Russian missile system have been found at the site of the flight MH17 crash in east Ukraine, Dutch investigators say.

They say the parts, possibly from a Buk surface-to-air system, are "of particular interest" and could help determine who was involved in the crash.

But they say they have not proved a "causal connection" between the parts and the crash. MH17 crashed in an area held by pro-Russian rebels in July 2014, killing all on board.

Here we go again. The original proof that they had the BUKs came from their images, title "look at these Ukrainian BUKs we captured!" Why the fuck would anyone pose with covertly brought in BUKs over the border? However, even if common sense isn't your pal, the German official report stated that those BUKs were Ukrainian. This propaganda is reaching Climate Change Denial level of stupidity.

Since he conrols the media it i not hard for him to score so high.

Considering he doesn't control the independent Polling Company that conducted the Poll, it is quite hard.

About half the polling agencies are state controlled and half are indie. The two major ones have an indie, Levada, and a state controlled one, VSIOM. Irrespective of that, they usually reach similar results, because both use credible research methodology. So the Putin-haters have two paths: first is to claim that Putin is a dictator and dictators have high approval rating, and second is to claim that these numbers are totally invalid, for some stupid reason which certainly exists... in fiction.

Well there are/were the conspiracy's about the Ukrainian air force shooting it down.

Which is technically possible, but the misiles might still very well had been built in Russia anyway

Le sigh: Ze plane was diverted and accidentally shot down by a BUK captured from Ukraine's armed forces. It was an accident. It wasn't set up by either side to blame another. It wasn't a goal of Putin to hit Malaysia Air, a country with which Russia has neutral relations. It makes zero sense for either side to want that plane shot down. It was an accident. Yet, both sides blame one another. Who cares about ending World Hunger, let's make up some more B/S about MH-17 instead. I'm sick of this bullshit propaganda coming from the DC and Moscow.

When the hole is deep after 70-200 years of economic mismanagement, you might excuse Putin for not radically turning the tables on Western Europe overnight. Natural resources isnt everything :cough Africa: nor is population immedietly equivalent to ecobomic prosperity (India anyone?).

Putin engineered an economic miracle, but he isnt the Messiah

So why does everyone act like he is?

Who's everyone? We're saying that he's the best leader that Russia had in the past 120 years or so. We're not saying that he's a messiah.

RT is on the ball.

RT's never been on the ball. It's why two of their TV reporters resigned live on air. Impartiality is basically non-existent.

Are you referring to Liz Wahl and Abby Martin? It's news to me, because Martin is/was still with RT, at least until February of 2015. http://www.rt.com/shows/breaking-set-summary/

Martin's claim was that Russia was violating Ukraine's territorial integrity, and because Martin values all territorial integrity, she thinks that was wrong. That's what she was talking about, not RT's super-duper bias. Martin is inflexible and nuts when it comes to territorial integrity, but that doesn't mean that she's a poor journalist on issues that she actually covers. Wahl was so bad at whoring herself out, that she still cannot get a permanent job.

[Shofercia]

Less, Putin is definitely the less-bad option. Forget the fact that under Putin, Russia has continually isolated itself from the rest of the world, has acted as an agitator with multiple countries, has threatened other countries with missiles and oversaw the largest downturn in Post-Soviet Russia's economy. Sure, Russian Nationalism is at an all-time high, but the Russian Nominal GDP per capita isn't set to rebound to pre-sanction levels until 2019.

If anything, Putin has set Russia down a path of further isolation and animosity with the power players who actually matter. Iran and Syria have proven to be such great allies, amirite?

Largest downturn was under Putin? Really now?

Russia's economy before Putin:

(Image)

Russia's economy during the Putin/Medvedev Administration:

(Image)

It's why I love facts, they're just so specific when it comes to fighting all of the anti-Putin horseshit. Speaking of Russian isolation, have you heard that India and Pakistan joined the Russo-Chinese Shanghai Cooperation Organization? Some mighty isolation there. Iran is indeed a great ally to have, why do you think Obama's easing sanctions? For shits and giggles?

Guess what, the Soviet Union wasn't Russia, so Putin DID oversee the largest economic downturn in the Modern Russian State's History. You also keep using the PPP, which is basically useless when comparing GDP per capita. Russia's Nominal GDP per capita has TANKED over the last two years, and isn't set to rebound until 2019 (if it does at all, predictions are unreliable like that.)

As for India and Pakistan joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, they're still observers until 2016. Let's be honest, the only reason they joined was for China. Russia is the annoying little brother in this situation.

You originally talked about Russian History, and the Russian Federation was proclaimed in 1991. Now you're changing that to Modern Russia. Fair enough, I can work with that too. First, thank you for admitting that Putin modernized Russia. You've said that Russia wasn't modern under Yeltsin, and became modern under Putin, ergo Putin modernized Russia. Again, thank you for that admission. Second, if we are to look at Putin's Modernized Russia, we're looking from 1999 until now, unless you actually believe that Medvedev's Administration wasn't pro-Putin. Thus, the claim that Putin saw the largest economic downturn while competing against Putin is true. It's also a completely idiotic comparison, since you're comparing Putin to Putin. I should hasten to add that Putin also saw the baldest economic downturn of Putin's Russia, with the most bear cavalry units deployed.

Second, nominal GDP doesn't matter to the voters as much as PPP GDP does. It doesn't matter as much to the factions in power as PPP GDP does. So you're essentially judging Putin on a category where he isn't even trying. And you're comparing that to Putin. Cool story bro. Regarding the SCO, first, India and Pakistan are members in all but name. Second, India's in the SCO in a HUGE part because of Russia:

http://www.rt.com/op-edge/213835-russia ... s-nuclear/
http://articles.economictimes.indiatime ... -fdi-limit
http://in.rbth.com/economics/2015/04/24 ... 42801.html
http://in.reuters.com/article/2014/12/1 ... 9V20141211
http://www.business-standard.com/articl ... 270_1.html

But please, continue to believe in fiction. It's most amusing to watch.

[Rimaea]

That video is from 2014, back when the Ukranian army had encircled Lugansk. It was filmed about a mile to the west of Vydno-Sofiivka, which is nowhere near the current Ukraine/Novorossiya border.

So why post the video now?

Ukrainian media space does this sometimes; they pull up old videos to showcase their "military successes" when they need to show the home public the army's successes on the field and (considering the Minsk agreements) how evil the other side is. In other words, an information manipulation technique used by every state, ever.

As for where I found the information, it can be found here. The two red dots are the destroyed BTR's, and the blue dot to the north is the destroyed Ukrainian tank (also in the video).

[Vassenor]

Here we go again. The original proof that they had the BUKs came from their images, title "look at these Ukrainian BUKs we captured!" Why the fuck would anyone pose with covertly brought in BUKs over the border? However, even if common sense isn't your pal, the German official report stated that those BUKs were Ukrainian. This propaganda is reaching Climate Change Denial level of stupidity.

...So saying that the airliner was shot down by an over-eager separatist SAM crew with little training who failed target identification is "Climate Change Denial level of stupidity", but saying that it was shot down by an aircraft not designed for air interception and with a flight ceiling considerably lower than the altitude the airliner was flying at is perfectly sane?

[Shofercia]

Here we go again. The original proof that they had the BUKs came from their images, title "look at these Ukrainian BUKs we captured!" Why the fuck would anyone pose with covertly brought in BUKs over the border? However, even if common sense isn't your pal, the German official report stated that those BUKs were Ukrainian. This propaganda is reaching Climate Change Denial level of stupidity.

...So saying that the airliner was shot down by an over-eager separatist SAM crew with little training who failed target identification is "Climate Change Denial level of stupidity", but saying that it was shot down by an aircraft not designed for air interception and with a flight ceiling considerably lower than the altitude the airliner was flying at is perfectly sane?

No, I'll state it in simpler terms: saying that BUK was given to Rebels by Russia is, by this point, Climate Change Denial level of stupidity. Saying that it was deliberately shot down by a plane is, by this point, also Climate Change Denial level of stupidity.

From the very same post:

Le sigh: Ze plane was diverted and accidentally shot down by a BUK captured from Ukraine's armed forces. It was an accident. It wasn't set up by either side to blame another. It wasn't a goal of Putin to hit Malaysia Air, a country with which Russia has neutral relations. It makes zero sense for either side to want that plane shot down. It was an accident. Yet, both sides blame one another. Who cares about ending World Hunger, let's make up some more B/S about MH-17 instead. I'm sick of this bullshit propaganda coming from the DC and Moscow.

That post uses variations of the word "accident" thrice, and yet you, somehow managed to presume that I claimed that it was deliberately shot down... Should I have said the word "accidentally" four times? Five? Six? It's Remember the fucking Maine all over again, except this time both sides are doing the finger pointing. And yes, it's tragic, but what's going to be even more tragic is restarting the Cold War, instead of solving World Hunger, (which is killing millions,) https://www.wfp.org/hunger/stats, because of a fucking accident. If you want to restart the Cold War, do it over something worthwhile, not over something where there was massive, albeit accidental, fucking up on all sides. And yes, there's a UNSC Resolution on point, http://www.un.org/press/en/2014/sc11483.doc.htm, but instead of working with it, US and Russia are finger pointing. On this issue, both administrations should grow the fuck up. /end rant