Ukrainian War Thread III: The Horrors

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

See, I have made peace with the idea that I will not live beyond 60 because of the incurable Russian and Saudi addiction to fossil fuels.
You on the other hand... believes there's a future for the Russian Empire (or the rest of the planet?) beyond 2050?

No, just ideally a global Leninist union of soviet states. Could be based in Rome for all I care. But it's time to abandon the Cold War, anyway. It was supposed to be over long ago. As Obama said to Romney, "The 1980s called. They want their foreign policy back."

Ah... information tranquilisers.
How I would love to disconnect my prefrontal cortex too and enter a world of blissful ignorance.

[Drago Soviet Russia]

See, you just proved my point by resorting to straight up McCarthyism and xenophobia. Next you'll be voting for the Swedish Nazis or something, no doubt joined by your shared love of Azov and Hitler.

I would suggest spending those rubles quickly or getting them exchanged soon.

You keep up the Russophobic straw men, I shall counter with accusations of Nazi sympathies. Who is funding and arming actual goosesteppers here, after all? Remember that Obama and the Democrats wanted a rapprochment with Russia just a decade ago. What happened? Hillary Clinton didn't get her Uranium One deal and she has never forgiven Putin for that. That is the source of our second Cold War, including the stupid decision to abandon the Minsk accord.

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

goosesteppers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4NPtpaKJFw

[Democratic Communist Federation]

And mine is probably Heidegger. That doesn't make me a fascist. Heck, I've listened to lectures from left-wing professors who read and quote Schmitt since his critique of liberal democracy is fairly strong. This doesn't make them Nazis.

Heidegger's enormous ego would never let him apologize.

Edit: I have devoted a section of one of books to Schmitt's political theology. However, as someone who identifies with Antifa, it is difficult for me to see beyond his odious ideology.

[Ulajhan]

I would suggest spending those rubles quickly or getting them exchanged soon.

You keep up the Russophobic straw men, I shall counter with accusations of Nazi sympathies. Who is funding and arming actual goosesteppers here, after all?

Russia mostly.

Where do you think so many far-right organizations and Wagner get there funding from?

[Drago Soviet Russia]

You keep up the Russophobic straw men, I shall counter with accusations of Nazi sympathies. Who is funding and arming actual goosesteppers here, after all?

Russia mostly.

Where do you think so many far-right organizations and Wagner get there funding from?

Wagner is overblown. Azov are the real Nazis. Note that only leftists were banned by Zelensky.

[Sotoak]

Russia mostly.

Where do you think so many far-right organizations and Wagner get there funding from?

Wagner is overblown. Azov are the real Nazis. Note that only leftists were banned by Zelensky.

Doesn't one of their main leaders literally have the SS tattoo? Wagner I mean.

[Port Caverton]

Russia mostly.

Where do you think so many far-right organizations and Wagner get there funding from?

Wagner is overblown. Azov are the real Nazis. Note that only leftists were banned by Zelensky.

TIL that a massive private military that helps Russia with wars is overblown.

Also why are you siming for a far-right oligarchy?

[Drago Soviet Russia]

Wagner is overblown. Azov are the real Nazis. Note that only leftists were banned by Zelensky.

Doesn't one of their main leaders literally have the SS tattoo? Wagner I mean.

So do a lot of Hell's Angels and ex-cons.

[Drago Soviet Russia]

Wagner is overblown. Azov are the real Nazis. Note that only leftists were banned by Zelensky.

TIL that a massive private military that helps Russia with wars is overblown.

Also why are you siming for a far-right oligarchy?

I'm just trolling. But you really do fall for it.

[Fahran]

Russia didn't become our enemy until after we chose Saudi Arabia over them. Even Obama wanted to reset things in favor of détente.

This isn't even remotely true. As people far more favorable to Russian foreign policy than I am have pointed out, Russia has been in contention with the West since at least 2004 when the Vilnius Group nations applied for membership within NATO. These hostilities became more pronounced in 2008 when Russia interceded in Georgia to support Abkhazian and South Ossetian separatists. The situation grew even worse when Russia annexed Crimea and began support separatists in the Donbas in 2014 as a response to the success of Euromaidan. Bush and Obama both attempted resets with Russia only to eventually arrive at the conclusion that American and Russian geopolitical interests were incompatible - especially in Eastern Europe. Syria wasn't exactly a stellar moment either.

This recent return of the Cold War is responsible for no small part of the xenophobic, McCarthyist attempt to paint everyone who dissents from the Western state media narrative as "Russian apologist," but who stands to gain by this?

Ukrainians? Mind you, I don't think all dissenters are "Russian apologists." There's a lot of very valid dissent against neoliberal hegemony. But, yeah, some of its very poorly researched propaganda coming from people who are actually fifth columnists for one reason or another.

Militarists and industrialists, of course! They are not motivated by patriotism, but by avarice. Russia shouldn't be our enemy. I guess Mitt Romney has won after all, despite being dead wrong.

Mitt Romney was actually correct, though probably not for the reasons he thought he was. Friendship with Russia at the moment would require us to renege on our commitments to NATO allies who, very understandably, do not want Russia annexing its neighbors with impunity as well as the EU, who do not want potential member-states getting invaded every time they consider applying.

The real fascists listen to CNN and MSNBC.

Does anybody on NSG have a definition for fascism that isn't completely insane? Like this is literally head and shoulders above calling Putin a fascist in terms of how vacuous it is.

[Sotoak]

Doesn't one of their main leaders literally have the SS tattoo? Wagner I mean.

So do a lot of Hell's Angels and ex-cons.

Issue is Wagner is deeply entrenched with the Russian Command and Control structure. They are by extension an element of the military to be used in proxy wars where there is reasonable deniability. See Syria.

[Ulajhan]

Russia mostly.

Where do you think so many far-right organizations and Wagner get there funding from?

Wagner is overblown. Azov are the real Nazis. Note that only leftists were banned by Zelensky.

That's a valid criticism of Zelensky.

But it's not really a defense of Russia, nor does it detract from Russia's place in helping far-right groups worldwide.

As far as I can see I don't see Azov invading another country.

[Archinstinct]

TIL that a massive private military that helps Russia with wars is overblown.

Also why are you siming for a far-right oligarchy?

I'm just trolling. But you really do fall for it.

Okay. In that case to moderation I go.

[Austria-Bohemia-Hungary]

Also why are you siming for a far-right oligarchy?

Because the "leftism" of certain individuals are ok with toddler-raping Neonazism these days.
Lenin would not have looked very kindly on the lot of these alleged "leftists"

[Drago Soviet Russia]

I'm just trolling. But you really do fall for it.

Okay. In that case to moderation I go.

For what? I didn't cuss anyone out or call anyone anything ad hom.

[Dtn]

goosesteppers

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q4NPtpaKJFw

they need dumb helmets and phallic flagwaving

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qjcev7HHKyE

[Sotoak]

As for Azov it was my somewhat hope that Wagner and Azov both wipe themselves up. I won't deny there's an issue with the far-right in Ukraine, but this neither justifies nor helps those efforts. If anything an invasion would have only popularized nationalists and the far-right by giving a massive external enemy that has often been spoken against by hardliners. This invasion if anything does only to make this issue worse.

[Fahran]

This makes sense to me. I think the USA has more or less decided as part of their political system that "Russia as an enemy" is a useful permanent feature to unite blindsight voters when the built-in polarisation between Dems and Republicans becomes too much. Hence a huge part of every presidential administration's US foreign policy features the needless provocation of countries outside of Western Europe (to unify voters and to keep their system from collapsing).

You're definitely on to something.

What was the provocation here exactly? Ukraine deciding it didn't want to remain within the Russian sphere of influence?

[HISPIDA]

Also why are you siming for a far-right oligarchy?

Because the "leftism" of certain individuals are ok with toddler-raping Neonazism these days.
Lenin would not have looked very kindly on the lot of these alleged "leftists"

*ruffles around in bag of lenin quotes*

here's one:

As a matter of fact, the social-chauvinists wish nothing else but a simple repetition of the old decisions, if only nothing changes in practice. This is, in fact, a tacit and hypocritically disguised amnesty for the social-chauvinist adherents of most of the present parties. We know that there are many who would follow this path and confine themselves to several Left phrases. However, their road is not for us. We have followed a different road, and will go on following it; we want to help the working-class movement and the actual construction of a working class party, in the spirit of irreconcilability towards opportunism and social-chauvinism.

[Fahran]

Wagner is overblown. Azov are the real Nazis. Note that only leftists were banned by Zelensky.

You do realize that several of the "leftist" parties that were banned actually had ties to people who have been seen with Nazi paraphernalia around them, right?

[Archinstinct]

Wagner is overblown. Azov are the real Nazis. Note that only leftists were banned by Zelensky.

You do realize that several of the "leftist" parties that were banned actually had ties to people who have been seen with Nazi paraphernalia around them, right?

Horseshoe theory is real.

[Dtn]

american volunteers reading nsg to see who they should be fighting for like



i suspect the venn diagram of people who discovered the concept of rashism in 2022 and those who think there's a place called "Maiden square" is a perfect circle

[Picairn]

Russia didn't become our enemy until after we chose Saudi Arabia over them.

Ahistorical nonsense.

[Infected Mushroom]

This makes sense to me. I think the USA has more or less decided as part of their political system that "Russia as an enemy" is a useful permanent feature to unite blindsight voters when the built-in polarisation between Dems and Republicans becomes too much. Hence a huge part of every presidential administration's US foreign policy features the needless provocation of countries outside of Western Europe (to unify voters and to keep their system from collapsing).

You're definitely on to something.

What was the provocation here exactly? Ukraine deciding it didn't want to remain within the Russian sphere of influence?

NATO continued to expand eastward.