Please, No War

[yellowwoodII]

News this morning tells about moving our troops into Europe.
i'm old enough to have lived through several wars now. So much blood and treasure.
Of course, I'm sympathetic to Ukraine. I support other ways of supporting them.
Unfortunately, these conflicts start out small but don't stay that way.

[Chainfire]

1. We have been too long without properly supporting the military industrial complex.

There is too much money to be made. Peace is bad for business.

[allegorical oracle]

9. Maybe missed your point, but TFG put something like $3 trillion into the military....

[mitch96]

15. agree

With a bit of
Ike was right watch out for them guys...
m

[zaj]

2. We are facing a global war against democracies by authoritarians

And the Republican submission to the authoritarians have weakened our ability to project a powerful, unified, peaceful deterrence.

We are facing violence because the GOP and Trump submitted to Putin and attacked our allies for years.

[Progress4ever]

5. Don't forget

Don't forget the Shrub like everyone else seems to. Nobody undermined American credibility more than W. off finishing daddy's business. Seeing these two rehabilitated in the media makes me want to throw up.

Edit - fixed typo

[zaj]

8. I agree, but it's different.

It's almost unimaginable for me to say this, but Bush was the worst President in generations. Lied us into a trillion dollar, mass death oil boondoggle.

And I'm grateful to have him as a reminder of how good it can be again, if the GOP were to find democracy once again.

Because we are facing a pre-WWII moment once again. And the modern GOP is aggressively supporting the modern equivalent of Germany.

It's so much worse than 2003.

[Progress4ever]

20. Afghanistan

Russia invaded the Czechoslovakia and Afghanistan too. Doesn't have to be a WWIII moment. Hopefully Joe can keep his head down and we have some asymmetric responses that make Putin regret a choice to cross the Ukrainian border. We train Green Berets in unconventional warfare for a reason.

[zaj]

23. Agreed, but the GOP will not unifying behind...

... a Dem. The GOP is a coalition of chaos. They are attacking the neoconservatives who would defend democracy.

The politics are completely broken. We are fighting each other, not unified in defense of democracy.

[Progress4ever]

24. Commander in Chief

Biden doesn't need the GOP to asymmetrically respond.

[zaj]

25. True, her has tools, and will use everything he has.

It will be interesting to see if he comes out damaged politically.

That is the entire point of all of this. Politically damage the defenders of western democracy to enable the corrupt, Putin friendly authoritarian leaders around the world... so they can empower each other and destroy western democracy.

[Progress4ever]

26. Time

Time to stop worrying what the Rethugs will do and start worrying about what WE will do. Don't let the CONS get in your head. That's the real objective. They want to demoralize us.

[HUAJIAO]

13. bingo !!

[The Magistrate]

3. Tell It To Putin, Sir

The idea that resistance to aggression is the cause of war is pernicious moonshine. In this instance military resistance may or may not be the wisest course, but make no mistake about what led to any war ensuing from Putin's invasion of a sovereign nation he wishes to reduce to colonial status.

[Progress4ever]

4. I don't want war either

As compassionate and empathetic people, our first reaction is always towards peace. And the OP is certainly correct the Rethugs and their bosses in the military industrial complex, sadly along with some Dem stooges, have roped us into more than a few wars. Wars that were just cash grabs for defense contractors. Iraqis and Afghanis suffered and died. So did countless Americans.

But this is bigger than that. This is Russia, this is Putin. This is the guy who stole the election using his propaganda in 2016. TFG would never have been in office without Putin. And now Putin wants more power. More land. He wants to use Ukraine for pipelines so he can export more greenhouse gas fossil fuels. He will take the profits from his climate destroying pipe lines and use those funds to run psyops against we Democrats here in the U.S. (He has done it before). TFG was bad enough, I don't want to see what the next orange monster Putin dreams up looks like.

At some point you just have to stand up to the bullies and Putin is the ultimate bully. This is the guy who made even talking about LGBTQ+ rights in Russia a crime. And he is looking to export that, here and everywhere else. At some point you have to stand up to them. Sanctions have been tried, and with a growing alliance with China Putin has found a way around them.

I don't want war either - I hope we find a peaceful solution. But we also can't keep allowing Putin to destroy the environment, contribute to ending civilization as we know it, subverting our elections here, and taking over his neighbors. I hope Biden can guide our Democracy through, as this will be THE test of his Presidency. Afghanistan didn't go well in the polls and a second mistake could bury the Democrats in '22 and '24.

[allegorical oracle]

6. Couldn't agree more. We've got enough on our plate with Covid and inflation.

[brush]

7. Call his bluff. You stand up to bullies. He doesn't want war...

with powerful foes. With weak countries like Ukraine he can bulldoze, he has no hesitance.

He'll back down.

[Tommy Carcetti]

10. The US is not going to be engaging Russia head to head on anything.

Mutually Assured Destruction is very much a thing.

But that doesn't mean burying our heads in the sand about Putin and the current situation, either.

[Hortensis]

11. Ignoring Russian military aggression would guarantee future war.

There are close to two dozen nations on Russia's border, and Putin wants to take over almost all of them and restore the old Soviet Union borders.

As it is, it's extremely unlikely to be war, warfare perhaps but not declared war. No one except Ukraine (defensively) wants that, very much including Putin.

[rockfordfile]

18. I agree with Putin being a major threat to other countries

[Magoo48]

12. The Jingos and war mongers of the MIC are slavering and licking their chops.

Jingoism and fear mongering alone create billions for massive overkill “systems” of questionable capabilities, and of course, billions in profits.

Runaway, vulture, extraction capitalism, like our own, must have enemies and high-tension, confrontational situations to drive the GDP. GDP measured economies lead only to a dystopian wasteland.

Is their no place left in liberal, progressive political dialogue for the peace lovers?

War Is A Racket.

[sarisataka]

14. Food for thought

“It is easy for you and for me to shrug our shoulders and to say that conflicts taking place thousands of miles from the continental United States … do not seriously affect the Americas—and that all the United States has to do is to ignore them… . Passionately though we may desire detachment, we are forced to realize that … every battle that is fought, does affect the American future.”

- Franklin Roosevelt, Fireside Chat, September 3, 1939

[iemanja]

16. The suggested response is sanctions, not war

and Putin is the one making war on the Ukraine. So you've got war, even though you may think it doesn't count if it's not the US. People will still die.

[Happy Hoosier]

17. They are being moved into NATO countries....

... to discourage adventurism once the bullets start flying.

Simple fact of the matter is that West has largely signaled to Putin that we are willing to let him seize Ukraine, Soviet-style. To our shame, IMHO.

[DavidDvorkin]

19. Sure, let's just give him the Sudetenland.

[FakeNoose]

29. Sorry friend, that's not a helpful comment

Putin already annexed the Crimea while Chump was POTUS. That's all he gets.

We have ways to convince Putin to back off that don't involve American troops. There's still a long way to go on this. On the other hand, Joe Biden needs to have all options ready so that he has visible threats when he needs them. I believe it will never get to that.

[DavidDvorkin]

31. Those who are saying we shouldn't confront Putin at all

Are telling him to keep gobbling territory, just as the Munich agreement told Hitler.

[Paladin]

21. A civil war, at an obscure place, on the other side of the world?

How can the U.S. resist, flushing thousands of lives and billions of dollars away on such a conflict?

The last time the U.S. avoided such a costly mistake, I wasn't even born---and I'm now in my 70's.

[electric_blue68]

27. I only support supplying Ukraine with everything we can, and ...

severest sanctions on Russia.

And I am a 2nd Gen half Ukrainian American.
It's not an "obscure place" to me.

[haele]

22. Most of this is posturing. War will only happen if both sides want it.

This will most likely end up being a few incursions testing NATO and the EU/US's partnership with Ukraine.
FWIW, I don't think the pro-Putin industrialists in Ukraine really want a Civil war - because I don't think they think Putin is as strong as he used to be and they don't trust non-native authoritarians. The Ukrainian industrialists politics are where I think most of the danger of things getting out of hand will come from.

Just from my viewpoint watching Putin over the years. He's recently starting to have to shore up his buffer dictators with actual Russian assets which is not going over well with both the Russian population and with the Russian economy. He has to be very careful going up to a potential actual conflict with real potential equally armed and outfitted trained advesaries.

Haele

[Xolodno]

28. Doesn't seem likely.

And from what I read, even people in Ukraine don't think its likely.

1. Territory disputes already disqualify both Georgia and Ukraine from NATO.

2. This could be his way of telling NATO with its recent incursions in the Black Sea and military aid to Ukraine to cut it out or he will do something crazy. And also to do an about face with Belarus.

3. This could also be a semi-bluff. No invasion, but in a few months we suddenly see tractors and building equipment to create new bases. So now, there will always be an army ready to invade. And shortly afterwards, put Intermediate ranged ballistic missile bases, no thanks to the DFG pulling out of the treaty. Plus it lends credence to their stance that they don't plan on invading Ukraine (at least not yet) and the USA is the war monger.

4. This gives him a lot of good intelligence on capabilities.

5. If he does make an incursion, it may be in Luhansk and Donbass as Kyiv still has not fulfilled the Minsk agreements. Thus putting the USA and EU into a really bad position (you are going to sanction us when its Kyiv not living up to their end of the bargain?).


Now, Putin could have gone off his rocker and does take Kyiv, everything east of the Dnieper river and south and link up with Transnistria. The sanctions would hurt, but, this could also be his last term and if that's the case, then this is his final "gift". The next autocrat will have to deal with it and many in the EU may look at it as an opportunity to start fresh. Plus, they have set up capabilities to lessen the damage of sanctions. And they did do some recent Constitution changes to insure nothing like Yelstin happens again and there are three potential successors.

[W_HAMILTON]

30. Tell it to Putin and Russia -- not us.