Lefty Memes

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[–] AlteredEgo@lemmy.ml 2 points 2 months ago (6 children)

Russia wanted control of Ukraine, and every place they lost when the USSR collapsed.

So your argument boils down to that the CIA operation to regime change the democratically elected government of Ukraine is a preemptive strike to...

NATO and the EU, also acting in their self interest, wanted Ukraine to favor trade, and defense pacts with them instead.

uh, gain control of Ukraine. And Russia should just concede that they lost.

I mean fine, I think that is what the people who planned this brinkmanship thought too. All is fair in love and war and so on. With "people" I mean Obama and Biden btw.

The problem is this was dangerous warmongering and we KNEW how Russia would most likely react. Even during the Maidan "protests" when senior US politicians visited Ukraine as support there were articles in western newspapers warning of this.

Because the exact same thing happened when the CIA interfered in Georgia with the "Rose Revolution" and talk of EU and NATO led to Russia invading. And yes there is hard evidence for CIA/NED interference in Georgia as well.

So: if you know that action A leads to consequence B, and you do action A anyway, you are accepting the consequence as the price for your actions.

So the moral question becomes - is it justified to start a war in order to bleed the dangerous ~~Orc~~Russian empire?

If your answer is yes, then that puts the onus of providing hard evidence that the alternative would have been likely to occur and to be worse.

And even then it doesn't justify fucking shitting on everybody who points out the historical facts and that this war was partially provoked? Why continue demanding unwavering support for the US, NATO and EU imperialism? Why deny reality? Why pretend that the western mainstream media is somehow reporting the objective truth and everything else is "Russian propaganda"?

The answer is that ONLY if you deny all historical evidence can you build consensus to endlessly continue the proxy war and make it sound like diplomacy is impossible.

Anyway, yeah Putin talks a lot of shit, he's known to do that. He's a sociopath who rules Russia by means of propaganda. But he hasn't started any wars except in response to US imperialist aggression (or maybe one, don't know about the Chechen war). So I don't think he would actually invade neighbors unprovoked. Ukraine could have stayed neutral and be... well not perfectly fine. But better than it is now.

What Russia did do is pretty much the same as what the US does - interfere through propaganda and other means in the democracy of other countries. This would justify harsh sanctions in my opinion, but does not justify war because moderating social media like facebook and twitter to filter propaganda would not even be that expensive. But that is not something you'd hear from a neoliberal.

It all boils down to this: This war was provoked, the evidence for interference and regime change is indisputable (they admitted it), there are actual nazi sympathizers holding power in Ukraine's military today. Would Ukraine be better off without a CIA plot and still neutral under Yanukovych's successor?

BTW this does not excuse Russia's invasion or make me pro Russia. And neither is this argument invalidated by any war crimes committed since the coup, or excuse these war crimes.

On a personal note I have to say that well at least the EU would be whole fucking lot better off without this imperialist bullshit. Without this insane wealth transfer to the military industrial complex. Without rearmament. Without the left completely turning off their brain and drinking the fucking NATO cool aid.

You give favor to one empire in this situation (and you acknowledge that is what they are, and what they are doing)

I did not, do not misrepresent what I wrote! I called them a burgeoning empire, an itty bitty little cute empireling! (/s in case you missed it again)

But yeah I think objectively Russia is the lesser of two evils by far.

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[–] Jiggle_Physics@quokk.au 1 point 2 months ago (5 children)

No, that wasn't my argument. The US and Russia have been having a cold war over trade, and defense, with ex-soviets countries since the soviet union fell. Both have been exercising various amounts of power over Ukiraine against each other. For instancem, Poroshenko was involved in very Trump like corrupt business deals with Russia. He was also playing cards of possibly siding with the EU to get more favorable outcomes from Russia, and vice versa. People in Ukraine had valid reasons to sour on him. I am not saying the CIA didn't act on this momentum, but you paint the CIA as a total control mechanism of Ukraine, and Ukrainians without, or very greatly reduced, agency over their own actions. This is something the "non-western" imperial apologists have a tendency to do. The CIA is credited with so much they are like some sort of near politically omnipotent entity, and the people in the countries they operate in are little more than easily controlled, witless, puppets. This is not true. Outside of situations where the military was totally willing to be pocketed by the US, the CIA has only the ability to give fuel towards already existing political momentum. Put their hand on the scale, so-to-speak. They also ignore the same proxy war crap Russia does, because it makes their narrative cleaner when they are only pointing to one provocateur. Yanukovich was corrupt, and his position within Ukraine was deeply soured by his own actions. Did the CIA play a hand in euromaiden? Of course they did. However they did not create the backlash to his presidency, nor was euroomaiden something the CIA fabricated whole cloth. In the end Yanukovich was deeply corrupt, had lost most of his favor with the people, and Oligarchs that would better profit from the deal with the EU, that he killed, likely false flagged some protestors, as an icing on the cake measure towards someone already in free-fall. Poroshenko was not assassinated, the military, and other security organs did not oust him, there was no massive public backlash, ala euromaiden. He lost an election to Zelenskyy, who won by a large margin for a national election. Zelenskyy was popular for a number of reasons, he was relatively popular as a comedian, he was charasmatic, and found it easy to defend himself with words, probably aided by his occupation. Also he garnered a LOT of popularity being that he was just some comedian, and Poroshenko was just another corrupt politician in Ukraine. So this was not some situation where Russia was just trying to be Ukraine's BFF, and giving them the best possible diplomatic outcomes. They had FSB on the ground, they were buying people, they were reaching deeper into Ukrainian trade interests, etc. They lost. Guess what? Neither group is the good guy here. You seem to take my stance that Russia is complete shit, and held back by NATO being a barrier of a, currently, greater imperial power, as me supporting the US/NATO. I see them both the same, just that NATO has a lot more wealth, so they are currently the ones exercising that power most broadly. If Russia could, they would, and Putin, when addressing his own people, even in private events, makes speeches about how that is exactly his intent. Nationalistic fervor is hugely popular in Russia. The point being, Russia is not JUST innocently defending themselves, they are vying for power projection as they can.

This same two way interference went on with Georgia as well. Difference is I don't turn a blind eye to Russia's empire expansion, or the "west's". They are both knowing players in a political campaign that predates the USSR.

"So your argument boils down to that the CIA operation to regime change the democratically elected government of Ukraine is a preemptive strike to…

NATO and the EU, also acting in their self interest, wanted Ukraine to favor trade, and defense pacts with them instead.

uh, gain control of Ukraine. And Russia should just concede that they lost."

Correct, I have modeled it after your argument of just surrendering Ukraine to Russia. If it's an acceptable outcome for Russia, it should be acceptable the other way around too. Both are just empires maneuvering for control of spheres of influence, and strategic resources.

"So: if you know that action A leads to consequence B, and you do action A anyway, you are accepting the consequence as the price for your actions." - in relationship to seeing expansion of western sphere of influence into Ukraine as something that will trigger war.

This cuts both ways, there has always been two players, at least, vying for Ukraine. Whoever lost the cold war either has to choose to cut their losses, or turn their military power on Ukraine, and invade. There is no morally upright outcome to this. Neither side was going to just give up. Well, at least I believe the US probably would have invaded, in case of loss, but that's not how it played out, so I may be wrong, but I am pretty certain I am not. I have no doubts it would have been an incredible tragedy for the Ukrainian people either way, and that is what I am concerned with. People who defend non-western empires so often call for nuance, but what they want is for only information painting their opposing camp in the worst light, and apologia when the corruptions, FSB manipulation, etc. of Russia is brought up. Always playing Russia as merely defending its self, and never just suffering the consequences of participating empire building proxy wars. This is the outcome when you are capitalists, you compete for trade, and influence, and you do whatever to achieve your goals. This inevitably leads to wars.

"But yeah I think objectively Russia is the lesser of two evils by far"

As do I, but only because they are the poorer empire, by far. They walk like a duck, and quack like a duck, so they are a duck, and loss of western control of these spheres of influence will only open a vacuum Russia will do everything in it's power to fill, as long as they are physically able to do so.

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[–] AlteredEgo@lemmy.ml 1 point 2 months ago (4 children)

Well great we agree on the basic facts then.

And yeah the CIA put their hands on the scale, but they funded and trained the main organizer behind Euromaidan who created a kind of alternative news channel. And the NED had funded 65 projects in Ukraine totaling over $20 million. So sure what the CIA/NED does doesn't always work out, but controlling about 5% witless puppets is often enough. If you continue to do it at least some of your seeds will bear fruit. Subversion of democracy in another country is a crime in itself. But we just ignore it when the US does it.

You can't just say "well whatever, both do it, we won, it's just what we do". The US and the EU and the liberals are responsible for ignoring it, censoring it, covering for this despicable criminal behavior. And fundamental to morality is that we are responsible for OUR behavior or what we can influence. We can condemn Russia, but it's outside of our control.

You literally cannot have a free press and a democratic government if a major superpower is spending millions to subvert you. And if some country takes action they are called authoritarian or corrupt by the west.

The point being, Russia is not JUST innocently defending themselves, they are vying for power projection as they can.

Yeah definitely. But that does not mean we should dismiss their legitimate security concerns. Like if China somehow did a regime change in Mexico (put their hand on the scale) the US would immediately react. And then if Mexico were to plan a military alliance with China, the US would invade. This is how superpowers who have actual enemies react. And Ukraine is like 400 miles away from Moscow, that is nothing so Russia does have a legitimate security problem with Nato and the US building bases there.

And THAT problem gets censored or shouted down at least outside of socialist subs. And in real life, it easily can get you fired, like loosing your job. The EU literally passed regulation to ban people from seeing any other viewpoint (even though RT is a legitimate propaganda outlet).

And the problem with this is that any diplomatic solution towards peace CANNOT go forward if all people see is "Russia evil empire attacked Ukraine for no reason".

And all this leads to an endless proxy war, down to the last Ukrainian.

It’s the Russian/China apologists that are annoying.

This is what I was responding to. Being called apologists and insulted and then they clutch their pearls when they get banned out of communities when they want to spew their lies and insults everywhere. This is what is insane.

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[–] Jiggle_Physics@quokk.au 1 point 2 months ago (3 children)

You have provided me no new information about what the CIA has done.

You also assume that any diplomatic solution with Putin is not just a temporary measure as, from his own mouth, he is really intent on empire building, and tells organizations like the future entrepreneurs of Russia that they should be building their lives towards these goals. Russia attacked Ukraine for their own interests. He has been preaching that since 2000, and one of his most pushed messages for why the law should be changed to make him president for life is that the restoration of the empire is not a plan that can survive through numerous elections.

So, NATO seeing this, over and over, while some leaders had reservations, they also had legitimate security concerns about Russia adding the Black Sea, and a huge amount of new borderland that connected to the Shenzhen Economic Zone. To add more to the picture: Life long leader from the secret police of the previous empire, and the contemporary Russia, with known power over their most prominent oligarchs, can't shut-up about expanding their empire, for over a decade. Then, when the re-ratification of the CFE was hinged on Russia pulling it's illegal military bases from Georgia, and Moldova, something both countries had been making clear they want gone since they were established, Russia completely withdrew. They then started a military build up, and began running advanced forces training in the caucuses, while giving more strength to boarders with Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine. Then they had those bases break away from their respective countries, and began defending them from being re-absorbed. Do you not see how the EU/NATO, could have legitimate security issues with Russia, keeping this in mind? Do you just paint the western hegemony the way many in the US just go around saying "dur hur Russia evil"? Because that is what a lot of people on lemmy do. Then demand nuance because the picture is more complicated than that, but only for non-western aligned countries.

This is all capitalist empire building bullshit. There is not one major economic power on Earth not participating in this shit in one form or another. While the west is the empire of establishment, the newer ones growing are committing a lot of the same horrors. The only difference I see, is that that they are restrained from just going on bombing campaigns, like the US, because the old empire is still there, and the consequences of dealing with that, as they are still extremely powerful, regardless of what is being said about the collapse of the west, will be extreme, and dire for everyone. Not just active warring empires, the entire world. As western influence over sphere in places like SEA, eastern Europe, central asia, etc, wain, you will see hostilities from other major economic powers grow in their regions. They are all hyper-nationalistic, and spending time on their social media reveals annexing countries, especially their neighbors, is very popular.

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[–] AlteredEgo@lemmy.ml 1 point 2 months ago (2 children)

Then you seem to be arguing that the regime change in Ukraine was a justified preemptive strike because Russia evil.

I actually half agree with this because Russia has been doing interference and disinformation and various denialist campaigns that significantly damaged the western democracy. But the rational arguments against this are:

Russia is not a significant threat to Nato, and has no engaged in unprovoked wars outside it's borderlands when those were interfered with
Russia's interference can be countered by mandating social media properly moderate bot networks and hate speech, or banning social media which doesn't.
The mentality that "the enemy is too strong and only understands violence" is delusional. There had been many trade agreements that ensured Russia would not suddenly go on a killing spree.
Provoking a proxy war to stop a war makes no sense. Or at least us supporting this madness makes no sense, compared to supporting sanctions against e.g. US and Israel, who have a far higher bodycount than Russia.

But again, my main problem here is what is "allowed to be said". There is a literal psychosis going on where even just understanding the enemy is treason. It's a complete and utter propaganda victory for the US imperialist forces.

And this is an issue because we are responsible for the influence we can bring to bear on our governments to seek diplomatic solutions and stop supporting an endless war.

Do you not see how the EU/NATO, could have legitimate security issues with Russia, keeping this in mind? Do you just paint the western hegemony the way many in the US just go around saying “dur hur Russia evil”?

No I don't see that. And I judge people based on what they do, not what they say. (or say they are going to do and then do it)

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[–] Jiggle_Physics@quokk.au 1 point 2 months ago (1 child)

No, my point is that nothing in this situation was justified. None of it. If, however, you feel the long term meddling in Ukraine, and invasion, by Russia is justifiable, not to mention the corruption it openly participates in that are classical empire bullshit, like having a prominent leader of your empire collateralize a billion dollar loan by a political figure, who used a lot of that money to finance their campaign, when every bank on earth had blocked his credit, and many other things, like almost completely funding mainstream popular right wing new media networks, who are all now failing when one Russian finance source got cut, you need to be seeing the nuance of the bigger empire too.

You are also skipping a number of things I brought up that signal security issues towards the EU, and just focused on what they leader of the country says. This makes me suspect of your good faith. After the fall of the USSR both Georgia, and Moldova, had infighting as new nations were being formed from the collapse. Russia then sent their military in to forcefully establish permanent military bases as a "peace keeping" operations, and violently crushed all descent to this with their military, and began propping up unrecognized "state governments" they owned as thin excuses to legitimize their actions. Now tell me, who does this sound like? Had we had not been having this conversation, and I were to tell you and unnamed country was doing this to two other unnamed countries, who would you have immediately thought I was walking about?

When faced with having to pull out, per request of the states they were occupying, in order to continue with the CFE, Russia backed completely out, and immediately began preparing their military for invading from the caucuses, and went into discussions of passing their forces through Belarusian borders. These are not just words, nor are they insignificant. This is what sparked the CIA to ramp-up efforts in those countries. They allowed the first annexations because it would hand Russia strategic resources they had long wanted. They hoped that would be the end of it. However, countries from central Asia, to Europe, warned Georgia, that Russia was preparing to move forward again. That is what ended up happening, but this time NATO had been preparing Ukraine, and began supplying them, so it wasn't successful. This time NATO saw an opportunity to not only bleed Russia, but to also field all sort of new weapons systems, and ideas they had been practicing in theory.

This is not the story of a country who never operated its military outside of its borders, nor one who's only evidence of threats of expansion are words. Bringing up that Russia has lost trade deals without killing everyone is dumb, the US has done the same. Russia has to be far more selective in how it exercises its hard power, because it is poorer, and less advanced in regards of military production, than the established empire.

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[–] AlteredEgo@lemmy.ml 1 point 2 months ago*

you need to be seeing the nuance of the bigger empire too.

Sure we as people have legitimate grievances about Russian interference. But like I already mentioned (I think) this is like tethering your goat outside, unguarded, and then loudly complaining when the bear eats it. If someone can just fund a presidential candidate and the media in another country because you shrank your guberment, and social media are completely unmoderated and sell ads to the highest bidder, then that is your own fault as well. Capitalism is incompatible with democracy.

The US and EU has been doing this for many decades, economic imperialism, predatory loans, IMF, sanctions, wars etc. So Russia doing it it back is not really a justification for anything.

Sure, fuck Putin and Russia, in an ideal world there would be justice - after all previous US presidents have been brought to justice. But I did not agree to fund a proxy war that is destroying Europe. I do not deserve to be called enemy for talking about historical facts. And reality of the history is being completely denied by leftists and liberals.

Now tell me, who does this sound like?

Ok sure the US does just goes into Mexico with the DEA with the blessing of the government and do whatever they want. But mostly they own their neighbors, and only intervene in countries halfway around the world.

I find it funny that people stress that "Russia attacked their neighbor" as if that is something that makes it worse than attacking someone halfway around the world. Bizarre.

And so what, are we the world police? We do not have the right to interfere in sovereign governments or start conflicts just because we don't like how other countries police their borders or deal or not deal with Russia. I don't envy them but we simply do not. And that is talking as if any of this was about morality and not power.

This is what sparked the CIA to ramp-up efforts in those countries. They allowed the first annexations because it would hand Russia strategic resources they had long wanted. They hoped that would be the end of it. However, countries from central Asia, to Europe, warned Georgia, that Russia was preparing to move forward again. That is what ended up happening, but this time NATO had been preparing Ukraine, and began supplying them, so it wasn’t successful.

Do you have any evidence / sources for this idea that Russia was just about to "jump Ukraine" or whatever you make it sound like? Or what are you saying?

I'd be curious to hear it. Otherwise this sounds completely ahistorical. Afaik Ukraine was just sitting there, perfectly middling.

And we know the operation leading to Euromaidan originated by the CIA/NED because they announced it, funded it, then did it. And in 2008 Europe "decided" that Ukraine should join Nato so a regime change signaled to Russia that this was the goal. To place Nato weapons right at their border, 400 miles from Moscow.