Ukraine conflict

Quote: Gandler

The larger issue is there are war crimes being committed in a country where there should not even be a war. The biggest crime is the invasion. The Just War Theory first mandates that a war be justified before worrying about methods, and this war should not have even occurred.

I believe it can be safely said that most wars would not pass objective applicaton of the Just War Theory test.

No, most wars were and still are over a desire to conquer, to exploit, and to enrichen.

That is how it has pretty much always been and how it still is today.

While I condemn Russia for invading Ukraine this is nothing new in European history; given that, who are we to condemn them?

It's not like our own petticoats are unsullied.

Ukraine is now the site of a proxy war where each side tests weapons and measures the performance of the other.

The reality is that we condemn Russia because they're our enemy; all the rest is window dressing.

Quote: missedhervee

I believe it can be safely said that most wars would not pass objective applicaton of the Just War Theory test.

No, most wars were and still are over a desire to conquer, to exploit, and to enrichen.

That is how it has pretty much always been and how it still is today.

While I condemn Russia for invading Ukraine this is nothing new in European history; given that, who are we to condemn them?

It's not like our own petticoats are unsullied.

Ukraine is now the site of a proxy war where each side tests weapons and measures the performance of the other.

The reality is that we condemn Russia because they're our enemy; all the rest is window dressing.

America has done a bad job if its wars were a desire to expand and enrichen. Most major wars since the 1900s have been about defense, of ourselves, our allies, or our interests. Not for a profit.

Why did America defend South Vietnam? To slow the spread of communism.
Why did America fight Korea? To slow the spread of communism (which remains stalemated to this day).
Why did we invade Iraq? To liberate Kuwait (which was annexed by an illegal invasion).
WWII we were attacked and then assisted our allies (I think we should have gotten involved earlier).
WWI we were persuaded to help our allies.

The U.S. is a terrible colonizer (if we were). Because we expend massive resources to defend struggling powers so that they can retain independence without getting anything in return (and often end up defeated anyway).

Russia is invading Ukraine to annex territory, if you do not see this, you do not see reality..... If you believe they are there to eliminate Nazis or stop bioweapons, you are living in a fantasy world.

As to who we are to condemn them, we are members of NATO and of a superior allied structure with advanced principles and ethics. We have the full ability to condemn barbarity. The only sad thing is that we are not doing more to help Ukraine.

Quote: Gandler

Russia is invading Ukraine to annex territory, if you do not see this, you do not see reality..... If you believe they are there to eliminate Nazis or stop bioweapons, you are living in a fantasy world.

As to who we are to condemn them, we are members of NATO and of a superior allied structure with advanced principles and ethics. We have the full ability to condemn barbarity. The only sad thing is that we are not doing more to help Ukraine.

I know the WWII statistics are familiar to most people, but I think it is still difficult to imagine what someone like Putin imagines when he sees former states of the USSR joining NATO.

Country Soviet Union
188,793,000 Total population as of 1 January 1939
8,668,000 Military deaths from all causes in WWII
4,500,000 to 10,000,000 Civilian deaths due to military activity and crimes against humanity
8,000,000 to 9,000,000 Civilian deaths due to war-related famine and disease
20,000,000 to 27,000,000 Total deaths

Country United States
131,028,000 Total population as of 1 January 1939
407,300 Military deaths from all causes in WWII
12,100 Civilian deaths due to military activity and crimes against humanity
000 Civilian deaths due to war-related famine and disease
419,400 Total deaths

Putin grew up under these Soviet leaders before he went into politics himself.
Putin age 12.0 to 30.1 Leonid Brezhnev | LBJ, Nixon, Carter, Ronald Reagan
Putin age 32.4 to 38.9 Mikhail Gorbachev | Ronald Reagan , George Bush Sr.
Putin age 45.8 Director of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation, the main successor agency to the Soviet Union's KGB. | Bill Clinton

It is possible that Putin has been harboring paranoid feelings for decades, which if he does have cancer have forced themselves to the forefront.

Quote: Pacomartin

I know the WWII statistics are familiar to most people, but I think it is still difficult to imagine what someone like Putin imagines when he sees former states of the USSR joining NATO.

Country Soviet Union
188,793,000 Total population as of 1 January 1939
8,668,000 Military deaths from all causes in WWII
4,500,000 to 10,000,000 Civilian deaths due to military activity and crimes against humanity
8,000,000 to 9,000,000 Civilian deaths due to war-related famine and disease
20,000,000 to 27,000,000 Total deaths

Country United States
131,028,000 Total population as of 1 January 1939
407,300 Military deaths from all causes in WWII
12,100 Civilian deaths due to military activity and crimes against humanity
000 Civilian deaths due to war-related famine and disease
419,400 Total deaths

Putin grew up under these Soviet leaders before he went into politics himself.
Putin age 12.0 to 30.1 Leonid Brezhnev | LBJ, Nixon, Carter, Ronald Reagan
Putin age 32.4 to 38.9 Mikhail Gorbachev | Ronald Reagan , George Bush Sr.
Putin age 45.8 Director of the Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation, the main successor agency to the Soviet Union's KGB. | Bill Clinton

It is possible that Putin has been harboring paranoid feelings for decades, which if he does have cancer have forced themselves to the forefront.

Maybe, but that is a stretch. Who knows that is in Putin's mind. We can only judge his intention based on his actions and history. Remember even just a month ago many were saying (including many on here) he would never invade Ukraine, and the border build up coverage was just paranoia. The only thing we know for sure is Putin needs to be removed from power.

Even WWII era Russia I feel minimally bad for, remember Russia was originally allied with the Nazis (and happily took their shares of land they conquered), they only thought Nazis were evil once they were betrayed, before that they were happy to be on the "winning" side....

Comparing war deaths with America is a challenge, because the war was not on our soil (except for some very brief and isolated exceptions), and we only became involved very late in the game.

If former USSR states were treated better by Russia they would not feel the need to flock to NATO.

Quote: Gandler

Most major wars since the 1900s have been about defense, of ourselves, our allies, or our interests. Not for a profit.

I wasn't talking solely about recent times, I was taking the long view through history, mostly pre-1900..

But as for modern times: Hitler definitely attacked his targets for the classic reasons: to exploit and enrichen.

He also wanted to resettle the conquered countries with Aryans: hello "Lebensraum."

Our involvement in the recent middle east conflicts was based on maintaining stability for the production of oil, our lifes blood today; who can forget the phony BS the gov't gave us as justification for invading Iraq, i.e. to stop the mfr. and use of weapons of mass destruction?

BS: a flatulent camel doesn't meet the criteria for a WMD: that was a dirty war based on American lies that we should be ashamed about having started.

As for Afghanistan, that was dirty as well: no "defense" there, only revenge...but gee, why didn't we hammer the real enemy, the country that funded and provided most of the men who pulled off 9/11: Saudi Arabia?

In a word: OIL

Pre-1900 the US was no better than any other country: the Mexican - American war and the Spanish - American war were for the reasons I stated; if you believe we were there to encourage democracy and help the downtrodden you are living in a fantasy world.

Quote: missedhervee

I wasn't talking solely about recent times, I was taking the long view through history, mostly pre-1900..

But as for modern times: Hitler definitely attacked his targets for the classic reasons: to exploit and enrichen.

He also wanted to resettle the conquered countries with Aryans: hello "Lebensraum."

Our involvement in the recent middle east conflicts was based on maintaining stability for the production of oil, our lifes blood today; who can forget the phony BS the gov't gave us as justification for invading Iraq, i.e. to stop the mfr. and use of weapons of mass destruction?

BS: a flatulent camel doesn't meet the criteria for a WMD: that was a dirty war based on American lies that we should be ashamed about having started.

As for Afghanistan, that was dirty as well: no "defense" there, only revenge...but gee, why didn't we hammer the real enemy, the country that funded and provided most of the men who pulled off 9/11: Saudi Arabia?

In a word: OIL

Pre-1900 the US was no better than any other country: the Mexican - American war and the Spanish - American war were for the reasons I stated; if you believe we were there to encourage democracy and help the downtrodden you are living in a fantasy world.

Iraq did have WMDs (if you count chemical weapons as WMDs, as the U.N. did, which Iraq actually used). People think WMDs only refers to nuclear weapons, which is not the case. However, the bigger issue for Iraq was removing Hussein, which the first Bush should have done. Sadly he was more concerned with the optics of a short and clean war politicly. Clinton should have later done this after the intelligence, but he did not want to get back into a war. However, 9/11 made people more open to war.

Afghanistan was about removing the Talban and it was a success. Part of it you could classify as revenge. But, taking action in response to an attack is also a justification.

Both Wars were not only just and necessary, but long overdue, and 9/11 finally gave inspiration to take care of what should have already been done.

Oil was not a factor in either (other than the factor of that is why Hussein originally wanted to take Kuwait).

Pre-1900 was many lifetimes ago, but America was better than many countries. Though America very rarely got involved in foreign conflicts with some exceptions (Spanish American War after Spain attacked).

Mariupol 4 or so months ago.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-06/hypersonic-missile-delay-puts-u-s-further-behind-russia-china


Maybe we "have" to play nice, until we can catch up with Russia and China's hypersonic missile programs?

Quote: petroglyph

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-04-06/hypersonic-missile-delay-puts-u-s-further-behind-russia-china


Maybe we "have" to play nice, until we can catch up with Russia and China's hypersonic missile programs?

???????
Are hypersonics making a difference in Ukraine
Russia has hypersonics and are getting their butt kicked
Pretty telling

Quote: terapined

???????
Are hypersonics making a difference in Ukraine
Russia has hypersonics and are getting their butt kicked
Pretty telling

My understanding is that Russia and China do not have very many of the hypersonic variety and that Russia has only tried one or two in Ukraine. At the price of them it probably makes more sense to use the slower ones even though they are more likely to be shot down.