I think this is the beginnings of an economy based on perpetual growth and fossil fuel energy running headlong into geological energy constraints. Basically I see an undulatory downward path for the rest of my life. From here out, I think any rallies in our economic condition are going to be met with spiking commodity prices that knock us right back down.
Joined: Jun 26, 2007 Posts: 1461 Location: The Canada of America
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 7:50 am Post subject: Re: Russian gas monopolies could turn back on Europe
GASMON wrote:
Never forget "our" Winston's mother was a full blooded yank.
Strike one.
GASMON wrote:
Father a member of the English elite.
Strike two (hey, are you getting these nifty "yank" references? )
GASMON wrote:
Churchill fought in the first world war
Ah, yes, Gallipoli. Sheer genius. Strike three; go siddown.
GASMON wrote:
and won the second one
Hey, after strike three, you're not supposed to swing again. Alright, alright. He's admirable for marshaling the effort in WWII, can't argue with that. But his record on dealing with anyone who wasn't white and English-speaking was abysmal. He happened to be right about Hitler largely because he identified ANYONE outside the Anglosphere with ambitions as a threat. He was a neocon before there were neocons. Jenny Churchill must have been a descendant of Thomas Jefferson's, because her son clearly considered freedom, equality, and democracy to be attributes of the pale-skinned folks of northwestern Europe; all other need not apply.
The bottom line is we can take his opinion on Russia with a grain of salt, because the man simply distrusted anyone who wasn't of his ethnicity. _________________ I can has cheezburger?
Joined: Jun 26, 2007 Posts: 1461 Location: The Canada of America
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 8:24 am Post subject: Re: Russian gas monopolies could turn back on Europe
btu2012 wrote:
As I already pointed out the admission of a new member into NATO is a decision involving the collective of NATO members and the applicant. I am not aware that Canada has any special say in such decisions, so I don't understand what you mean by "us" as a Canadian.
In this case, "us" is NATO. But after a certain point, us isn't "us" anymore. The US was all for admitting Ukraine and Georgia but other members seem to have drawn the line at former SSRs. It would have been a little like inducting the CSA into the British Empire after Vicksburg and landing troops there. I don't think NATO should have been expanded at all; frankly, we should have folded it up in 1991 and founded some other instrument for collective security that didn't have a history of being aimed at Russia, but we didn't. At least we've finally put the brakes on.
btu2012 wrote:
Russians are free to violate any treaty they wish
No, they're not; that's what treaties are all about. I no more want to see them abrogating, say, SALT II than I want to see the US doing it.
btu2012 wrote:
A particularly well-known example is their violation of the Yalta agreement to hold free elections in occupied Eastern Europe
And this is the example you mean to follow, then, is it? The future's so bright, I gotta shades. So your justification for destabilizing the strategic balance of power in an age of thermonuclear weapons is the failure to observe democratic niceties (ones that we ourselves hedged on in Italy and Greece, by the way, when the likely results didn't suit us) at a moment in time predating the creation of the transistor? That's a bit twee, don't you think?
btu2012 wrote:
Next time you sing hosana to Russia
I'm not here to praise the country in every particular of its actions, but I'm here to say I understand them. We had a chance, and good long one, too, to make a friend and a partner of Russia, but we've surrounded it with implicit military threats and attempts at economic containment. I wouldn't expect any country to accept that, and certainly Russia doesn't have to, and that's what we're seeing.
btu2012 wrote:
Obviously the polls you have seen did not include many of the nations who were victimized by Russia.
That would hardly be objective, would it? If you wanted to know what "the world" thought of the US currently, who would you ask? Spain and India, say, or Iraq and Afghanistan?
btu2012 wrote:
But I advise you once again to talk to people from CEE and from the Russian near abroad
Here's a better idea: why don't you talk to the Russians and find out why they seem to think that they need to put diplomatic pressure on neighbours and spend so much money rebuilding an armed forces? Why don't we ask Americans why they seem to feel it's necessary to blow a half trillion dollars a year they largely don't even have on THEIRS?
btu2012 wrote:
Well, they have been pitching fastballs at many others, and especially at Europe, since the Cold War ended.
They sure have been lately. It's too bad we didn't work to get them on our team in 90s. Everyone seemed to think it was good enough to let them be towel boy.
btu2012 wrote:
The US did of course take advantage of Russia's weakness, as Russia would have done had the US been in a similar situation.
If this is only to be expected, I don't see the point in criticizing them for rising from the mat, do you? They have oil, they have gas, they have a huge country full of resources that don't require them to, ohhh, say, invade Iraq, per se. If they start doing that, I'll criticize them too. But just dusting themselves off and insisting they're not going to be a doormat anymore but a respected regional power? That's just something we have to live with. We probably should have known this day would come and gotten them "in our tent, pissing out" as LBJ would have put it. That's going to be a lot harder now that they don't have much incentive to.
btu2012 wrote:
Regarding Russia's "sensibilities", allow me to be unconcerned about them. I will consider their tender feelings when and only when they show some capacity to admit responsibility for their 300 years of murderous imperialistic rampage.
Yeah, I'll be waiting to see Medvedev and Bush up there side by side with their respective mea culpas in hand. Look, here's me not holding my breath. _________________ I can has cheezburger?
Joined: Jun 26, 2007 Posts: 1461 Location: The Canada of America
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 9:05 am Post subject: Re: Russian gas monopolies could turn back on Europe
btu2012 wrote:
you might not be aware that some of Russia's neighbors actually want to have missile shields
No, SOME people in those countries do. A lot don't want to be in either military camp. Joining the EU doesn't necessitate joining NATO.
btu2012 wrote:
Some CEE states actually requested that NATO give them nuclear weapons due to what they view as the Russian threat to their existence. It was NATO who refused this in order to allay Russian "concerns". Funny, eh ?
Ukraine and Kazakhstan voluntarily turned theirs over to Russia. No "requests", no floating proposals, but an actual transfer in the light of day... this is a matter of historic record. Now if everyone around them is supposedly so scared of Russia, that strikes me a really unlikely course of action. And yet, they did it. Funny, eh?, as you say.
btu2012 wrote:
Funny that you mentioned Afghanistan, a country originally invaded by the Soviet Union and where the latter committed an unimaginable number of crimes during a decade of occupation. Interesting how selective your memory seems to be.
Not to mention yours, and everyone else's. There's nothing "original" about the Russians invading Afghanistan. Everyone knows trying to get to Moscow by force is a bad idea, but the British demonstrated how bad an idea invading Afghanistan was long ago. The Russians had to learn that lesson all over again. And incredibly, just a generation later, we're having to learn that same lesson! I couldn't believe it when everyone seemed to think this was a GOOD idea in 2001. As far as I can see, there's nothing "funny" in mentioning Afghanistan at all. It was huge, stupid mistake everyone should have seen coming, and the one good thing I can say is that Canada wasn't dumb enough to repeat it by backing the subsequent invasion of Iraq.
btu2012 wrote:
And yeah, the Soviet Union armed Iran and the US armed Iraq during the Iran-Iraq war. How interesting that you only remember the crimes of one side. The very definition of bias.
You seem to have forgotten the US armed Iran, too. That's what the Iran-Contra scandal was all about. Were you around for that? Can you imagine how people there feel about the US, knowing its principles weren't about backing a side it believed in, but using the deaths of thousands on both sides to enrich its arms manufacturers and to further its imperial aims in subjugating another country in Latin America to its will?
btu2012 wrote:
You know it's really funny to hear you distorting a piece of history which I happen to be very familiar with. It is the CEE states who wanted that expansion much more than the US did.
From the Beeb, March, 2002:
Quote:
An American Deputy Secretary of State, Richard Armitage, says Washington would like to see Nato admit as many new members as possible and has urged the candidates, including Bulgaria and Romania, to redouble their efforts.
Mr Armitage was speaking in Bucharest at a meeting of 10 aspiring member states. A Nato summit in November will decide whom to invite to join.
The aftermath of 11 September has increased the strategic importance of several areas of the world in Washington's eyes, and Nato's south-eastern flank is one of them.
Bulgaria and Romania were seen as lagging far behind other Nato candidates like the Baltic states and Slovenia; now they seem more plausible.
btu2012 wrote:
Both Russia and NATO have remained on 24/7 nuclear alert throughout and after the end of the cold war.
Russia ceased keeping bombers in the air on a 24 hour basis and patroling remote areas in 1992. They resumed doing so in August, 2007, long after it had become militarily and financially feasible to do so. It was a symbolic gesture, but one with a point to make. I think our ship to making a friend of Russia has sailed.
btu2012 wrote:
If you are a true left-winger then you should believe in national self-determination
Yes, and I'm seeing Russia assert that, after having been appointed milkmaid of the West 15 years ago.
btu2012 wrote:
But clearly you are not a left winger, but an apologist of Russian imperialism.
I'm not a fan of extraterritorial exertions of force by anyone. But I hardly see the Russians as the archetypal example of that in the world nowadays. Their response and posture is, so far, entirely defensive and reactionary. I'm watching for developments beyond that.
btu2012 wrote:
According to your world view US imperialism is evil but Russian imperialism is quite OK. ...Russia also did and does it in places not within its immediate sphere of influence, such as Iran, China, North Korea, Vietnam, Central and Latin America, the Middle East, Kunashiri Islands, the North Pole, Cambodia, Africa etc etc etc etc etc.
How many troops are we talking about? Because that's what I'm talking about. Having diplomatic relations with countries around the world is the norm for ALL of us. Having military bases in them is unusual. Occupying them and decapitating their governments it extraordinary. And sorry, but I'm just not seeing the Russians doing that in, what was it? Iran, China, North Korea, etc. etc. etc. Thank you very much.
btu2012 wrote:
Nah, I think that it was just the price of oil.
That was money that was leaving the country, either to foreigners or Swiss bank accounts held by Russian bagmen a decade ago. There's a lot less of that going on now, and that's what's making the difference.
btu2012 wrote:
It's really interesting to see how supportive you are of Latin American countries who try to leave the US sphere of influence, while being grossly insensitive to and un-supportive of nations who try to leave the Russian sphere. Are you sure that you don't work for the FSB ?
I wouldn't mind the cheques. Sadly, though, I remain an unaffiliated philosophical free agent. Do you like the money coming from The Project for an American Century, by the way? My, peak oil won't hurt YOU that much.
I'm no more interested in seeing the Russians annex or overturn the governments of the countries around it than I am to see the US do it to, say, Cuba. But I don't think it's in anyone's longterm interests to push NATO like a blade right up to Russia's throat, especially since we're all tied to a "sole superpower" in decline in both economy and the principal resource of the age. EU, yes; NATO, no. I'm all for expanding the network of economic and cultural cooperation in Europe (albeit more slowly, over the course of a generation), but not the military aspect. We're going to pay a huge, unnecessary price for that belligerence in the future. Just how large and the nature of the price, I can't say. _________________ I can has cheezburger?
Last edited by Nickel on Tue Jun 03, 2008 9:36 am; edited 4 times in total
Joined: Sep 24, 2007 Posts: 2584 Location: third from the sun
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 9:06 am Post subject: Re: Russian gas monopolies could turn back on Europe
Nickel wrote:
I don't think NATO should have been expanded at all; frankly, we should have folded it up in 1991 and founded some other instrument for collective security that didn't have a history of being aimed at Russia, but we didn't. At least we've finally put the brakes on.
Well Georgia and Ukraine want to join this military alliance, and they applied to enter even though they knew that they would likely be rejected due to Russian objections. So one question for you ought to be why do all ex-Soviet states want to join this alliance as soon as they get a democratic government ?Maybe they know something that you don't ?
NATO happens to be the most successful security arrangement in history, in sharp contrast with the disastrous alliances extant in Europe before WWII, which proved to be useless. This explains why the alliance is so popular among Eastern European states, who have a bitter history in that regard.
Also NATO underwent a transformation from an anti-Soviet block into a block concerned with the general security of its members, and made multiple overtures toward Russia, which is a member of NATO's "Partnership for Peace" etc. NATO is aimed at Russia only to the extent that Russia is a threat to European security.
In my opinion it makes perfect sense for Europe to have a continent-wide military alliance. A look at the map shows that one primary potential threat to European security is formed by the Russian federation. Why would anyone want Europe to be disunited and weak when it neighbors the most heavily nuclear armed state on the planet, a state with an intense history of aggression against multiple European nations ?
Nickel wrote:
No, they're not; that's what treaties are all about. I no more want to see them abrogating, say, SALT II than I want to see the US doing it.
Unfortunately there is no international regime to force anyone to obey treaties, so in practice anyone is free to disregard them. But I understand what you mean (they are not morally free).
Nickel wrote:
So your justification for destabilizing the strategic balance of power in an age of thermonuclear weapons is the failure to observe democratic niceties (ones that we ourselves hedged on in Italy and Greece, by the way, when the likely results didn't suit us) at a moment in time predating the creation of the transistor? That's a bit twee, don't you think?
I am not sure why you view Russia's murderous occupation of half of Europe as an irrelevant "nicety." You complain that Churchill only cared about white people, but you seem to view Eastern Europeans as subhuman. Do those people have a right to be free, or should they again be sold in bondage to Russia as per the glorious Western tradition? The West betrayed them so many times in the past so why not once more ?
Regarding Italy, Greece: of course the Soviet Union was deeply involved in both Italy and Greece at the time, financially and trough terrorism etc so it's not like they were clean.
Nickel wrote:
I'm not here to praise the country in every particular of its actions, but I'm here to say I understand them. We had a chance, and good long one, too, to make a friend and a partner of Russia, but we've surrounded it with implicit military threats and attempts at economic containment. I wouldn't expect any country to accept that, and certainly Russia doesn't have to, and that's what we're seeing.
Yes, I feel for poor Russia. What a disaster that some of their neighbors might become able to defend themselves. Gone are the glorious days when Russia could rape them on a whim.
Actually the EU and NATO did do about anything imaginable to make a friend and partner of Russia, to the point that Russia once even considered joining NATO. It's not like NATO didn't try.
Nickel wrote:
That would hardly be objective, would it? If you wanted to know what "the world" thought of the US currently, who would you ask? Spain and India, say, or Iraq and Afghanistan?
Your argument above is why people talk about lies, damn lies and statistics.
Nickel wrote:
Here's a better idea: why don't you talk to the Russians and find out why they seem to think that they need to put diplomatic pressure on neighbours and spend so much money rebuilding an armed forces? Why don't we ask Americans why they seem to feel it's necessary to blow a half trillion dollars a year they largely don't even have on THEIRS?
Actually I did talk and talk to Russians rather often. Most are brainwashed in the extreme by the Russian media, and think that Putin is a great man. Those few who don't are horrified and want to emigrate permanently.
Nickel wrote:
They sure have been lately. It's too bad we didn't work to get them on our team in 90s. Everyone seemed to think it was good enough to let them be towel boy.
Actually the Russians have been interfering with the internal politics of EE and of the Russian near abroad (including through military action) ever since 1990, but you seem to have missed that. They were doing so while the EU and NATO were making friendly overtures towards them, overtures which were mostly ignored. Transnistria, Chechnia, Abkhazia, etc -- does any of that ring a bell ? Most of it started before Putin. I won't even mention the crypto-communist regimes they supported in EE and the openly Stalinist regimes they support in the stans etc. They never stopped interfering, rather it is you who stopped noticing.
Nickel wrote:
If this is only to be expected, I don't see the point in criticizing them for rising from the mat, do you? They have oil, they have gas, they have a huge country full of resources that don't require them to, ohhh, say, invade Iraq, per se. If they start doing that, I'll criticize them too. But just dusting themselves off and insisting they're not going to be a doormat anymore but a respected regional power? That's just something we have to live with. We probably should have known this day would come and gotten them "in our tent, pissing out" as LBJ would have put it. That's going to be a lot harder now that they don't have much incentive to.
It is to be expected because Russia is a racist, chauvinistic, narcissistic and imperialist nation without any trace of respect for their neighbors and with a long history of aggression, attempts at de-nationalization etc etc against every one of those neighbors.
I don't understand what you find confusing about my criticism ?
Nickel wrote:
Yeah, I'll be waiting to see Medvedev and Bush up there side by side with their respective mea culpas in hand. Look, here's me not holding my breath.
And while you wait, CEE and the Russian near abroad will do anything in their power to safeguard their security and independence from the Russian Empire. As will Latin America vis a vis the US.
This might include placing missile shields and US bases on the territories of EE states, and other such actions aimed at making it harder for Russia to rape and control its neighbors.
Similarly, Latin America will work hard on building a Latin American Union, and likely a military alliance on that continent. _________________ only the paranoid survive
Last edited by btu2012 on Tue Jun 03, 2008 10:52 am; edited 2 times in total
Joined: Sep 24, 2007 Posts: 2584 Location: third from the sun
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 9:48 am Post subject: Re: Russian gas monopolies could turn back on Europe
Nickel wrote:
No, SOME people in those countries do. A lot don't want to be in either military camp. Joining the EU doesn't necessitate joining NATO.
You seem to be quite misinformed. Joining NATO is the first priority (much more so than joining the EU) because those nations are first and foremost afraid of what Russia might do to them. That's because of what Russia did do to them in the past. The exact same logic applies with respect to the US in Latin America.
Nickel wrote:
Ukraine and Kazakhstan voluntarily turned theirs over to Russia.
You forgot to mention that both Ukraine and Kazakhstan were controlled by openly Stalinistic, pro-Russian and undemocratic regimes at the time.
Clearly you only see what you want to see.
Nickel wrote:
There's nothing "original" about the Russians invading Afghanistan.
Well could you explain to me what makes the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan any better than NATO's invasion of the latter ? I am waiting...
By the way, I am not defending what the US is doing there or in Iraq, in case you didn't notice.
[quote="Nickel"]You seem to have forgotten the US armed Iran, too. That's what the Iran-Contra scandal was all about. Were you around for that? Can you imagine how people there feel about the US, knowing its principles weren't about backing a side it believed in, but using the deaths of thousands on both sides to enrich its arms manufacturers and to further its imperial aims in subjugating another country in Latin America to its will?
Nickel wrote:
w people there feel about the issue since I talked to Iranians on both sides of it. Both Russia and the UK/US have a history of violent interference with Iranian affairs which goes back about 100 years. I am defending none of them -- each of them is responsible for what they did.
[quote="Nickel"]The aftermath of 11 September has increased the strategic importance of several areas of the world in Washington's eyes, and Nato's south-eastern flank is one of them.
I underlined an important part. Have you ever heard of the Visegrad 4 group and how the whole NATO expansion started ? That was in Clinton's time.
Nickel wrote:
Russia ceased keeping bombers in the air on a 24 hour basis and patroling remote areas in 1992. They resumed doing so in August, 2007, long after it had become militarily and financially feasible to do so. It was a symbolic gesture, but one with a point to make.
I highlighted the crucial word "symbolic". Bombers make little difference, we live in the era of strategic missiles, and nothing ever changed about that.
Nickel wrote:
I'm not a fan of extraterritorial exertions of force by anyone. But I hardly see the Russians as the archetypal example of that in the world nowadays. Their response and posture is, so far, entirely defensive and reactionary. I'm watching for developments beyond that.
Yeah, right. Quit reading Pravda. Once again Chechnia, Abkhazia, Transnistria, Nagorno-Karabakh etc etc etc.
Nickel wrote:
How many troops are we talking about? Because that's what I'm talking about.
Please Russia was simply in a position of weakness, so they were less visible except in their near abroad. Now they are a bit stronger and so they are becoming more visible once again. That's all.
Nickel wrote:
That was money that was leaving the country, either to foreigners or Swiss bank accounts held by Russian bagmen a decade ago. There's a lot less of that going on now, and that's what's making the difference.
The price of oil only started to increase after 2000, i.e. after Putin took power. What you say doesn't address my argument.
Corruption is rife in Putin's Russia, only now it is controlled by the FSB.
Nickel wrote:
But I don't think it's in anyone's longterm interests to push NATO like blade right up to Russia's throat, especially since we're all tied to a "sole superpower" in decline in both economy and the principal resource of the age. EU, yes; NATO, no. I'm all for expanding the network of economic and cultural cooperation in Europe (albeit more slowly, over the course of a generation), but not the military aspect. We're going to pay huge, unnecessary price for that belligerence in the future. Just how large and the nature of the price, I can't say.
Well, the problem is that the EU makes no sense without a continent -wide security arrangement capable of holding Russia back. Like it or not Russia remains the largest potential threat to the EU and will stay so as long as they insist on trying to control their neighbors.
Regarding beligerence, it's too late for Russia to convince anyone that they are nice guys. There is such a thing as Karma, and Russia's chicken are coming home to roost. _________________ only the paranoid survive
Joined: Jun 26, 2007 Posts: 1461 Location: The Canada of America
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 10:29 am Post subject: Re: Russian gas monopolies could turn back on Europe
btu2012 wrote:
Well Georgia and Ukraine want to join this military alliance, and they applied to enter even though they knew that they would likely be rejected due to Russian objections.
Russia doesn't decide who gets into NATO; NATO members decide. And we decided no. And I think was a pretty good call.
btu2012 wrote:
So one question for you ought to be why do all ex-Soviet states want to join this alliance as soon as they get a democratic government ?
Cementing alliances with the EU and the money there. There's no denying that's a more attractive prospect than trying to get back into a customs union with Russia. There's little doubt in my mind they're taking a longterm view of the operation and joining NATO in lieu of the EU security force that's pretty much bound to succeed NATO in a generation or so. Despite surface appearances, it's pretty clear to me that Europe is in the process of disengagement from North America in tacit recognition that its interests are not necessarily those of the US.
btu2012 wrote:
NATO happens to be the most successful security arrangement in history, in sharp contrast with the disastrous alliances extant in Europe before WWII
Because humanity didn't actually blow up the world? Bravo. I'm not convinced it would have been any more "successful" than any other had the weapons been purely conventional.
btu2012 wrote:
Also NATO underwent a transformation from an anti-Soviet block into a block concerned with the general security of its members, and made multiple overtures toward Russia, which is a member of NATO's "Partnership for Peace" etc.
That was actually in response to a Russian initiative — they floated the idea of actually joining NATO in 1992 — I remember it — and it went nowhere. I felt at the time that was a huge historic opportunity lost. NATO, in the meantime, has gone from the defensive alliance it was when my father served in it to an instrument of imperialistic reach, which is not what it was intended to be and why a number of its oldest members have much less enthusiasm for it than they had during the Cold War. Not only was it an anachronism in the 90s, it began operating outside its scope, first in the Balkans and now in the Middle East. That's either going to be curtailed by the circumscription of US power as the dollar declines, or NATO is going to be shell in which the US and a handful of auxiliaries from its newer members invade other countries while the older core members remain nominal members but effectively withdraw from the organization for most practical purposes and begin making other arrangements among themselves. We're already seeing this.
btu2012 wrote:
NATO is aimed at Russia only to the extent that Russia is a threat to European security.
Given the nature of the last 15 years, this is a bit like the second-story man saying "I only have a gun in case the guy in the house has one." Russia hasn't been expanding its military alliances in Europe or posturing as a global invader. It's disingenuous in the extreme to characterize THEM as the threat to which WE are responding.
btu2012 wrote:
In my opinion it makes perfect sense for Europe to have a continent-wide military alliance.
It does. But Russia is in Europe. The United States is not.
btu2012 wrote:
A look at the map shows that one primary potential threat to European security is formed by the Russian federation. [b]Why would anyone want Europe to be disunited and weak when it neighbors the most heavily nuclear armed state on the planet, a state with an intense history of aggression against multiple European nations ?
Anyone might have asked the same question of Germany before the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community. Inclusion begets mutual self-interest. But exclusion begets mistrust and self-interest. This is what we've fostered in the last 15 years, and we're reaping what we've sewn. Russia has not been made a friend, and it's a powerful country that's been told repeatedly its interests are its own look-out. When I consider how different things might have been, I'm depressed by the contrast.
btu2012 wrote:
I am not sure why you view Russia's murderous occupation of [b] half of Europe as an irrelevant "nicety".
I believe you were speaking of a particular aspect of the Yalta Conference, were you not? The elections? I'm not about to defend the activities of Russia in those years. But why is Russia untrustworthy on the basis of those years? The US killed an estimated million people in Vietnam during the same period. Untold millions in Latin America, directly and indirectly. The British killed untold numbers during the Empire, and routinely imprisoned people who wanted to be free of it. Moreover, the US and UK are currently the military occupiers to two sovereign nations; whereas Russia, whatever it did in the past, is not occupying any other foreign country. Explain to us why you feel that Russia poses a credible and existential threat to Europe, but the US and UK cannot be seen to pose a credible and existential threat to Russia.
btu2012 wrote:
Regarding Italy, Greece: of course the Soviet Union was deeply involved in both Italy and Greece at the time, financially and trough terrorism etc so it's not like they were clean.
Ah, so when we're involved in Eastern Europe and the Russians fix the game, that's bad. But when the Russians are involved in Western Europe and we fix the game, that's okay. Glad we know where you stand now. "Thank you very much", I believe is the phrase.
btu2012 wrote:
Yes, I feel for poor Russia. What a disaster that some of their neighbors might become able to defend themselves.
I suppose we might weep for ourselves that the same can be said of Russia. All that oil, and Yeltsin just opened the door, and now it's shut and it's actually theirs again.
btu2012 wrote:
Actually the EU and NATO did do about anything imaginable to make a friend and partner of Russia
Like what?
btu2012 wrote:
Your argument above is why people talk about lies, damn lies and statistics.
Your argument is the reason we don't put victims on juries, either.
btu2012 wrote:
Actually I did talk and talk to Russians rather often. Most are brainwashed in the extreme by the Russian media
Oh, yes, that's right, I forgot. I ALWAYS forget that everyone ELSE in the world that we don't happen to like is therefore perforce "brainwashed", by Pravda, or Al Jazeera... no, never by CNN or FOXNews and the companies that pay them and every Congressman and Senator loping up the steps of the Capitol Building.
btu2012 wrote:
and think that Putin is a great man.
They might think he's a great man because to them he IS a great man. The point of greatness its very subjectivity. Even Lincoln wasn't "great" in a good deal of the of US for most a century after he was dead.
btu2012 wrote:
Actually the Russians have been interfering with the internal politics of EE and of the Russian near abroad (including through military action) ever since 1990, but you seem to have missed that.
I did. You might want to fill me in on that. I don't remember them being in Yugoslavia fighting us, for instance, or landing troops to prevent the illegal partition of Serbia recently... though I see they've decided to adopt our example with regard to Georgia's own secessionist region. I'm pleased we could lend them so much whitewash; we might have been able to justly criticize them otherwise.
btu2012 wrote:
Transnistria, Chechnia, Abkhazia
Chechnia is actually in Russia, and unfortunately they have the same right to hold onto it that the US had to hold onto Missouri before it could break away... not to mention recovering places like Florida and Mississippi against their will. Abkhazia is a perfect example of what I meant by the example we set. We can hardly criticize Russia for supporting Abkhazia when we've done exactly the same thing in Serbia.
Transnistria is a better example for the point you're tying to make, but even there, it's complicated by the fact that this was a place that was in the Soviet Union. It's not like the Russians sailed across the ocean and occupied some other country. They have troops there as a result of having been the army there. Should they be pulled out? Definitely. Are they being used as an instrument of illegitimate pressure? Certainly. But has pushing NATO ever closer to their borders ameliorated that or made such ventures seem justifiable in the eyes of the Russians? It's worth considering.
btu2012 wrote:
It is to be expected because Russia is a racist, chauvinistic, narcissistic and imperialist nation without any trace of respect for their neighbors and with a long history of aggression, attempts at de-nationalization etc etc against every one of those neighbors.
What, an the United States and the UK can claim otherwise? Why do you keep accusing Russia as though it were somehow extraordinary in these regards, and being opposed by countries that are stainless?
btu2012 wrote:
I don't understand what you find confusing about my criticism ?
Its utter one-sidedness.
btu2012 wrote:
And while you wait, CEE and the Russian near abroad will do anything in their power to safeguard their security and independence from the Russian Empire.
Maybe, but given the state of things, I wouldn't be surprised if that's increasingly a policy of Finlandization. _________________ I can has cheezburger?
Last edited by Nickel on Tue Jun 03, 2008 11:25 am; edited 1 time in total
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 10:57 am Post subject: Re: Russian gas monopolies could turn back on Europe
btu the racist keeps bleating about brainwashing. Well, you retard I get my news from the BBC, CBC, MSNBC, The New York Times, The Guardian, The Independent, and even CNN. But I also get the story from other sources, which being an ignorant hate-filled pin head (akin to all the Global Warming knee-jerk deniers) you dismiss out of hand. Like Lenta.ru, Gazeta.ru and other non-English sources. The real funny thing is that Russians have distrust for the media as their default position (thanks to the USSR years) unlike people in the west who give their media the benefit of the doubt (even if they grease the way for the invasion of Iraq, get caught with their pants down and are trying to do the same thing for the coming attack on Iran). Bleaters like btu are fine specimens of brainwashing. Finger pointers are typically guilty of the sins they screech as being the fault of others.
Joined: Jun 26, 2007 Posts: 1461 Location: The Canada of America
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 11:09 am Post subject: Re: Russian gas monopolies could turn back on Europe
btu2012 wrote:
You forgot to mention that both Ukraine and Kazakhstan were controlled by openly Stalinistic, pro-Russian and undemocratic regimes at the time. Clearly you only see what you want to see.
So your contention here is that "Stalinistic" countries don't want nuclear weapons, but that nice "democratic" ones do. Hm. And this is in aid of your point that it's the Russians who are the threat, rather than responding to a threat, is it? That's... an interesting way of seeing only what you want to see, I'm afraid.
btu2012 wrote:
Well could you explain to me what makes the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan any better than NATO's invasion of the latter ? I am waiting...
Well, that they did it well over a century after the British tried it... we're doing it within 20 years of telling the whole world what a naughty thing it is. Hell, some of the same politicians are still alive. A lot of the planet just might consider that really hypocritical. But other than that, not much.
btu2012 wrote:
By the way, I am not defending what the US is doing there or in Iraq, in case you didn't notice.
I should certainly hope not.
btu2012 wrote:
I know how people there feel about the issue since I talked to Iranians on both sides of it. Both Russia and the UK/US have a history of violent interference with Iranian affairs which goes back about 100 years. I am defending none of them -- each of them is responsible for what they did.
So what exactly do you have against Russia that you're busting their balls and painting them up as monsters while giving everyone else a pass for doing the same things? What's your agenda against the place? Let's put a fine point on it: for all the aggression in their past, right now, I'm not seeing them sailing around the world upsetting applecarts. I'm not seeing them creating rings around other countries to hem them in militarily and economically. I'm seeing them rise to these challenges, though, and I would hope and expect my country, or anyone else's, to do the same in similar circumstances. So what's your issue with Russians in particular that you deny them the same rights as anyone else?
btu2012 wrote:
I underlined an important part. Have you ever heard of the Visegrad 4 group and how the whole NATO expansion started ? That was in Clinton's time.
I don't care if it was in George Washington's time; the idea is a mistake and it's clearly predicted on containing Russia and seeing to it it remained economically dependent on the West and no impediment to the hegemony. They were bound to resent that, but we gambled there'd never be anything they could do about it and we lost. Now you want to tell me that's "doing everything we could" to befriend Russia; well, sorry, I'm not buying the Brooklyn Bridge from you either.
btu2012 wrote:
I highlighted the crucial word "symbolic". Bombers make little difference, we live in the era of strategic missiles, and nothing ever changed about that.
Oh, well I've highlighted the word "in", even though it has nothing in particular to do with your point, either.
btu2012 wrote:
Russia was simply in a position of weakness
That's what we were banking on and working to preserve. Unfortunately for us, they dumped Yeltsin and got Putin.
btu2012 wrote:
The price of oil only started to increase after 2000, i.e. after Putin took power. What you say doesn't address my argument.
So you're contending that if those resources were currently still in the hands of foreigners and Russian billionaires, that somehow all that money would still have accrued to the Russian government and the people in general. There's no question they're better off as a result of the rise in the price of oil... but by what mechanism under the Yeltsin regime do you propose they would have been the beneficiaries of that rise in the price? That's what YOU'RE not addressing, and which is at the heart of the point I was making about nationalization.
btu2012 wrote:
Corruption is rife in Putin's Russia, only now it is controlled by the FSB.
No argument here. It's highly unfortunate.
btu2012 wrote:
Well, the problem is that [b]the EU makes no sense without a continent -wide security arrangement capable of holding Russia back.
Certainly it does. Several, even most, of the members are not in NATO. Have the Russians rolled in? Why do you presume they feel it would necessarily be in their interests to do so? They're rich. They can buy whatever they need without having to bleed out their ass on the military, unlike some other superpowers that aren't so lucky. Sort of like the USSR was twenty years ago... _________________ I can has cheezburger?
Joined: Sep 24, 2007 Posts: 2584 Location: third from the sun
Posted: Tue Jun 03, 2008 11:44 am Post subject: Re: Russian gas monopolies could turn back on Europe
It wasn't "we", but a small group among "us" who blocked the MAP for those countries mainly due to economic interests (oil) and cowardice. Selling the East again, and behaving like the fifths column in an alliance in which those "us" are a tiny minority.
btu2012 wrote:
It's disingenuous in the extreme to characterize THEM as the threat to which WE are responding.
Really ? Europe was divided for 50 years because of Russia. That and 300 years of incessant imperialism is enough reason for me and most others. Not to mention the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact, which started WWII.
Nickel wrote:
It does. But Russia is in Europe. The United States is not.
Europe currently needs the US nuclear umbrella given the formidable nuclear arsenal of Russia, the largest in the world by a big margin. Without NATO, Europe would have to develop sufficient nuclear deterrence to maintain balance with Russia. Europe can do that, would you and Russia be happy with it ? Let us know and we'll start rolling out nukes tomorrow.
Russia doesn't have any interest in being in Europe, even though their core territory is there by most geographic definitions. Siberia was acquired by imperial expansion, like 2/3 of current Russian territory.
Nickel wrote:
Anyone might have asked the same question of Germany before the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community. Inclusion begets mutual self-interest. But exclusion begets mistrust and self-interest. This is what we've fostered in the last 15 years, and we're reaping what we've sewn. Russia has not been made a friend, and it's a powerful country that's been told repeatedly its interests are its own look-out. When I consider how different things might have been, I'm depressed by the contrast.
That's why NATO and the EU tried and try to include Russia, however the Russians would have none of it. It's more important for them to control Ukraine, Belarus, Georgia etc, by murder and war if necessary.
Nickel wrote:
But why is Russia untrustworthy on the basis of those years? The US killed an estimated million people in Vietnam during the same period.
Neither Russia nor the US are trustworthy given their past actions. I don't have any way to establish trust except by judging past behavior. Do you have another ?
Russia has a horrible record in Europe, period. How could Europe possibly ignore that record ? How could Latin America ignore the record of the US in that region ? Would you try to stop Latin Americans from organizing their defenses based on the "sensitivities" of the US ?
Very much unlike Russia, Germany did everything possible to take responsibility for their past deeds, compensated the victims etc. Meanwhile Russia puts out new manuals exalting Stalin as a great modern leader.
Nickel wrote:
Ah, so when we're involved in Eastern Europe and the Russians fix the game, that's bad. But when the Russians are involved in Western Europe and we fix the game, that's okay.
I don't get it. Did I in any way defend what the US did in Greece or Italy (e.g. operation Gladio) ? I only pointed out that the Russians weren't clean either, i.e. that both Russia and the US have a bad record in those countries.
As far as I am aware, however, the US didn't install puppet governments in Western Europe and proceed to kill Western Europeans by the tens of millions in extermination camps. Perhaps you aren't quite aware of what went on behind the Red Curtain, courtesy of mother Russia. Every time you pontificate from your cozy safe country about how the East shoul
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