Gifts for Putin, Demands for Zelensky
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@Jolly said in Gifts for Putin, Demands for Zelensky:
Why are we pushing Europe to 5%? Because 5% will probably supply enough combat power that they can defend themselves.
Follow the current German/French consortium on a new MBT? They've just about got it finalized and Rheinmetal has chucked a monkey wrench into the whole thing.
They can't help themselves and I think Americans are getting tired of carrying their load.
I don’t mind pushing Europe to spend 5%. I’m not fond of us only being at 3.6 and looking to drop 8% per year.
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I understand saying that is going to set some people off because they take an absolutist view about American relations with Ukraine that suggests no matter what Zelensky does, he is entitled to billions upon billions of dollars in taxpayer-funded weapons and aid.
No way. Surely nobody is that silly and immature.
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@Jolly said in Gifts for Putin, Demands for Zelensky:
I see and hear that Rubio has no response for why Trump posits that Zelensky is a "dictator without election."
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There is nothing wrong with the United States trying to get something in return for all it has spent, and despite some ignorant claims to the contrary, Lend-Lease in World War II was not free.
That’s true and the UK only finished paying its Lend-Lease debt back a few years ago.
Interestingly, the USSR never remitted so much as a penny for any of its Lend Lease assistance after WWII. The total technical and material aid Stalin received from the USA from 1941 through 1945 totalled about 11 billion USD. That would be over 1 trillion USD in today’s dollars. (McMeekin: Stalin’s War, 2021. pp. 658 - 659)
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Well, that went over your head ...
“Cry havoc and let slip the DOGE of war!”
Warning: I post things that interest me. Read and comment at your own discretion.
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Sec. Rubio said "One of the points that the President made is that Ukraine is on another continent and it doesn't directly impact the daily lives of the people of the US."
What the................?
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It would be a concession to stop prosecuting a war they are destined to win, absent an escalation between nuclear powers that ends who knows where. That is a concession we should all care about, not that it's obvious that we all do, as we deploy our armchair principles.
Education is extremely important.
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It would be a concession to stop prosecuting a war they are destined to win, absent an escalation between nuclear powers that ends who knows where.
No, that would be an outcome. A concession by Russia at this point would be that Kremlin stops attacking what remains of Ukraine and accepts that it is a fully sovereign and independent country that will freely decide its own future path. Putin’s NATO threat justification is a figment of his own twisted perception of reality.
‘a-blowe yow and be-kele yow wel, and comyth up all with your ease’ ~ attributed to Henry V
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Assume nothing of the sort from Putin. He is incapable of negotiating anything in good faith. Putin’s objective, at the very least, is to have what will be left of Ukraine as a wholly subservient vassal state along the lines of Belarus.
The Ukrainian nation will not accept that outcome.
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@LuFins-Dad said in Gifts for Putin, Demands for Zelensky:
Look at all the TDS in the comments. A combination of armchair principles and hatred of Donald Trump, extrudes as a self-righteous desire for a bloody conflict to continue indefinitely. Gotta love humans.
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Here’s a simple fact. There was no resolution in the offing under Biden. The prior administration and the Europeans seemed absolutely locked in on supporting the Ukrainians enough to put up a passable defense, but not enough to allow them to actually win the war, either. The whole “wearing down Russia’s military” sounds good on a balance statement but is a ridiculously immoral and unethical view, in my opinion. Spending and wasting Ukrainian and Russian lives to no great ultimate effect.
Did Trump go about this the right way? No. He’s a dickhead. But something is at least getting done. So which is better? A polite coward that lets the war continue killing people indefinitely, or a dickhead that does and says mean things, but gets the war ended and gets a business deal done that reimburses our investments and also provides an immutable security guarantee. It also opens up an economic opportunity for Ukraine that was not being utilized before.
The Brad
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In 2017, we were all assured that Ukraine was corrupt and the Government filled with individuals gat we’re little more than thugs. Now the same people are touting Ukraine as he brightest and shiniest example of honest democratic governance. LMFAO
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@LuFins-Dad said in Gifts for Putin, Demands for Zelensky:
A polite coward that lets the war continue killing people indefinitely,
In fairness, that appears to be the will of his voters. Democracy in action.
Education is extremely important.
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You guys talk as if the only two possibilities were status quo or Trump switching sides and completely adopting every last one of Putin’s talking points while shaking down our former ally.
Seems there might have been other possibilities.
“Don’t make me repeat myself”
- history
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@Horace said in Gifts for Putin, Demands for Zelensky:
@LuFins-Dad said in Gifts for Putin, Demands for Zelensky:
A polite coward that lets the war continue killing people indefinitely,
In fairness, that appears to be the will of his voters. Democracy in action.
You may be right. The coward in this war is, of course, Putin, who alleges that he has 90% or more support of the Russian voters to pursue this war indefinitely.
The thought of free and sovereign Ukraine on his border is indescribably horrific to his existence. An existential threat beyond all others.
