Ukraine?

[George K]

What the hell is going on there?

What is Putin's objective, annexation?

[Mik]

My guess is he wants the attention and thinks he can get Biden to lift sanctions. Either that or he knows that we are preoccupied with China and Taiwan and thinks he can just take it. He might be right.

[George K]

@mik said in Ukraine?:

He might be right

He ain't stupid.

[kluurs]

It could be a coordinated effort.

[kluurs]

Perhaps time to for Kim Jong-un to put something into play as well.

[Copper]

Ukraine was #1 on Tucker's agenda tonight.

Long story short

Mr. Biden wants Ukraine to join NATO
Why?
Because he is stupid and senile and thinks it is still 1990 and the Soviet Union is a problem
And he needs a war because his approval is so low

Mr. Putin?
He doesn't want NATO on his doorstep
Would we want China allied to Mexico and Canada?

Other experts
We can't possibly win a conventional war on Russia's doorstep, no way
So nukes? Nobody wins
Impossible situation for the US

More miscalculation
This just pushes Russia closer to China

Bottom line?
Hope Mr. Biden's approval improves or else.

Oh, and I almost forgot, democrats hate the USA

[Renauda]

@copper said in Ukraine?:

Mr. Putin?
He doesn't want NATO on his doorstep
Would we want China allied to Mexico and Canada?

In 1936 the American newspaperman Roy Howard interviewed Stalin. During the interview Stalin made the following observation

****History tells us that when a state wishes to attack a state with which it does not share a border, it begins to create new borders until it neighbours the state it wishes to attack ****

In a word that is precisely how Putin sees NATO expansion into former states of the USSR in general and into Ukraine in particular.

[Mik]

And he is not wrong. The constant expansion of NATO is trying to keep a boot on Russia's neck.

[George K]

Peace in our time.

Biden will press Ukraine to basically accept that the Donblas region, which Russia has troops in, has been successfully conquered by Russia and is now part of Russia.

Administration officials have suggested that the U.S. will press Ukraine to formally cede a measure of autonomy to eastern Ukrainian lands now controlled by Russia-backed separatists who rose up against Kyiv in 2014. An undefined "special status" for those areas was laid out in an ambiguous, European-brokered peace deal in 2015, but it has never taken hold.

Biden also will have to finesse Ukraine's desire to join NATO. The U.S. and NATO reject Putin's demands that they guarantee Ukraine won't be admitted to the Western military alliance.

But senior State Department officials have told Ukraine that NATO membership is unlikely to be approved in the next decade, according to a person familiar with those private talks who spoke on condition of anonymity.

For Biden, the challenge will be encouraging Kyiv to accept some of the facts on the ground in eastern Ukraine, without appearing to cave to Putin -- a perception that could embolden the Russian leader and unleash a fresh line of condemnations by Republicans as Biden's popularity is already in decline.

Remember when Trump was Putin's puppet? Good times.

[Mik]

This is worse than I imagined.

[Copper]

The Russians must not cross the Ukrainian border

But they can come across the Rio Grande whenever they like

[Axtremus]

So … @Mik , @George-K , what do you think the USA’s policies towards Ukraine and Russia should be?

For @Renauda , I am under the impression that he just wants the USA to leave Ukraine and Russia alone (don’t try to expand NATO to include former Soviet states), but he can correct me if that’s wrong.

[Renauda]

@axtremus

Ostensibly, that is a major part of what Putin wants from the West. That means a Ukraine that resides outside the influence of western liberalism that is predominant in the EU. Putin also wants a Ukraine that remains culturally and economically integrated with Russia.

If the report above is true, then Biden’s policy is not too far removed from The Minsk Accord that Ukraine agreed to but did not implement to solve the Donetsk question. Essentially Ukraine needs to adopt a form of federalism that will accommodate the ethnic Russian speaking majority who have lived in those regions for hundreds of years.

The borders of Ukraine that now exist were arbitrary constructs made up during the early years of the USSR. When it fell apart in 1990, none of the political leaders of the country saw the need to revise the borders as they believed they were entering into a voluntary confederation of states that had made up the USSR. Still, I personally do not believe Putin wants eastern Ukraine. Unlike Crimea, he knows only too well that it is an economic and political liability that Russia can I’ll afford.

As for Crimea, it is part of Russia. It will not be returned to Ukraine. Kyiv, Washington and the rest of Western liberaldom will just have to get over it.