This pretty much sums up the useful idiot position. US - bad. Therefore, any anti-US propaganda should be given extra credence, any US ally should be viewed with extra suspicion, and any US adversary - with extra deference.

So when Russian MOD claims that American biolabs in Ukraine have been developing bioweapons capable of selectively targeting Slavic ethnic groups, and that they have been studying bats, tics and birds as possible vectors of transmission of lethal diseases across the border, such claims ought to be taken very seriously indeed, and at the highest level. — SophistiCat

Noam Chomsky first political book's name tells it all: "The Responsibility of Intellectuals". The thinking goes that in order to improve our Western World, we have to be critical of it's actions. Here's the "The world's greatest intellectual, by a pretty big margin" explaining his argument quite clearly:



Yet as usual, people get lost with this argument, lose the narrative just on which side they are and start believing baseless propaganda of very nasty regimes and become the "useful idiots" in the information war. Or then start to fear if they take side with any issue with the US, they might give credence and justification to everything the US does.

And then at the same time forget to condemn the attackers, talk anything about the attrocities that happen and give any support for those that are fighting for their freedom and for their right to exist.

interspersed with snippets of unrelated tourist information. — Isaac

They're just such peace loving people they're already plugging the Ukrainian tourist industry to help the rebuilding effort. It's thoughtful.

But yes, all this criticism of Russian logistics ... sort of requires knowledge of Ukrainian logistics also to come to any conclusions.

There are actually 4 ways Russia can encircle all Ukrainian forces east of the River.

whether Ukraine has sufficient supplies of fuel — Isaac

1. It can join the North-West and South-West pincers in more-or-less a straight line through farmland.
2. It can breakout the Salient East of Kiev in a move south to the river, and breakout it's South-West salient in a move North-East of the river (and just blow up all the bridges in between if any remain).
4. It can break out one of it's salients in the East to the river to accomplish the point above in a different way.
5. It can just blowup all the bridges.

There's certainly no question Russia has sufficient fuel supplies to do any of the maneuvers above.

And the core problem of infantry vs. armor is that armor can just flank tens of kilometres around you.

One possibility is that what we have seen in Ukraine so far is largely what Russian generals largely want us to see, or then fine with it. I have a hard time believing Russian generals will evaluate success and failure apart from military victory.

For any would be commentators concerned about the gross misfeasance indicated below...

forget to condemn the attackers, talk anything about the attrocities that happen and give any support for those that are fighting for their freedom and for their right to exist. — ssu

... I've gone to the trouble of preparing a guide.

..(1).. is a bad man and all the bad things are his fault. ...(2).. is a bad thing. I feel sorry for ..(3)...

Just copypaste the above and fill in the latest media villain de jour at (1), whatever crisis is in the headlines at (2) and the latest protagonist at (3). Then you can crack on with your original post unafraid of damnation from anyone who requires we all wear them like a fucking badge before they believe anyone has emotions.

Oh, but do be sure to keep up with the latest version. At the moment it's

1. Putin
2. Invading people
3. All Ukrainians and anyone helping them

Do not, under any circumstances accidentally use last month's entries (check Facebook for details), and avoid at all costs generalities like...

1. The obscenely rich and powerful
2. Fucking over the poor
3. The poor

This bioweapons story is Pizzagate-level insanity. And yet adult people of adequate intelligence take it seriously, pour over Nulland Q&A for vague hints of confirmation... The mind boggles. But then we've seen it before: QAnon, 9/11 conspiracies, etc.

I have an idea! Let's send Noam Chomsky, the greatest intellectual alive, to Donbass. Let him sort it out!

This bioweapons story is Pizzagate-level insanity. And yet adult people of adequate intelligence take it seriously, pour over Nulland Q&A for vague hints of confirmation... The mind boggles. But then we've seen it before: QAnon, 9/11 conspiracies, etc. — SophistiCat

When it's reported by the news (Fox News), there has to be at least something true, right? In Pizzagate I think Clinton's election team sometimes ordered pizza, perhaps from Comet Ping Pong or at least somewhere else. Of course, everything else is total and utter lunacy. But does it matter?

Even that it's denounced, that there is no basement in the pizzeria, it doesn't actually matter. If the other has to react and say "This isn't true", they are already talking about it. However crazy and unimportant it might be. That's enough. The discussion can move next week to something else and people will forget it.

This bioweapons story is Pizzagate-level insanity. — SophistiCat

Right so the New York Times article in 2001 describing how Project Clear Vision created biological weapons which they hid from the mandatory UN declarations, carried out with private bioweapons researchers Battelle, partly in their Lugar Center in Georgia must have slipped past the NYT's editorial guidelines - what with such a notion being "Pizzagate-level insanity" and all.

To think anyone would be insane enough to think the US would fund research involving biological weapons in Ukrainian labs when the only evidence we have of them doing anything even remotely similar is them funding research involving biological weapons in Georgian labs.

I see now I've been a fool, obviously if the US fund such programs in Georgia it's nothing but insanity to think they'd do so in Ukraine!

Do not, under any circumstances accidentally use last month's entries (check Facebook for details), and avoid at all costs generalities like...

1. The obscenely rich and powerful
2. Fucking over the poor
3. The poor — Isaac

Uhh... this is a thread about the Ukraine Crisis. :roll:

But of course we could talk about one if not the most obscenely rich and powerful, Vladimir Putin. One opposition leader remarked that the expensive wristwatch he has weared was more than what Putin officials declares to be owning. Pictures from his 1 billion palace.

The really stark example of the rich fucking over the poor: institutionalized kleptocracy.

(A kleptocracy whose leader starts wars btw...)

Well, I mean, replace "Russia" with "USA" and you can find very similar claims by the US concerning Iraq.

But it's clear propaganda. Of course, the US is a real super power in terms of military might and global reach, but Russia is a regional power and has the most nukes.

Chomsky has condemned this Russian war clearly and unequivocally.

Uhh... this is a thread about the Ukraine Crisis. — ssu

It was a piece of social commentary about today's mercurial, shallow emotional flag-waiving. It's relevance to this thread is the obsession with it demonstrated here.

It was a piece of social commentary — Isaac

It was just your failure to understand that Putin has outdone his western counterparts in fucking over his countrymen financially.

Sigh. @Tobias this thread is a prime example. :roll:

It was a piece of social commentary about today's mercurial, shallow emotional flag-waiving. — Isaac

For you, perhaps. For us, it might seem so. Not for Ukrainians.

An interview with Zelenskyy done by Vice, Worth watching. (9 min)

There is a whole crackpot conspiracy subgenre of "perpetrator spilling the beans in public for no reason." Government officials supposedly confessing to blowing up WTC buildings, climate scientists admitting forging data, etc.

Putin has outdone his western counterparts in fucking over his countrymen financially. — frank

Seriously? You want to put some figures to that? Putin has impoverished more people to a greater extent than the US?

Let's start with the Gini coefficient...

Russia 37.5
US 48.9

US wining the 'fucking over the poor' competition so far.

There's not even a whole percentage point between them on percentage of the population below the poverty line, and the US is getting worse while Russia is slightly improving.

Shall we look at crippling terms of debt next, or unreasonable tariffs on developing countries' exports, or the impacts of American vs Russian-based TNCs. You choose.

for no reason — SophistiCat

How is 'avoiding openly lying on public record' not 'a reason'?

He's not wrong though.

It's a coin toss. One side results in the deaths of potentially billions and the other thousands. Might as well refuse to even toss the coin.

Seriously? You want to put some figures to that? — Isaac

Sure. Median wealth:

USA: $121,700
Russia : $871

This is kleptocracy at work: no investment in future production, just raping resources til there's nothing left.

Oh I agree! I wasn't being sarcastic.

Seriously? You want to put some figures to that? — Isaac

Sure. Median wealth:

USA: $121,700
Russia : $871 — frank

And going down for Russia. But some other indicators, that actually tell something on this issue:

Life expectancy:
USA: 76.3 years
Russia: 68.2 years

Absolute povetry. Percent of people living on less than 5,5 dollars per day:

USA: 1,7%
Russia: 3,7%

Kleptocracy. Corruption perception index (the lower, the more corrupt):

USA: 67 (27th least corrupt country)
Russia: 29 (on 136th place least corrupt country)

And those stats aren't actually great at all to the US.

And btw, Ukraine covers both the US and Russia on the income inequality scale measured by the gini-coefficient, it being at 25. And as there is a war (which this thread is actually about), income inequality is going down. Hurray!!! :zip:

What lower income inequality looks like:


The oligarchs aren't surely making a buck here... if they aren't in the weapons business.

The claim was about Putin fucking over his countrymen. Indices of overall poverty aren't relevant to that claim. If they're all poor then one sector aren't fucking over the other are they? The claim was not "there are some bad things about Russia" that I wouldn't have contested. The claim was that it is worse than the west for enriching one class at the expense of impoverishing another. For that you need indices of inequality, not mean wealth.

Russia's pretty good at shafting the poor, but not the best.

All of which is, of course, irrelevant to the point, which was about the gross display moral pearl-cluthing over the exact indiscriminate disregard for humanity that's gone on virtually uncommented on for decades.

All of which is, of course, irrelevant to the point, which was about the gross display moral pearl-cluthing over the exact indiscriminate disregard for humanity that's gone on virtually uncommented on for decades. — Isaac

That’s wrong, but if it was right, it would be irrelevant.

The claim was about Putin fucking over his countrymen. Indices of overall poverty aren't relevant to that claim. — Isaac

Putin is fucking his countrymen and stealing the wealth from the Russian nation. Are you really denying that and becoming a true Putin apologist or what? I thought you were critical of the West's and US actions.



The Yeltsin-Putin kleptocracy has ruined Russia. That's the fact. The ex-Soviet countries that chose the West and the EU (and thankfully some could!) have prospered far better than Russia.

You don't get prosperity by starting wars. You get prosperity by trade.

The bio-weapons labs…er…bio-defence labs in Ukraine should be investigated. Any facilities designed to “consolidate and secure pathogens and toxins of security concern” should involve a modicum of transparency, if not for safety, then at least to waylay the fears of potential enemies. Given the corruption and strife in Ukraine, perhaps even more is needed.

But it’s far too late for the US to do anything about these facilities, now. Like American assets and man-power in Afghanistan, it was all sacrificed on the incompetence of the current administration.

Hey, when a country invades another, u would expect that common people would support the defending country and chastise the invading one. This doesnt seem to be the case here. What does the most intelligent person on the planet have to say about this?

Hey, when a country invades another, u would expect that common people would support the defending country and castise the invading one. This doesnt seem to be the case here. — Pussycat

Of course not!

The people here are fond of philosophy!

Hence it seems they have to be critical of the US and the West because... they come from the US and the West! Because it's good to be against everything bad the US has done. Like to enlarge NATO and "force" Russia to invade a third country. For them it's meaningless to ponder about what Russia has done. But engaging the discourse that Russia promotes is great, because Russia is against the US and the West.

So some opt to be a Полезный идиот!

i dont know about philosophy or whether russia's hand was forced, but i believe people want this war over quick so that they return to their normal lives, that was disrupted, double, if you count covid. The quickest way would be for ukraine to surrender, rather than to embark on a long term war. If someone also recognises the russian win as a defeat of the west, and is against the west, well then this would be a double win for them.

Hey, when a country invades another, u would expect that common people would support the defending country and chastise the invading one. This doesnt seem to be the case here. — Pussycat

How so?