The most important question here is who is backing the rebel forces. That will tell us much about the future of the country.

There's a lot more going on behind the scenes. The obvious question to ask is how a regime that withstood years of heavy western pressure suddenly crumbles like a crouton, because that already fails the common sense test.

The most-likely culprit here seems to be Erdoğan, and there are rumors that Assad due to his strong dislike of Erdoğan was getting in the way of a deal between the Turks and the Russians over Syria.

Alexander Mercouris goes deep into the subject in his latest update.

What is certainly an aspect worth noting about this event is that an ideologically neutral Syria is now (at least on the surface) controlled by jihadi extremists - a development that will probably be very displeasing to Israel, though there are some upsides as well.

Using the metaphorical nose, this Korean scenario stinks of Guoanbu influence. — kazan

Any concrete indications of that?

As far as I've been able to tell this president and his party have been notoriously hawkish on North-Korea, which would not seem logical.

Let him visit. See what happens.

Amnesty International investigation concludes Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza

Same shit, different day.

Is there anything left to say at this point?

[...] yet there are many Putin apologists like one frequent commentator on the thread [...] — ssu

In fact one commentator in this thread [...] — ssu

No idea if this latest jab was aimed at me, but is this some kindergarten-level attempt at misrepresenting other people's opinions while trying to save yourself from a rebuke?

Grow up.

Those great men you talk about were no more "god like" than people around today. They were just as ruthless, immoral, power-hungry, and cruel as you seem to want to be. Their status is a product of slanted history and your fantasy life. They killed and enslaved millions of people. — T Clark

You think anyone living in western society today (which I'm assuming this thread is about) is going to be remembered as a great person?

I loved it. :up:

Western society is no longer an example worthy of emulating. It provides nothing in the way of spiritual fulfillment, no role models, no worthy causes, etc.

It's just a hot mess. We're all caught up in it.

If you're living in the city you'll have it worst. I would consider moving to a place closer to nature, where you'll probably find more like-minded people seeking to get away from the clownshow.

I conclude that you're unable to admit even something so basic as NATO and Russia being involved in a proxy war against each other. That's how flimsy your arguments are - you need to twist and turn around even the most obvious realities.

On the topic of first-hand accounts: I have shared them. You, presumably, haven't even bothered to look at them.

Can you ever just make a concise point? All this waffling and linking articles is just vague and pointless. I'm not going to fish through dozens of articles and previous posts to figure out what your arguments are.

Also, just linking articles is not something that holds any value in today's information environment. The internet is flooded with propaganda and nonsense.

I could find hundreds of articles about why the earth is supposedly flat if I wanted to. You'll simply dismiss them, as will I with yours.

You replied to my post stating that NATO has been involved in a proxy war in Ukraine for three years.

Do you dispute this?

Do we hear from you what was wrong there? — ssu

The title alone makes me not take it seriously - trying to claim authority by presenting 'fresh evidence', as though anything is going to top the three corresponding Ukrainian accounts that have been out there for years, and the Western press has done everything in its power to ignore.

Then they mention some details and pretend 'this makes everything different' - how convenient. Plausible deniability achieved, etc., people who have been searching for any excuse to dismiss the clear picture we already had now have a little yarn to spin.

I don't waste my time on such 'journalism'. That's why I dismissed it.

What? :brow:

These aren't 'Kremlin lies' - these are common views held among many Western scholars. If you don't want to debate, don't debate, but don't throw this weak nonsense at me.

We reiterate the decision made at the 2008 Bucharest Summit that Ukraine will become a member of the Alliance [...]

, that's not very ambiguous, is it?

You really think a commitment to the very the thing that sparked this whole catastrophe was going to set the Russians at ease in 2021?

How harmless do you believe the Russians viewed this as, considering 'ambiguous' commitments in 2008 led to over a decade of Western involvement in Ukraine, complete with coup d'etat and military training and armament - all of which clearly intended to make Ukraine jump the gun on a Russian intervention and create a fait accompli?

[...] yet there are many Putin apologists like one frequent commentator on the thread who promote "realpolitik" and the anti-American narrative and tow the Kremlin-line. — ssu

What's your deal with getting so personal?

Well, what did you expect?

I'm not sure if you've noticed, but NATO has been involved in a proxy war against Russia for about three years now. We're launching missiles into Russia. Imagine if the roles were reversed, and it was Russia firing missiles into Europe.

You're looking at the world through star-spangled glasses, that's why 579 pages in you still haven't gotten beyond the surface-level propaganda.

As said many times, I believe Putin is wholly and solely responsible for the criminal invasion of Ukraine, the destruction of billions of dollars worth of property and deaths of hundreds of thousands of people. Wholly and solely. — Wayfarer

Then I suggest you start reading from page 1 and report back to me once you've caught up.

"Fresh evidence" - Yea, typical nonsense when unfortunate facts need to be white-washed, which is obviously what the West needed to do with their actions in Istanbul.

I've shared multiple accounts (like 5?) of the Istanbul negotiations, all of which either Ukrainian, Western or neutral, and they all sketch the same ugly picture, so accusing me of cherry-picking doesn't impress.

Coming from the person that repeats one single reason for the war. — ssu

What "single reason for the war" do you believe I am repeating?

Putin annexed Crimea. Annexed territory. — ssu

The idea that Russia's annexation of Crimea was purely territorial/imperial is a completely unconvincing argument to make, and not only do you seem to be doing that, but you're also using that argument to then claim Russia's reason for war in 2022 must be the same.

You can no longer rely on the annexation of the four oblasts, since Russia has already proposed to return them to Ukraine in return for Ukrainian neutrality during the Istanbul negotiations, so now you retreat to an even less convincing argument.

Add there all the rhetoric of how artificial Ukraine as a state is and how it should be part of Russia. And all the focus on Novorossiya. — ssu

Again, that's simply cherry-picking.

You're ignoring a decade of clear signals to the West over a selective interpretation of a single sentence.

Whenever the Russians say things that confirm your preconceived notions of this conflict you attribute great value to them. When they don't, you ignore them.

Cute posturing, but you failed to respond to the point I made.

The major reason for the war and the objectives cannot be put more clearly than Putin did in September 30th 2022. — ssu

You're simply cherry-picking.

The idea that the Russian goals in September 2022 more purely reflect their initial goals than those stated up to and including March/April 2022 has no logical basis whatsoever.

In fact, it's plainly counter-intuitive and pretends that the developments of the war, amongst which a complete rejection of diplomacy by the West, did not significantly impact Russian war goals.

Face the reality what Putin wants. — ssu

The unfortunate thing for you is that the Russians have told us exactly in word and in deed what they want for over a decade - a neutral Ukraine.

That is the reality.

You're pretending that all of these things that happened in reality should be ignored in favor of lowbrow "us vs. them" narratives, and attempts at mindreading the Kremlin's 'true' intentions.

The Russians offered us the terms, the Ukrainians accepted and the West boycotted it and subsequently ruled out negotiations in favor of 'breaking apart Russia', 'inflicting a strategic defeat', 'enacting regime change', etc.

You'd have to be pretty foolish to think that such a move on the part of the West wasn't going to have fundamental consequences for the nature of the war.

To gain Ukraine and it's territory is an objective itself and has been absolutely central here. To argue something else is not only wrong, but dangerous. — ssu

The Istanbul agreements are direct evidence to the contrary. Ignoring the evidence that is out there in favor of warmongering for total war is what is dangerous, and that's what many in the West are engaged in.

The Russians were willing to settle the war in March/April 2022 without any territorial gains for themselves.

That's a fact. It's confirmed by neutral sources, and even by the Ukrainian negotiators themselves.

For Putin this war is existential. — ssu

Not just for Putin, mind you.

It's quite popular among the mainstream media to repeat the idea that this is 'Putin's war', but it's been known since prior to the 2008 Bucharest NATO Summit that NATO expansion into Ukraine is a red line for much if not all of the Russian political establishment.

So yes, the Russians are prepared to go far in order for this war to be settled in their favor. That much should be crystal clear by now.

That moment has passed, it's not turning, things have changed. — ssu

True. Things have gotten gravely worse for Ukraine. There's nothing left of the bargaining position they had in March/April 2022. Frontlines are crumbling, nations are starting to talk about withdrawing support, etc.

That's a direct result of choosing the military path, and continuing on the military path will obviously extend this trend probably all the way to Ukraine's total demise.


In Ukraine's defense, there is another dimension to this.

In March/April 2022, the West told the Ukrainians to cease negotiations - even make them impossible as Zelensky made sure to cement in the Ukrainian constitution - and double down on the military path.

Ukraine likely did this because of promises that were made by the West.

Now Ukraine is likely and understandably bitter about the prospect of negotiations in the face of wavering Western support. We basically made them fight on for two years, for nothing.

That's probably why Ukraine will need serious 'nudging' (aka, threatening to cut off support) to force them to change their stance.

The Americans have already stabbed the Ukrainians in the back.

The promise upon which the Ukrainians hedged their chances against the Russians was the fact that we would come to their rescue. We did not. We hung them out to dry, drip-feeding them weapons and aid in a way that's ensuring their slow demise.

There is no military path to an independent Ukraine. Ukraine will be completely hollowed out. Whatever is left at the end will not be an independent state in any meaningful sense of the term.

Ukraine's best chance at independence were the Istanbul negotiations.

Our shockingly obscene incompetence has already guaranteed a victory for Putin.

If you're still hoping for a victory you need a dosis of reality.

A sophisticated way of saying "Putin bad." - not very convincing.

If we want to avoid WW3, we should probably look into our own role in perpetuating the conflict - for example at the role of the US and the UK in blocking the Istanbul agreement, and Biden's current escalatory actions to make peace impossible when Trump has stated he intends to pursue a deal.

This is the absurdity when politicians are let to micromanage warfighting. Yet when you ask the President to answer something, he definitely will then answer these kind of question and then you simply are trapped in the situation where politician just decide on everything and they don't look at the war from the warfighting stance, but from their own political view. Then war becomes "sending messages", not fighting to win the war and defeating the enemy. — ssu

I don't know about micromanaging, but for politicians to command the military is only proper.

"War is a continuation of politics by other means," as Clausewitz said.

When fighting and winning the war becomes a goal of its own (as is often the type of tunnel vision military leadership suffers from), it is a recipe for disaster.

You end up with geniuses like MacArthur who wanted to nuke China because he was unable to accept the Korean War was going to end in a stalemate.

We are talking of a 10-50m CEP with ATACMS. — ssu

With just a tiny, old INS over a 300km trajectory?

Yeah, no.

The whole point is for the GPS and INS to function together to reduce their respective errors.

The ATACMS was developed in the 1980's. It has inertial guidance just as nearly all long range missile artillery systems have, even if it can be aided by GPS. — ssu

You won't hit the broad side of a barn with just '80s INS, but the guidance modules have been updated over time to be able to correlate INS with systems other than GPS, since GPS is basically a relic of the past due to how easily it is jammed.

The issue for Ukraine is that GPS is heavily jammed and thus long-range ATACMS missiles have to rely on different guidance systems to achieve a high degree of accuracy - most-likely classified US ground mapping methods. Hence the obvious conclusion that they're being operated by Americans.

That's not "Putin talk" - that's simply in the nitty-gritty of how these sorts of things work.

And all this "Putin talk" is coming from Western analysts.

Also note the gold price responding to recent geopolitical developments.

When Trump got elected, the price of gold started to come down significantly from an all-time high. Apparently the world, unlike this forum's left-leaning denizens, viewed Trump's election as a turn towards stability.

A few days later, this downward trend is reversed as the Biden administration takes clear steps to make said turn towards stability impossible. The gold price skyrockets to a new all-time high and probably will continue going through the roof for the next several days.

This is not 'Putin talk', it's simply a fact that Ukraine is incapable of operating these weapon systems alone. It's inherent to the weapon systems.

It requires US or British assistance for virtually every step of the deployment process. The strikes are probably completely planned by American and British operators.

With that said, if we survive all of this, maybe several countries in Europe will reinvent this Dutch tradition:

It is one thing when, like during the Cuban Missile Crisis, countries are playing nuclear chicken with their own countries at stake.

Right now, the US and the UK are playing with Ukraine and Europe.

No country in the world should accept this.

They were both downright awful. Maybe that had something to do with it.

This sexist country just can't stand the thought of a woman leader. — RogueAI

Except that Hillary Clinton, an unimaginable hag of a woman, won the popular vote by a comfortable margin in 2016. But keep coping, I suppose..

Well, it can't get any worse than the Biden administration, which is now playing a game of nuclear chicken with Europe as their bargaining chip.

Ten weeks until Trump takes office. Lets see if Europe survives.

The point here is that Ukraine lacks the ISR and fire control capabilities to strike targets deep inside Russia, which means that at this point US and British weapons are being used, using US and British targeting data, operated by US and British operators, to attack Russia directly. (Maybe a Ukrainian presses the final button for appearance's sake)

In other words, NATO, via the US and the UK, is now directly at war with Russia, or so the Russians argue.

When Russia is directly at war with another nuclear-armed power, that puts into effect aspects of their nuclear doctrine, one of which being (I assume) that nuclear weapons are to be permanently aimed at you and me.


It's honestly quite remarkable to me that you're still showing no signs of alarm. At what point will you say enough is enough? When the air sirens go off?


Do you understand the implications of the argument I have put forward previously, that:

1. Europe and Russia are parts of the world the US will no longer be able to control going into the future.

2. Europe and Russia will play a critical role in keeping China's economy afloat in case of a US-China war.

3. Europe and Russia being in pole position to benefit greatly from a US-China war, and probably becoming the laughing thirds of such a conflict.

I wager that the Americans view 'limited nuclear war' as an excellent means of taking out two potential geopolitical rivals who stand to benefit from a US-China war: Russia and Europe.

____________________________________________________________________________

People in the UK are Europeans, actually. :wink: — ssu

For the sake of geopolitics, they are not. The UK belongs to the periphery, and as such benefits from keeping Eurasia divided and fighting amongst themselves. The US operates on exactly the same principles.

Deterrence stops Putin. — ssu

This isn't deterrence. This is provocation and escalation, and it achieves nothing besides those two things. Besides, the Russians have made clear they believe they are protecting vital strategic interests - in other words, they won't be bluffed out of this.

The US and the UK are playing with fire, and it will be us, the Europeans, that are going to get burned.

Sweden and Finland both have this thing called "total defense". — ssu

What you'll have is a total curling up in the foetal position while our countries are incinerated.

You're sitting on the front row, I on the second.

We have nothing to gain here.

All we can hope for is for the Russians to understand that it is the US and the UK who are pursuing this strategy over our backs, and that the Russians seek to impose costs on them instead.

That's the only way for the US and the UK to start behaving - if they are the ones to pay the price of war.

Two nations are flaunting the fact that "their missiles" are hitting targets in Russia: the US and the UK.

What did they achieve?

Nothing, except for the fact that Putin has stated in September they would consider themselves to be at war with NATO if this were to transpire, with which he refered to their nuclear doctrine which undoubtedly prescribes that in the event of a war with another nuclear-armed power, Russian nukes should be ready 24/7 to deliver a 'second strike'.

How do Europeans sleep, knowing they're the playing chips with which the US and the UK are pursuing these types of escalations?