Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-25

[mongers]

The Ughurs are a perfect examples of exactly what we are talking about - a people who ARE NOT given equal political rights, are not free to exercise their political rights, and have zero influence over those who rule them.

I don't understand why you pretend like we don't get this. We are Americans! Our foundational political document states

... When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, ...

... Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

The Uhgurs would have a completely defensible right to overthrow the Chinese government, with violence if necessary. So could the Chinese people in general, for that matter.

But you are saying the Ukrainians should overthrow their own government, and we should support that, if they wish it. Not because they have determined that their government has in fact become destructive of their own ends, or has not represented them.

The two situations are not the same. Ukraine is a democracy, as imperfect as it might be, and I have never seen any evidence at all the the Ukrainians living in Crimea or the Donbas were oppressed or not given a political voice.

You know, democracy is actually better then authoritarianism....right? There is a value judgement to be made between the form of government Ukraine is trying to uphold and the form of government that China has, much less the form of government within Russia. It's ok to notice that one is better then the other.

And this is an improvement from some ALL CAPS ?

[Sheilbh]

Via Luka Ivan Jukic - always weird to see some Uncle Napoleoning. But iit seems this authentic and absolutely spontaneous protest in Moscow forgot Russia's version of Ukraine's borders Needlesss to say I fully agree with them that Crimea and the Donbas are Ukraine:

[Berkut]

There was a terrorist attack on Sevastopol?

Why are they so focused on the Brits in particular?

[grumbler]

And his is an improvement from some ALL CAPS ?

Beautiful non sequitur!  Almost a classic.

[The Larch]

There was a terrorist attack on Sevastopol?

I guess they mean the recent drone attack on the Black Sea fleet, which is only a terrorist attack in their minds, of course.

Why are they so focused on the Brits in particular?

Russian propaganda has regularly included the UK near the top of their enemies list since the beginning of the war. It's actually somehow endearing.

[Sheilbh]

There was a terrorist attack on Sevastopol?

I think they mean the attack on the Black Sea fleet.

Why are they so focused on the Brits in particular?

Uncle Napoleon - still a thing in Iran too. Although I think with Ukraine it's been particularly heightened because of how vocal the UK's been - there have been loads of weird clips on state TV about Johnson or Truss specifically.

Mark Galeotti has spoken about it more generally as there is apparently a sense in Russia of the UK as the old enemy and, apparently, in their view, their wiliest foe/most likely to engage in dark arts through the intelligence services. Which is mad, it feels like us not doing anything is taken as evidence that we're doing something nefarious but very subtly

I wonder if there's an element of mirroring. Old empire, edge of Europe, history of dark arts - and we in the UK maybe think the Russians are doing more than they are too/it's all 5D chess etc.

Russian propaganda has regularly included the UK near the top of their enemies list since the beginning of the war. It's actually somehow endearing.

Yeah - same with Iran but there it makes more sense.

[Valmy]

The paranoia and hatred for the Brits was a huge deal in the Soviet Union. But it is kind of weird isn't it? The British were always the Russians #1 trading partners and allies. I mean there was the Great Game(tm) and that unfortunate business in the Crimean War. However, even when they were leading the charge in funding the Whites and intervening in the Civil War, it was the Brits who were the first ones to kind of normalize relations through signing the first trade deal with the USSR.

Yet the distrust and paranoia about the British was so pathological that the mountains of evidence being given to Stalin that the Germans were going to invade in 1941 was taken to be evidence for the opposite by Stalin almost entirely on the basis that it a big portion of it came from the British.

Crazy.

But besides weird paranoia by the Bolsheviks and Stalin of the UK as somehow Capitalist Bourgeois Imperialist Enemy #1 I am not sure where it comes from.

[Solmyr]

It's a weird love/hate relationship. If Russians go to live somewhere abroad, it's most likely London.

I suspect imperial competition as well as UK having a liberal society as opposed to Russian autocracy are the main traditional reasons.

[Sheilbh]

The paranoia and hatred for the Brits was a huge deal in the Soviet Union. But it is kind of weird isn't it? The British were always the Russians #1 trading partners and allies. I mean there was the Great Game(tm) and that unfortunate business in the Crimean War. However, even when they were leading the charge in funding the Whites and intervening in the Civil War, it was the Brits who were the first ones to kind of normalize relations through signing the first trade deal with the USSR.

I mean going back to sort of Great Game stuff, London was also a centre of Russian exiles during the Tsarist period (and the Cold War). There was imperial competition in the Great Game but also the Anglo-Japanese Alliance of 1902 - from St Petersburg the British Empire was a big foe trying to strangle/encircle the Russian Empire (especially where it's most vulnerable on its massive Asian border).

Also there was a sense - that hugely affected Stalin's views of the UK - of the Brits getting their allies into very big land wars in Europe and then not doing much of the fighting.

On Soviet trade - it's true but the UK wasn't great at the type of trade the Soviets wanted. And this is fundamentally because the UK was a hegemonic power that benefited from the world order of the 1920s, the Soviets were a revisionist power, like Germany, Japan and Italy. So the UK trade with the Soviets was very extractive and it was beneficial because it gave the Soviets hard currency, but I think the trade deals with Germany are vastly more important to them because it gives them access to the tech and expertise for building heavy industry under Stalin (which is then used to crush Germany).

Although there is at least one example of that post-war when Attlee's government was desperate for currency so descided to export Rolls Royce jets to the Soviets as old allies on the clear understanding that they would not be reverse engineered. Needless to say a year later the Soviets didn't need that trade deal any more because they'd developed a very familiar looking jet (which - as with heavy industry in the 1930s - seems a bit reminiscent of China trying to break through the tech gap now)

Yet the distrust and paranoia about the British was so pathological that the mountains of evidence being given to Stalin that the Germans were going to invade in 1941 was taken to be evidence for the opposite by Stalin almost entirely on the basis that it a big portion of it came from the British.

There's an edited version of Ivan Maisky's diaries who was Soviet Ambassador to London 1932 to 1943 which are fascinating. Both for the take on Britain and the Soviet view of Britain's various permutations of appeasement, but also the internal Soviet politics and fears as Maisky was an ally of Litvinov. He was also, I think, one of only two ambassadors who stayed in post through the Great Terror.

And the inter-war period is key - Kotkin's second book on Stalin is really good on this - because the Soviets keep pushing for a deal with Britain, France and a central European power (not Poland) against Germany. The Brits are consistently the most reluctant and there is a real sense that they are stringing the Soviets along and going to play their old British trick of starting a war in Europe and then hiding behind their navy.

[Tamas]

I am still half suspecting that Russia is trying to bait Ukraine turning Kherson into a Stalingrad. Have them bogged down there whole winter and do a new Russian offensive in the spring

[Sheilbh]

I still half suspecting that Russia is trying to bait Ukraine turning Kherson into a Stalingrad. Have them bogged down there whole winter and do a new Russian offensive in the spring

I think that's my read too on Kherson - it feels like a trap.

Though I think Ukrainians will be too smart to fall into it if it is.

[Josquius]

I am still half suspecting that Russia is trying to bait Ukraine turning Kherson into a Stalingrad. Have them bogged down there whole winter and do a new Russian offensive in the spring

My fear is less stalingrad style resistance and more a nuclear land mine or a movie style break the dam and sweep them away.

Or it could well be this is just what Russia wants everyone to think as a more effective way of slowing ukraine down than conventional resistance.

[The Larch]

My fear is less stalingrad style resistance and more a nuclear land mine or a movie style break the dam and sweep them away.

I thought that Ukraine had already recovered the area around the dam? Or maybe only on one side of it?

[Zoupa]

They haven't. They're about 10 km away.

[PDH]

Ukraine may well be letting the manpower (mostly) escape while blocking the heavy weapons and armor from leaving.  This is somewhat what happened at Izyum where fleeing and weaponless Russians then fail to effectively to set up new defenses.

The Dnipr is big and the bridges are within range of Ukrainian artillery to at least interdict heavy equipment from crossing. 40,000 desperate soldiers can fight pretty well in a city, but 40,000 fleeing soldiers cannot defend away from the city.