(April 14, 2014 at 4:39 pm)A Theist Wrote: We have this written guarantee, signed by Adolf Hitler! Proof that appeasing a dictator equates to peace!

Putin is not Hitler. And he knows that only so much will be tolerated before a world of shit would rain on his parade.

He's not a delusional idiot like Hitler.

Kudos! I hope this won't be the last kudos I give before the nukes rain down.

(April 12, 2014 at 2:50 pm)Moros Synackaon Wrote: It is expensive for the Russian military to be parked on the Ukrainian border.

The longer the US and Ukraine can keep them on the border threatening to do something but not doing anything, the more untenable it becomes for Russia.

Putin needs to save face. If he cannot get a conflict, or a very stupid politician on the opposing side, then he will look foolish when it becomes too expensive for the Russian military to remain there.

I agree with the original post – the US should not militarily intervene in Ukraine. The US instead should force Russia to pretend and posture along Ukrainian border for as long as possible.

Consider Crimea a loss, and instead focus on attempting to give liquidity to Ukraine and spin up the light manufacturing in the western Ukraine to compensate for the economic losses.

If the Ukraine is not bankrupted by Putin's oil price war, then he will have effectively lost his attempt at subjugating a former satellite state.

I am afraid even Russia can easily afford keeping a mere 30,000 troops at a high state of readiness (but not actually expending supplies and ammunition, and not suffering casaulties, in a real war) indefinitely a few dozens or hundred kilometers from their normal bases, but still well within a high developed part of Russian territory.

Soviet Union kept 150,000 troops in parmament war footing for 9 years of actual combat operation in Afghanistan at the end of a vastly longer and more tenuous supply chain in one of the most underdeveloped countries in the world, bordering the largest as well as most underdeveloped part of the Soviet Union, while starring the US down in a comprehensive cold war military build up.

Actually, Putin does not look too smart to let things progress to the point where Ukraine can threaten to leave Russian orbit. But once that happens there is no other smart thing he could do then to do whatever it takes to keep Ukraine from leaving Russian orbit.

Once that has happened, the singular act of idiocy was on the part of the new Ukrainian government in making it virtually its first official act to deprive Russian language of its status of one of the official language in Ukraine, thus immediately riling up ethnic russians - largest minority group in Ukraine, as well natively Russian speaking and russophile Ukrainians in eastern Ukraine, and hand Putin the tool with which to lever eastern Ukraine away from Kiev.

I think it is now fairly evident Putin is going to keep levering chunks of Russian speak, or ethnic Russian majority parts of Ukraine away from Kiev. The Russian army massing on Ukrainian border is there to threaten intervention in order to prevent Kiev from using too much force and being too effective in suppressing Russian speaking local insurgency. Meanwhile the Russians will keep inciting ethnic Russians and Native Russian speakers in Eastern Ukraine to revolt and clamer for independence. I think Russian would likely end up with all of Ukrainian territory east of Donets river. I think they may eventually even end up with most of Ukraine east of Dniper river.

The Russian economy depends solely upon it's oil. Of it's economy, there has been insufficient growth to support a country of Russia's size. That alone bodes poorly.

Of the wealth in the economy, the majority of it is concentrated in less than several hundred individuals.

How can you use assumptions based off the Soviet Union when the environment is completely different?

Can you justify such?

(April 14, 2014 at 6:14 pm)Moros Synackaon Wrote: The Russian economy depends solely upon it's oil. Of it's economy, there has been insufficient growth to support a country of Russia's size. That alone bodes poorly.

Of the wealth in the economy, the majority of it is concentrated in less than several hundred individuals.

How can you use assumptions based off the Soviet Union when the environment is completely different?

Can you justify such?

Russian economy still has a certain size and revenue. Tax from Oil and Gas exports may be the main source of Russia government's discretionary revenue, but that does not mean these are the only things Russia makes. Russia is still a major producer of machine tools, a major ship builder, electronics manufacturer, construction and manufacturing equipment. Even if what Russia makes isn't fully competitve in a free market, their products still has value to their own economy and can certainly support a military effort.

Overall Russian economy still ranks 8th in the world by nominal and 5th largest by purchase power parity. The gap between nominal and PPP immediately indicates the Russia's productive power is not mainly reflected in exports of raw material. By either measure Russian economy remains larger then Italy, and larger than India or those of any other BRIC countries except China. You would have no trouble envisioning India keeping 30,000 troops, nor indeed 300,000 troops, on high alert against Pakistan. So why 30,000 Russians?

Relative to the United States, Russian economy today was perhaps half as big as the economy of the Soviet Union had been in the late 1980s. So Russia really still has considerable potential for large military efforts.

Putin demonstrated repeatedly it is Putin, not the oligarchs, who call the shots. Oligarchs who defy Putin have their entire wealth stripped from them and sold to the state at artificially low prices, and their persons then placed in solitary confinement for 15 years. So the concentration of wealth in the hands of the Oligarchs does not mean Putin can get his hands on them if he want them for his own ends. So I can't see why there can be doubt Russia could come up with 15 - 20 billion to sustain a campaign to threaten Ukraine.

I think Putin wants most of eastern Ukraine, not just crimea, and will get much of what he wants. Sooner or later, seditious acts by ethnic Russians and russian speakers will either wrestle de facto control of those regions from a weak and impotent Kiev and hand them to Moscow, or Kiev will be forced to crack down violently on the ethnic Russians and russians speakers, and Putin will have his excuse to invade and take these parts by force.

(April 14, 2014 at 6:31 pm)Chuck Wrote: I think Putin wants most of eastern Ukraine, not just crimea, and will get much of what he wants. Sooner or later, seditious acts by ethnic Russians and russian speakers will either wrestle de facto control of those regions from a weak and impotent Kiev and hand them to Moscow, or Kiev will be forced to crack down violently on the ethnic Russians and russians speakers, and Putin will have his excuse to invade and take these parts by force.

All Kiev and the West has to do is carefully tamp down those seditious acts.

The calmer they can do it, the more frustrated Putin will get.

The weaker he'll look too.

(April 14, 2014 at 5:34 pm)Rahul Wrote:

(April 14, 2014 at 4:39 pm)A Theist Wrote: We have this written guarantee, signed by Adolf Hitler! Proof that appeasing a dictator equates to peace!

Putin is not Hitler. And he knows that only so much will be tolerated before a world of shit would rain on his parade.

He's not a delusional idiot like Hitler.

Putin is using the same actions that Hitler used...When Hitler was gobbling up territory in Europe the United States and other European countries mostly stood by and let him do it, until war broke out. If the United States and it's European allies would have acted much sooner against Hitler we probably would have avoided WWII.

Putin is a thug and he knows the U.S. and the West are going to do very little to stop him. He'll take the Ukraine.

(April 14, 2014 at 8:22 pm)Moros Synackaon Wrote:

(April 14, 2014 at 6:31 pm)Chuck Wrote: I think Putin wants most of eastern Ukraine, not just crimea, and will get much of what he wants. Sooner or later, seditious acts by ethnic Russians and russian speakers will either wrestle de facto control of those regions from a weak and impotent Kiev and hand them to Moscow, or Kiev will be forced to crack down violently on the ethnic Russians and russians speakers, and Putin will have his excuse to invade and take these parts by force.

All Kiev and the West has to do is carefully tamp down those seditious acts.

The calmer they can do it, the more frustrated Putin will get.

The weaker he'll look too.

You can't tamp down seditious act if the acts are not all motivated by grievance you can address, and you can't establish credible threat of effective coercion.

Ukraine can do neither. Ukraine will lose very badly. The only question is will Ukraine lose fatally. Once it became clear the west, particularly the US, had its hands in the unrest Ukraine through NGOs, Putin will not, and indeed can not, back down.

The west, particularly the US, but not so much France and Germany, has been trying to strip Russia of her entire sphere of influence and make it untenable for Russia to pursue any sort of independent foreign policy. Mostly Russia has been losing, although putting up increasingly stiff struggle since 2003. I think the west is belatedly realized in Ukraine it has inadvertently maneuvered Putin into a situation which he can not afford to lose but which he can indeed win.

I don't like the way America sticks their nose into everything that happens around the world, as if their our saviour, unfortunately Australia where I live licks their ass, like many others do also.

(April 15, 2014 at 1:47 am)psychoslice Wrote: I don't like the way America sticks their nose into everything that happens around the world, as if their our saviour, unfortunately Australia where I live licks their ass, like many others do also.

If America remained isolationist throughout its history Australia would have been licking Japan's ass right now and Europe would have possibly been licking either the asses of a Nazi Empire, or a Soviet Communist Empire. Our involvement with material and manpower was one of the factors that helped win WWII. If Hitler would have been dealt with sooner rather than later before he became strong the world at the time could have avoided a lot of death and destruction. The same with Putin. He's getting stronger and bolder the more the West and America delays seriously dealing with him. The longer the West delays and appeases Putin he'll be too strong to deal with when they feel they've had enough of him.