RE: The US should not intervene in Ukraine!
April 11, 2014 at 4:37 pm
(This post was last modified: April 11, 2014 at 4:44 pm by Anomalocaris.)
I think he is pretty rational in exploiting the various latent idosyncracies of Russian society, including homophobia, to create the impression that he stands with the more conservative of them, so as to mobilize them to support his own agenda.
We may think it is unscrupulous, but that is different from irrational.
BTW, even if he violently invades and occupies all of Ukraine, I am confident NATO won't intervene. Russia's 8000 nuclear warheads still counts for something. Right now nuclear nonproliforation has just taken as big a dent as it has ever suffered. No regime that has voluntarily given up its nuclear program in return for international promise of security has fail to come to grief. Meanwhile any regime that has clung to its nuclear program have thus far survived with territorial integrity intact. I don't think we will ever again see any deminution of effort on the part of non-nuclear states to acquire nuclear weapons from now on.
What is more, Putin seem to have weighed the value of money to the west much more finely than any government in the west, and knows much more precisely how much he could push before the west really can't stand it any more. And I think he judged correctly that he could push a lot more and the west really will still stand it, even if the west right now imagine in our indignation that we won't stand for it.
We imagine we are passable poker players trying to play chess. Putin is a real chess player.
We may think it is unscrupulous, but that is different from irrational.
BTW, even if he violently invades and occupies all of Ukraine, I am confident NATO won't intervene. Russia's 8000 nuclear warheads still counts for something. Right now nuclear nonproliforation has just taken as big a dent as it has ever suffered. No regime that has voluntarily given up its nuclear program in return for international promise of security has fail to come to grief. Meanwhile any regime that has clung to its nuclear program have thus far survived with territorial integrity intact. I don't think we will ever again see any deminution of effort on the part of non-nuclear states to acquire nuclear weapons from now on.
(April 11, 2014 at 3:36 pm)Minimalist Wrote:Quote:The first time Russia cuts off the gas supply, that will change.
Money talks - bullshit walks. Even Putin understands that.
What is more, Putin seem to have weighed the value of money to the west much more finely than any government in the west, and knows much more precisely how much he could push before the west really can't stand it any more. And I think he judged correctly that he could push a lot more and the west really will still stand it, even if the west right now imagine in our indignation that we won't stand for it.
We imagine we are passable poker players trying to play chess. Putin is a real chess player.
