Nicker on 5/1/2025 at 15:18
If Putin's real motive was to inspire the devotion of the Russian people and to make Russia a great nation, he could have accomplished that in spades if he had devoted the resources and people power into positive improvements within Russia. Build and repair infrastructure, promote education, legal reforms to enable small business start-ups, improve health care...
He could have created a lasting legacy. Instead he has gutted a generation of young people, squandered international good will, destroyed the economy, lit political fires which will burn for decades and doomed Russia to generations of catch up. And that is even if he wins against Ukraine.
But we love our strong-man psychopaths.
lowenz on 5/1/2025 at 18:31
Quote Posted by Nicker
If Putin's real motive was to inspire the devotion of the Russian people and to make Russia a great nation, he could have accomplished that in spades if he had devoted the resources and people power into positive improvements within Russia. Build and repair infrastructure, promote education, legal reforms to enable small business start-ups, improve health care...
He could have created a lasting legacy. Instead he has gutted a generation of young people, squandered international good will, destroyed the economy, lit political fires which will burn for decades and doomed Russia to generations of catch up. And that is even if he wins against Ukraine.
But we love our strong-man psychopaths.
People love psychopaths because "
POWAHHHHH, me I can't but he can!!!1111"
And you can't make to the history books without a bloody war (literally).
Psychopaths know really well the fascination they can create around themself just behaving like the "strong man" with "respect to traditions" (of course culture is NOT "traditions" but for nationalists traditions and
devotion to traditions are the only things that matter when they can't have wellness and happiness - like in Russia - so the mass killing is not a problem.....this must be clear: for the "people" a mass killing of "others" is NEVER a problem and so a "leader" can always play that card, he just needs a good excuse like "traditions protection" to sacrifice "heroes" to ).
It's really power politics by the book.
lowenz on 5/1/2025 at 21:29
About Putin personality: personally I don't think he's psychopath, I think he's a schizoid with a very strong psychopatic deformation toward the use of power to "protect something" (from non-existent dangers, not because "western decadence contamination" doesn't exit but because a russian "cultural pureness" to preserve from "western decadence contamination" doesn't exist.....it's just how his mind processed the antimaterialistic "rebirth" of post-communism ideology, creating a foul "love" to the "motherland" - he's really like Mussolini with his "roman" idea of Italy against the wicked Albion, that's why he's natural in fascism organicism and mafia-like mentality)
Starker on 14/2/2025 at 09:20
Lord Dampnut has secured peace for our time:
[video=youtube;oqdtHl9koIQ]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqdtHl9koIQ[/video]
demagogue on 14/2/2025 at 13:17
Just in time for the Munich Conference too. :p
Or I should call it Munich Conference 2.
Starker on 17/2/2025 at 12:09
Russia attacked the Chernobyl power plant and punched a hole in its sarcophagus a couple of days ago as part of its wider efforts of nuclear sabre-rattling which has turned out to be super effective on the US so far: (
https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-war-chernobyl-zelenskyy-71d781dbd66754d0a548edd388f3447a)
Looks like, with NATO falling apart, having nuclear weapons is going to be the only way forward for the bigger countries that face a threat from Russia and China -- not just Ukraine, but I think Germany is now seriously contemplating them, not to mention Taiwan and South Korea that have so far suspended their nuclear development programs but also retain a relatively high degree of nuclear latency: (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_latency)
Starker on 18/2/2025 at 06:17
Lord Dampnut's Versailles treaty for Ukraine got leaked:
Quote:
(
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2025/02/17/revealed-trump-confidential-plan-ukraine-stranglehold/)
Donald Trump's demand for a $500bn (£400bn) “payback” from Ukraine goes far beyond US control over the country's critical minerals. It covers everything from ports and infrastructure to oil and gas, and the larger resource base of the country.
The terms of the contract that landed at Volodymyr Zelensky's office a week ago amount to the US economic colonisation of Ukraine, in legal perpetuity. It implies a burden of reparations that cannot possibly be achieved. The document has caused consternation and panic in Kyiv.
[...]
President Zelensky himself proposed the idea of giving the US a direct stake in Ukraine's rare earth elements and critical minerals on a visit to Trump Tower in September, hoping to smooth the way for continued arms deliveries.
[....]
He probably did not expect to be confronted with terms normally imposed on aggressor states defeated in war. They are worse than the financial penalties imposed on Germany and Japan after their defeat in 1945. Both countries were ultimately net recipients of funds from the victorious allies.
If this draft were accepted, Trump's demands would amount to a higher share of Ukrainian GDP than reparations imposed on Germany at the Versailles Treaty, later whittled down at the London Conference in 1921, and by the Dawes Plan in 1924. At the same time, he seems willing to let Russia off the hook entirely.
Donald Trump told Fox News that Ukraine had “essentially agreed” to hand over $500bn. “They have tremendously valuable land in terms of rare earths, in terms of oil and gas, in terms of other things,” he said.
He warned that Ukraine would be handed to Putin on a plate if it rejected the terms. “They may make a deal. They may not make a deal. They may be Russian someday, or they may not be Russian someday. But I want this money back,” he said.
Trump said the US had spent $300bn on the war so far, adding that it would be “stupid” to hand over any more. In fact the five packages agreed by Congress total $175bn, of which $70bn was spent in the US on weapons production. Some of it is in the form of humanitarian grants, but much of it is lend-lease money that must be repaid.
[...]
So, according to Lord Dampnut's plan, Russia, the aggressor who started the war, would get vast amounts of territory and resources, would have its sanctions lifted, would get invited back to G8, and would not have to answer for any the war crimes it has committed.
Ukraine would get -- blocked from NATO, not receive any other security guarantees, and would have to pay heavy reparations the likes of which were not even demanded from Nazi Germany.
Well, I kind of expected this was the "peace plan" all along... to hand Ukraine over to Russia on a plate by trying to make Ukraine surrender.
demagogue on 18/2/2025 at 07:19
He blames Ukraine for not rigging a sham investigation against Hunter Biden to help his second election, which led to his first attempt to illegally cut off US aid to them that got him his first impeachment. Not to mention he's been a Russian asset suckling from the honeypots they've been gifting him since the 1980s.
I was reading that Starmer was mentioning a willingness to send UK troops to Ukraine as part of the deal... which made me wonder about the chances other countries could still get dragged into the war if the peace breaks down after all.
But I can't see Ukraine accepting any deal like this that Trump makes over their head.
It's hard to see how Zelensky gets to the table from Trump's perspective, since he's delusional.
But then again he's so delusional it's actually not that hard for him to give up the farm when someone can twist it the right way.
(Trump was just spouting off last week that Hamas has to release all of the hostages in 3 days or the ceasefire is over and all hell will break lose, backing even Netanyahu into a corner, then Hamas releases 3 more hostages 3 days later, and Trump is like that's acceptable, this is a win for us all... (9_9)
So I wouldn't actually make a hard prediction that Zelensky will be kept out forever.
But I don't know. I can't predict this one well.
Maybe it'll be like Afghanistan or Iraq with guerilla war just going on for decades now.
Starker on 18/2/2025 at 10:34
From the way I see it, asymmetrical warfare is the only way forward now, unless Ukraine wants to surrender now and face a stronger Russia in the future. Unfortunately, Europe still doesn't have the manufacturing capabilities necessary to sufficiently support Ukraine (especially since it has to compete with the cheap slave labour from North Korea) and Western European countries still don't seem to be in any particular hurry to stand up to Russian aggression in a more substantial way.
Starker on 18/2/2025 at 15:00
So, of course Russia is not satisfied with what Lord Dampnut has already given up. They additionally demand:
* complete replacement of Ukraine's leadership (presumably with one that they approve of)
* full control of the territories that Russia has not managed to conquer or had to retreat from
* demilitarisation of Ukraine
* Europe and the UK to be completely excluded from all negotiations
I guess the "negotiations" are going well as far as Russians are concerned.
