Five Russian jets have been blown up by Ukraine in the past three days, as Britain said drone attacks on targets within Russia were being launched from inside its own territory.
You need to understand some history, and the bigger picture.
Ukraine isn’t Putin’s endgame. He wants to rebuild the USSR, which means after taking Ukraine he’s coming for the Baltics and parts of Poland and Romania, and we now know his playbook: cause political instability in the area, replace the locals with Russians, then claim they need to be “liberated” from “Western Nazis”; that’s what he’s already done several times, and is also why Moldova need to be seriously concerned about Transnistria (I’m sure they already are).
The history you need to understand is that of appeasement. It was tried with Hitler. But it didn’t stop his lust for more and more, and the millions of deaths from WWI and WWII were the results. Giving Ukraine to Russia increases the chance of nuclear war; it doesn’t decrease it.
So Putin must be stopped in Ukraine. And he must be pushed completely out of Ukraine including Crimea because otherwise he’ll just regroup and try again later. Which he might still do anyway, but he’ll have had to deal with the fallout of the huge cost of the Ukraine invasion for zero benefit and the Russian reputation and economy in tatters. But appeasement doesn’t work and doesn’t stop wars.
We don’t need to completely defeat Russia. We just need to push them out of Ukraine and hold them back. What Russians do in their own country is their business. And when they’re ready to rejoin the civilised world we should be equally ready to welcome them back. We also need to strengthen our entire eastern flank: not aggressively sabre-rattling, just enough to make Putin think twice about launching an invasion or starting any funny business there.
There’s a similar problem on the horizon with China, and Taiwan isn’t Xi’s endgame.
Main sources: Vlad Vexler, Peter Zeihan, China Uncensored.
Not disagreeing with the general point but please note that China Uncensored is Falun Gong-affiliated and should really not trusted in anything they say about China. (I say this as someone who is very critical of China)
And Peter Zeihan… I don’t know that guy just rubs me the wrong way. Also lots of right wing associations afaik.
You need to understand some history, and the bigger picture.
Ukraine isn’t Putin’s endgame. He wants to rebuild the USSR, which means after taking Ukraine he’s coming for the Baltics and parts of Poland and Romania, and we now know his playbook: cause political instability in the area, replace the locals with Russians, then claim they need to be “liberated” from “Western Nazis”; that’s what he’s already done several times, and is also why Moldova need to be seriously concerned about Transnistria (I’m sure they already are).
The history you need to understand is that of appeasement. It was tried with Hitler. But it didn’t stop his lust for more and more, and the millions of deaths from WWI and WWII were the results. Giving Ukraine to Russia increases the chance of nuclear war; it doesn’t decrease it.
So Putin must be stopped in Ukraine. And he must be pushed completely out of Ukraine including Crimea because otherwise he’ll just regroup and try again later. Which he might still do anyway, but he’ll have had to deal with the fallout of the huge cost of the Ukraine invasion for zero benefit and the Russian reputation and economy in tatters. But appeasement doesn’t work and doesn’t stop wars.
We don’t need to completely defeat Russia. We just need to push them out of Ukraine and hold them back. What Russians do in their own country is their business. And when they’re ready to rejoin the civilised world we should be equally ready to welcome them back. We also need to strengthen our entire eastern flank: not aggressively sabre-rattling, just enough to make Putin think twice about launching an invasion or starting any funny business there.
There’s a similar problem on the horizon with China, and Taiwan isn’t Xi’s endgame.
Main sources: Vlad Vexler, Peter Zeihan, China Uncensored.
Not disagreeing with the general point but please note that China Uncensored is Falun Gong-affiliated and should really not trusted in anything they say about China. (I say this as someone who is very critical of China)
And Peter Zeihan… I don’t know that guy just rubs me the wrong way. Also lots of right wing associations afaik.
Vlad Vexler is cool tho.