FLEA

Thats fine but I quantified my argument as mainstream which is backed by evidence. Yeah there are protest in Moscow, that probably does not represent the majority though. Russia is known for having a very vocal minority that is usually stage lit by Western media. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2018/10/04/6-charts-on-how-russians-and-americans-see-each-other/

Also, what are you going to do when we oust Putin and Russia popularly votes for another Anti-American dictator? Because mainstream Russians don't really like the US or US foreign policy. Are you just going to keep warring with Russia until every single person in that country agrees to vote for someone who is pro-US?

There seems to be a split right now between WH Dems and Congressional Dems. I think negotiating a solution to override WH though will be hard though. Dems are facing a bit of a crises now for which values they are going to stand up for.

Back your claims, or get off the adult table. I'm done argueing. You have offered nothing to support your claims. I literally regurgitated the entire Soviet policy textbook answer on why they see the west as the aggressive one on here and all you offered was "your insane to believe that." But you have offered nothing otherwise. Back your claims, or go eat your chicken nuggets. If you don't want to be a big kid in these decisions, that's fine. But don't sit there and pout when people who spend a lot of time on this stuff and have arguments that actually have merit disagree with you. Go back to your flying planes and let people who are focused on avoiding nuclear miscalculation figure this out for you.

Hell, I even directed you to a DoD written course syllabus that you can take for free, but my guess is you won't do that because you're too busy watching Firefox and whatever else you get your policy from.

Nope. I've cited academic articles, policy, history and shit tons of evidence. You just said "Russia bad because I learned it in Top Gun 'Merica!". Either back your claims or get off the adult table and go eat your Mac and cheese with the kids.

For fuck sake we've already argued through all of this. Nothing you have said above holds water to anything. Either go with evidence for any of your claims or just admit they are your biased opinions you learned on your 18th rewatch of Red Dawn. I don't really care to debate people who deliberately remain uninformed about an issue.

Would you blame the French for that?

So call your senator or representative and tell them that. Tell them you stand for Ukraine independence before a nuclear free Iran. I'm merely pointing out this situation is way more complicated than people credit it for.

Because it wasn't a theoretical red line it was a very real red line that we knew about and we have recognized and talked about for decades. Noone on here is apologizing for Putin. We are accusing everyone of not taking him serious. You are all just falling into a trap of believing he is an irrational clown that just bungled himself into a disaster and I'm afraid that complacency widespread in US government is going to lead to the US getting out maneuvered by him. This dude knows what the fuck he is doing. He's been doing this for a long time.... And he's gotten really good at it. Even now the way the media covers his invasion they are making it seem like he is failing at every turn. However, we know Russia is actually probably meeting or exceeding their own measures of success. The stuff they are losing was expendable and was being used to set forward supply post, critical nodes, and infrastructure for their follow on forces. It's very possible the west is going to face a moment of shock in about a week when Kyiv is surrounded and we can no longer get aid in or out. I'm not an expert on Soviet combined arms doctrine but there are lots of people who are that are highlighting this and yet we still want to focus on the 18yo conscript who forgot to set the tanks parking break as representative of the whole Russian military backbone.

So the Ukraine can choose to align themselves with whoever they want but we can't? We are obligated to an accept an alliance with anyone that ask for it. Interesting take.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/iran-nuclear-deal-agreement-expected-european-diplomat Another tie-in to how a failure to attempt diplomacy complicates things. Did anyone stop to think for a second that we might need Russia's cooperation to secure other interests?

We didn't force Putin. Noone is saying that. Not a single person is saying the West is responsible for Putin invading the Ukraine. People are saying that diplomatic options to avoid the war though were bypassed because we dismissed Putin's concerns as non material and believed he wouldn't start a shooting war over those concerns. Then, he did start a shooting war over those concerns and we seem shocked.... Sounds more like we miscalculated more than Putin.... And we're going to continue to miscalculate as long as we continue to dismiss his motivations and what he is or isn't willing to do to secure them.

You are setting the conditions that make diplomatic or economic solutions impossible. You are basically saying "only war is a solution to this because the west should have the freedom to act with impunity and not care about what other country's concerns are." That's fine, but don't bitch and moan when those countries don't care about your concerns either. Every state has equal voice at the UN, that's a key tenant of sovereign principals. But you are consistently advocating that's not true that only the US voice matters. That's a problem.... We are a single country, we are not a conquerer or an empire.

Ahhhhh nothing like a good ol security crises to cement those approval ratings before going into an election your party is unpopular in.... https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/596890-bidens-approval-rating-jumps-to-47-percent-after-state-of-the-union-address

It's not that they are expendable. Everyone weeps for them right now. But we have limited resources, and those resources need to be spent prioritizing the liberty, freedom and safety of the American people before other countries. Accelerating standoff against Russia jeapordizes those interests. Diplomatic/Economic solutions are more effective in preserving them.

See the Presidential thread. Posted an article that pretty much said the Democrats have come full fucking circle and are going to make America great again, again. It's just absolutely tragic it had to take the suffering of Ukraine for them to come to that conclusion.

WW2 was won with US money, British Steel and Russian blood, or so they say. Its about more than budget and spending. That's our strategy it's not theirs. They conscript, and Russian doctrine literally just allows them to throw waves and waves of bodies. It's going to be bloody, for everyone, and there is going to be a lot of scorched earth over Europe when it happens. Forget helping the Ukranian people, there won't be a Ukranian people after this. The ones that make it out will have diaspora'd while the entire east European plane is turned into a no man's land.

It is an assumption, but so is presuming he won't use Nukes. Bashi and I are making a risk based analysis. The risk that he does outweighs the cost of letting him sit at the big kid table and talk to grownups, which is all he really wants. Putin has way more reasons to use nuclear weapons than to not use them. He's also been working diligently to modernize his arsenal where we have not been until very recently. That demonstrates he has considered future planning for what efforts he was going to make that might justify their use. Putin also has the advantage of a cemented leadership, his own. He knows US Presidents change every four years and he can always wait for a weak one (like our current) to start pressing the nuclear triggers.

Yes we all know you don't value the lives of American innocents just Ukranian innocents, you've already said as much. Or basically you said, "I'm willing to intervene militarily to protect Ukranian innocents even if that means subjecting US civilians to the massive casualty of nuclear war."

You made a bunch of claims with zero evidence so I'm just going to ignore them as your poorly informed opinions.

Look I know this is hard for you to fathom but at the end of the day, 1 pilot and 1 plane is not winning a war. A war is a statewide effort. That's what total war is, it's the whole country unifying as one apparatus to win. US industry and academia definitely won the war for us. There are not many serious thinkers who think otherwise. It was the first time in history we saw the advantage of literally just being able to throw money on a fire until the fire went out. It doesn't mean the people that actually fought aren't heroes or were valuable, but the strategy the US used to win WW2, and literally every conflict we've planned for after that, are heavily reliant on the capability to gen up industry to reconstitute losses. Why do you think we folded on the F-15EX? Did we really need it? Or did we recognize and industrial advantage to Boeing keeping additional fighter production lines open? Academia fell out in Vietnam but came back after GWOT. Prior to Vietnam you use to no kidding be able to major in Military Science and Strategy at most US universities. The war/defense department were largely staffed by civilians and policy makers would get degrees in it. The military would pull key academics from universities to solve hard problems and the imbed them with industry to drive technological solutions. This is the American way of war man. This is how we fight. Money and technology. I'm not sure how else I can explain it to you.

The battle of Britain, was a battle.... The war was literally won by the US capability to outproduce and replace British losses in a 3 year period faster than Germany could destroy them. to out it in perspective, US and UK commanders could afford to take risker actions because the loss of resources was a non issue to them.

Academics won WW2. Yes, Academics. Turing, Einstein, etc.... Academics and industry. Get something straight, US military never won a war. US industry backed by academia won every one from the 20th century on. Your interest isn't the lives of our citizens though. You have argued at every corner your interest is Ukranian freedom and you are willing to sacrifice our own country to a pyre to insure it. So for fuck yourself.