Trump’s position on Ukraine aid
A discussion of the topic in today’s open thread has convinced me to write a separate post about Trump’s position on aid to Ukraine.
Hungary’s Orban – Putin’s closest ally in Europe – has started a rumor that Trump won’t support Ukraine aid:
“[Trump] will not give a penny in the Ukraine-Russia war,” Orbán told Hungarian state media Sunday. “Therefore, the war will end, because it is obvious that Ukraine can not stand on its own feet.”
Orban may have chosen his words quite carefully, particularly this one: give. Trump is actually proposing a loan, threading the needle between the right’s substantial anti-aid-to-Ukraine and pro-aid-to-Ukraine wings. This is from four days ago:
How to resolve the impasse and help Ukraine? Of all people, former President Donald Trump has suggested a workaround — convert the cost of the weapons transfers into a loan. Trump even specified that the loan would bear no interest and would only be paid “if Ukraine ever strikes it rich.” …
This has a historical precedent. During a Caribbean cruise after his reelection in 1940, President Roosevelt conceived of a mechanism whereby the U.S. could lend or lease military equipment and ammunition to countries considered vital to the defense of the U.S. FDR likened Lend Lease to loaning a garden hose to a neighbor whose house was on fire. By not styling the assistance as a grant to the UK, FDR assuaged concerns about “foreign aid.”
Yeah, this may have been Orban’s way of helping Russia. I’ve seen Trump’s “lend or lease” plan mentioned before, so maybe you’re right on Orban starting a rumor…
Maybe Orban is able to toy w/ Trump – if so, why hasn’t Trump’s campaign cleared it up?
Trump tells you what he is for, rather clearly, if you want to pretend otherwise,
Certainly an interesting proposition. Then, maybe Ukraine could get the aid it needs.
Do the same for Israel?
Karmi:
You are clinging to this one idea, and have zero evidence for it except for Orban’s claim, which I have already pointed out uses the word give rather than loan.
I don’t think this is a new or novel idea– and it makes sense.
I remember Trump suggesting this several weeks ago. When did Orban raise the issue?
According to a recent story, Ukraine raised the issue, trying to circumvent the slow pace of US funding of the war– suggesting they thought they were already using lend-lease.
This is Europe’s war. The EU has a combined GDP similar or larger than the US and the richer countries in the EU have much lower debt ratios. They can afford it. The EU failed to deliver all the promised aid in 2023 and they’re $50 billion aid package they announced earlier in 2024 is reported to be spread over 4 years. If that is true– they’re only kicking in $12 a year.
And don’t forget only $15 billion of this $61 billion aid package will buy ammunitions and arms.
But the critical issue is Ukraine will never come close to its goal of “victory”– driving Russia back to the pre-2014 borders without the US or NATO becoming directly involved with more manpower than they’re currently providing.
That money would be better spent building a security system sufficient to the task.
miguel+cervantes:
Yeah, right…for example:
Trump flip flops on House TikTok ban, pulling rug from under Republican allies
I saw an interview of Trump by a network info hottie recently. She kept trying to get him to commit to helping Ukraine militarily. He steadfastly insisted “first the killing has to stop”. Sounds good to me.
Here’s the issue with lend-lease.
Biden instituted it in 2022 through 2024. Probably why they wanted that aid package passed in 2023.
The article doesn’t indicate the advantage of using this program– and it probably doesn’t affect the larger part of the aid to Ukraine– humanitarian and funding Ukraine’s pensions, etc.
I heard Trump mention a loan– which would be repaid based on Ukraine’s ability. I think the aid from the EU is in the form of a loan.
Biden Signs Lend-Lease Act to Supply More Security Assistance to Ukraine
https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3025302/biden-signs-lend-lease-act-to-supply-more-security-assistance-to-ukraine/
Poland’s new (but old) President has challenged the NATO Alliance to match her 3% of GDP defense spending. France’s Macron is chomping at the bit to get French troops into relief of Ukrainian soldiers, such as by doing mine clearing operations.
And finally, the Biden effort to close Russia’s $300 billion in sanctioned assets in the West to liquidate and send to Ukraine seems to be gathering momentum.
Thus, there are alternatives to the US underwriting ongoing corruption in Putin’s War,
“Of all people, former President Donald Trump has suggested a workaround”
It’s so amusing watching idiot reporters try to protect their preconceptions when encountering evidence that Trump isn’t the idiot they are so sure he is.
@Brian,
What kind of security system are you thinking of?
BJ, the Ukrainians have proved to be fairly good tacticians (though it’s hard to know how much of that is coming from US/NATO targeting/surveillance, but Poland would be the model I would use. They have a robust military with good stockpiles.
The war has to end before this could be implemented.
Meet Europe’s coming military superpower: Poland
https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-military-superpower-poland-army/
Brain E:
Any basis for your certainty?
What exactly is the US or NATO becoming directly involved with providing more manpower?
And of course you would have no objections to that? Or would you say,
Isolationism. Don’t hide.
Om, you branded me an Isolationist. I consider myself a realist. I’ve come to the conclusion that all-out war with the current available weapons is no longer viable. We have made weapons too lethal.
Why am I certain Ukraine can’t push Russia out of Crimea and Eastern Ukraine oblasts? They made no progress in the 2023 summer offensive. Russia has somewhere around a 3-1 manpower advantage. It takes more men to mount an offensive operation than defensive. Russia continues to make incremental gains.
I don’t know this for a fact, but there are indications that Ukraine is finding it harder to get replacements. For those reasons and other, it’s unlikely Ukraine can “win” the war, based on their objectives.
You have postulated that the use of long-range missiles could make Crimea untenable for Russia, also citing success with Ukrainian boat drone sinking/damaging Russian ships. There is no evidence it will make the outcome any different (though it might be a realistic bargaining chip in negotiations).
Completely taking out the Kerch bridge would be a blow. But consider this scenario. Why did the German military reveal the talks about using their missiles to take out the bridge, when one of the officers was in Singapore talking on an unsecure line? Did they mean for it to be leaked, which would effectively take that option off the table? They were talking 10-20 missiles on target to have an effect and the use of possibly 100 missiles (if I remember the conversation).
While this certainly signals to the Russians the potential threat the West could impose, and Macron saying France might provide troops if Russia attacked Odessa (which isn’t likely given the difficulty of mounting an attack toward there) these are really meant to create a few more bargaining chips in a negotiated settlement.
The German leak revealed there are NATO advisors in Ukraine. The US no doubt provides logistical support (satellites, etc) for targeting, and Daniel Davis has said the CIA has bases in Ukraine.
What I mean by directly involved would be use of the entire arsenal of the US Air Force to gain air dominance. We could overwhelm the Russian air defense system. I doubt NATO has that capability. But we or NATO aren’t going to do that, because there would be losses, possibly significant. That would also mean attacking Russian territory.
I, like others think NATO has outlived its usefulness, and unless European countries take responsibility and start providing for their own defense, yes I would dissolve NATO.
I’m not against the US aiding its allies. I’m not an isolationist, but a realist. What are the goals? What are the expectations of success? What exactly will success mean? We have squandered too much of our country’s wealth (trillions in debt).
By the way. When did Ukraine become an ally? Did they meddle in the 2016 election?
I’ll start to evaluate the reporting about Ukraine and its progress when I start to see reporters on the ground in Ukraine, doing the reporting. One of the signature features of this war has been the strong psy-ops aspect – the understanding that we should buy into long-distance pin-point analysis which always seems to be attached to demands for more money.
On-site reporting and diplomacy. That’s when we’ll know that the right kind of progress is being made, or at least attempted.
Brain E:
LOL. Too many targets. The realist part is especially rich, Ukraine’s 2024 offensive failed for various reasons, and now the isolationusts are doing all they can to choke off ordanance (155 rounds for example) while bitching that it is too expensive to resist aggressive totalitarians.
China won’t be cheap, and you won’t resist them either.
But the funny part is your concept of Ukraine attacking into the teeth of the Russians. You do realize that your realist Russians spent 2022/3 and most of 2023 attacking and finally taking Bakhmut and Avdivhka without capturing or encircling the Ukrainians and thus have lost 350,000 casualties? You do realize Realistsre wnsive tvhong that?
You do realize that the Crimea is one bridge away from untenable? You do realize that the Russian Black Sea fleet has fled?
Regarding NATO, for some insane readson Sweden and Finland now consider it a positive reality. Funny how being a neighbor of Russia defines a nation’s reality and best interests.
But you be you, isolated and protested by the vast oceans of the 19th century.
Realist. LOL
Be against aid to Ukraine if you want. And if this makes it palatable to support it , also fine. But Don’t pretend that what Trump’s offering is a loan. It will be aid to Ukraine. What collateral does Ukraine have? Do you really think they’ll pay it back? The lend lease in ww2 was mostly forgiven- except for the UK repayments and help.i don’t think Ukraine will be in any position to do that
om, you do know Biden has had the authority to send $4 billion in Defense Dept. stocks while all of this has been going on?
Europe failed to provide the ammunition they pledged.
Europe may buy ammunition on the open market because they don’t have any/can’t make it.
Russia’s decision to take ground (which always involves higher casualties) is a demonstration of what? Ukraine is losing ground because Russia is willing to suffer high casualties? I’m not sure what this has to do with whether or not Ukraine’s objectives can be met.
What kind of casualties will Ukraine be willing to make in their next offensive. My understanding the losses of men and material were quite high in this summer’s offensive.
And Ukraine sinking/damaging a small portion of the Black Sea fleet will likely have no bearing on the outcome of the war. This is a ground war.
The analysis I have read is Ukraine needs to dig in with defensive lines while the Gripens and F16’s come online with any potential of another offensive in 2025.
Sweden and Finland joining NATO may force the other European countries to actually pay their dues. Good for Sweden and Finland if they succeed.
Israel,
I’m not pretending anything. If this is all just a gift, why is Biden using the Lend-Lease program?
Don’t forget that only $15 billion of the proposed $61 billion package will go toward armament and ammunition. The rest will go to a variety of programs including government pensions and other operating expenses, humanitarian aid and quite a bit of programs that could be described as other.
One reason to structure this as a loan or lend-lease is that the country receiving the aid will more likely make the best use of the aid. Or at least that’s the thinking.
“Scholars have argued, at least since the early 1960s, that recipient countries view loans as different from grants because they carry the burden of future repayment. This induces policymakers to use funds wisely and to mobilize taxes or, at least, to maintain current levels of revenue collection. In contrast, grants are viewed as free resources…”
https://www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/fandd/2004/09/pdf/clements.pdf
Brian E:
Here are some clues. The Kerch Strait Bridge goes over a body of water called The Black Sea. Ships that float on the Black Sea are used to protect that bridge from other floaty things (marine drones and floaty things with bombs in them). They also provide floaty places from which to use radar systems to also protect the thing going over the water from flying things called missiles.
These concepts and clues may help you and the deep reality of the situation. But there is always a new reason for an isolationist not to resist tyrany.
350,000 Russian losses in men since 2022, most in 2023. Ponder that reality.
The realists in 1940 urged Great Britain to concede to that Austrian corporal’s demands.
This looks like a deep-state runaround to me. We’re going to “lend” money to Ukraine and then they can pay us back “if they can?” It’s aid. It will never be repaid. Calling it a “loan” is just a dishonest debating trick to avoid the real policy discussion.
Ukraine has been utterly destroyed by this war. Their population that hasn’t fled has been decimated. The likelihood of Ukraine having the financial means to pay back aid to the United States anytime soon is slim-to-none. Even if they have the means, the optics of a post-war Ukraine taking billions of dollars that could have been used rebuilding their own infrastructure and sending it to the United States would be horrific. It would never happen.
And then you have the small matter of winning the war. There is no way that Ukraine will be in a position to pay back anything unless it defeats Russia. As we sit now, we have Ukraine in a grinding war of attrition with a power having a much larger population and much greater industrial capacity. I have yet to see a reasonable plan for Ukraine to defeat Russia other than wishcasting about how they would have won already if only we were giving them one more weapons system.
And now Trump is some kind of genius because he suggests a loan – a loan that will almost certainly never be paid back, even in part? If this is what he is actually going to do, maybe he’s a genius propagandist, but this isn’t genius policy. It’s the same old policy cloaked with a new dishonest argument.
Frankly, my first reaction was to note that the major cheerleader for Trump’s lend/lease plan is Lindsey Graham. Is this actually Trump’s policy or did Graham and other Ukraine hawks seize on something that slipped out of Trump’s mouth during one of his BS sessions? Trump also did meet with Orban recently. My best guess is that both Orban and Graham are telling the truth. Trump told Orban what he wanted to hear, and then also told Graham what he wanted to hear. What would Trump actually do if he wins the election? Who knows? Probably whatever is suggested by the last person he talks to.
But back to the whole lend/lease thing being such a brilliant idea. Whatever the policy merits of the move (and I agree, there were many), what FDR actually did was a gross abuse of executive power. The law, passed by Congress, forbid the president from providing war materiel to the UK. FDR found a sham “workaround” that allowed him to de facto ignore the law. This was very much the predecessor of all of the “workarounds” that Biden, Obama their ilk have “found” in recent years. I can see celebrating the result of lend/lease. The law forbidding military aid to the UK was stupid and wrong, but it was the law. Holding up lend/lease as some sort of genius tactical move is contrary to much of what the right professes to believe about abuses of executive power.
CC™ joins the ranks of the isolationists because The Great Orange Whale is mentioned, priorities, and going back lets jump on FDR. The isolationists weren’t keen on resisting that tyrant totalarian either (not FDR, the other one). Note to the isolationists, the Navy and Coast Guard were involved in hostilities with German submarines before 12/7/1941. Shocked I’m sure you are.
Should the US Navy be in the Red Sea or the Med nowadays? That is a long way away across the wide, wide oceans.
om – I’m sorry. That’s just silly, and a stronger word may have been more apt. I’ve been consistently skeptical of our Ukraine policy here for years. Also, I’m actually closer to Trump’s thinking on Ukraine than I am to that of Haley or the so-called “GOPe.” So anti-Trump animus has supposedly driven me to now adopt Trump’s point of view on Ukraine? That’s just dumb.
And using the “isolationist” smear against anyone who is anything other than a 100% Ukraine hawk? Anyone who wants anything other than a blank check for Ukraine must also want us to pull our military back to our own borders? That’s stupidity on stilts. It also happens to be how we’ve ended up in any number of foreign war disasters over the past few decades.
Frankly, that sort of condescending nonsense is what empowers Donald Trump in the first place. I don’t like the man, not at all. But I understand why he has succeeded. I question whether you do.
“……By the way. When did Ukraine become an ally? Did they meddle in the 2016 election?………”
good question !
And in Sept. 1939, was Poland an ally of the USA?
The outcome in Ukraine will determine the actions of Russia after that conflict is settled.
Sweden, Finland and Poland (and even Germany ?) are not waiting around to see how that mess is resolved.
Obviously they think Russia is now a threat to them.
What do these nations know that we don’t?
Though I agree with Trump on many issues, I find it real hard to believe his statement that he will solve the Ukraine mess within a few days of becoming president.
I guess he could convince Ukraine to just give up the territory now under Russian control; that would do it.
But that certainly would embolden Russia to just wait four years – after Trump is no longer president – and then invade, say, the Baltics or Finland.
It’s possible to end the Ukraine mess, but I don’t see a way at all to end Putin’s desire to re-establish an Russian empire; in this regard, he is no different than Hitler’s quest for “lebensraum.”
CC™ forgets his comments that he was in agreement regarding Ukraine assistance, but his positions are flexible when The Great Orange Whale is involved, except that The Great Orange Whale must be fought. Others have questioned your truthiness in the past.
Isolationist is what they are, or ‘real isolationists’ as in keeping it “real.”
Stupid on stilts? How about 155 mm ammunition and ATACMS with sufficient range and warhead to remove a certain piece of enabling infrastructure built BTW after Vladdy seized Crimea.
From your strawman, you might think Ukraine needs tactical nukes.
But the the isolationists/realists have been whining that arms provided to Ukraine might be escalate the conflict; Ukraine attack Russian military targets on Russia. Not just attacking Russians in Ukraine. “That wouldn’t be prudent,” eh, CC™.
Bauxite,
Biden used the lend-lease program to send aid in 2022. I provided a link at 5:24pm
Nothing new or novel.
CNN-“Russia is producing about 250,000 artillery munitions per month, or about 3 million a year, according to NATO intelligence estimates of Russian defense production shared with CNN, as well as sources familiar with Western efforts to arm Ukraine. Collectively, the US and Europe have the capacity to generate only about 1.2 million munitions annually to send to Kyiv, a senior European intelligence official told CNN.
The US military set a goal to produce 100,000 rounds of artillery a month by the end of 2025 — less than half of the Russian monthly output”
Exclusive: Russia producing three times more artillery shells than US and Europe for Ukraine
https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/10/politics/russia-artillery-shell-production-us-europe-ukraine/index.html
Its a looting party and were not invited
From what Putin has said–pre “Special Military Operation–about issues like Greater Russia, former borders, potential enemies, and so forth, there is, as far as I can see, no reason to think his reasoning applies solely to Ukraine.
If he could bring the Russian people along with him, provide opportunities for the oligarchs, cover for western apologists, “Pol Pot is a peaceful agrarian reformer!” “It’s all Henry Kissinger’s fault!” “Never heard of him!”, there is no reason to absolutely rule out him applying the same thinking to other nations.
Perhaps the catastrophe in Ukraine might remove Vlad’s support for further adventures.
While it is a ground war, naval assets cost money and, if there’s a reason for one to be in a place, then sinking it means another must be found. Either built for some other purpose and sent to the newly open slot, or pull one from another likely important role. IOW, not chump change.
Brian+E – The subject of your link was an act of Congress. FDR used “lend/lease” to get around an act of Congress. If Congress authorized “lending” war materiel to Ukraine, that’s legally kosher, which FDR’s actions, largely, were not.
I still think that whole concept of lend/lease is misleading. The vast majority of the time it is indistinguishable from aid and calling it lend/lease is dishonest. Although the very fact that the, “Ukraine Democracy Defense Lend-Lease Act of 2022” was widely understood to be aid rather than a loan kind of mitigates the damage in my view. Politicians were lying, but at least we knew they were lying.
Building on your point, though, the framing of this defense of Trump is odd. Orban claimed that he was going to cut off aid. We’re now told that he’s not going to cut off aid, he’s just going to change it to lend/lease. Well, as you pointed out, aid to the Ukraine has already been called lend/lease. So what is the change? Trump is notoriously Ukraine-skeptical. Are we to believe that his only change to policy is to use a word game that makes no practical difference in the level of expenditures and, in fact, has already been used for previous Ukraine aid packages?
It looks to me as though somebody tried to bamboozle Trump. Or Trump is trying to bamboozle us.
Richard+Aubrey – Part of the reason for my skepticism on our Ukraine policy is that I think you can explain (not excuse) Putin by looking at a map. If Ukraine joins NATO, Russia’s only access to central Europe will be through a narrow corridor of Belarus and Poland. Save Belarus, Russia would be completely surrounded on the European side by NATO. Russia has been saying for 20 years that Ukraine joining the EU and NATO was a red line. We just didn’t care.
Putin has been brutal in former Soviet repulics, including Ukraine and Georgia. But what is the argument that he is going to invade other countries? The Baltics are NATO members now with Article 5 protection. I just don’t see Putin launching a frontal assault on NATO. He’s been bogged down for two years against Ukraine. Could he really think that he matches-up well against NATO?
Bauxite:
Why would you say that Trump is “bamboozling” anybody when he has described his proposal fairly clearly? You can find some of his statements here. I don’t think that Trump himself has claimed this is some sort of completely revolutionary idea.
The isolationists say nix to NATO and then CC™ while just earlier agreeing with the isolationists now cites Article V of the NATO charter as a deterrent to Vlad’s future adventures.
“Very interesting,” (Rowan and Martin’s Laugh In).
It’s almost a bamboozle.
Bauxite
Precisely
Putin’s thinking is shaped by the map. But. NATO including Ukraine or not, there are always borders with old enemies. If it weren’t Ukraine keeping him awake nights, might well be another
Here is an interview by a Ukrainian journalist with Rep. Jim Costa (D-CA21) about the funding bill.
While Congress approved the Lend-Lease program, apparently it was never implemented and has expired. Toward the end of the interview the issue is discussed.
Even Costa is recognizing some sort of negotiated settlement is necessary.
Some of the interview:
Interviewer: Yes, Russia should be out of Ukraine, out of Crimea and Donbas.
Costa: Well… I think that President Zelenskyy realizes that that is a long-term goal for Ukraine.
The reality of Putin agreeing to leave Crimea, while we try to bring the war and the hostilities to an end, would not probably happen initially.
Interviewer: President Zelenskyy says quite the opposite.
Costa: I understand that. But… Just as Putin has had some ideas about what he thinks are Russia’s terms for ending hostilities, certainly, President Zelenskyy and his government have their goals.
I don’t pretend to speak for the President of Ukraine or the parliament. This is something that has to be discussed internally.
But we in the West, supporting Ukraine, have to do everything we can, I believe, to put Ukraine in the strongest possible position to negotiate an end of hostilities and some agreement on how you go forward.
“Zelenskyy should realize Crimea is a long-term goal. First we must try to end the war.” An interview with Congressman Jim Costa
https://www.eurointegration.com.ua/eng/interview/2024/02/29/7180742/
neo – I think it’s pretty clear that the loan would never be repaid. A loan that will never be repaid is not a loan at all, it’s a gift or aid or whatever you like to call it.
Trump is promising that a loan to Ukraine is going to be better fiscal policy than an aid grant. In the real world, where the loan will never be repaid, there is no difference between the loan and an aid grant.
If Trump understands that the loans would never be repaid, then he is bamboozling his supporters to make them believe that he’s being more fiscally responsible. If Trump does not understand that the loans would never be repaid, he is being bamboozled by whoever pitched the idea to him or whoever has told him that it would work.
To me, this sounds a lot like Trump’s suggestions that we take Iraq’s oil to compenstate us for war expenses or that we somehow make Mexico pay for his wall. Like those proposal, this one does not appear to be reality-based.
Bauxite:
You are free to believe the loan will NEVER be repaid, and others are free to disagree. But Trump makes it very clear that the loan is highly unlikely to be repaid, but is still a loan that has at least SOME chance of being repaid under certain conditions, unlike a gift which has zero chance of being repaid.
The distinction is quite clear.
Rep. Jim Costa (D) says something and the Pope says surrender now.
Well isn’t that special.
What are Vlad and Medvedev saying? Do tell.
om, Costa is a supporter of Ukraine. I think his view is probably held by many in Congress and the EU.
When Costa said this: “But all I know is that we’ve got to provide Ukraine with all the support we possibly can, both the United States and Europe, so that we put President Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian government in the best possible position to negotiate some sort of an end to this war.
What the terms would be, I cannot tell you.”, is just a politician lying. He knows it won’t include Crimea.
The aid isn’t to win the war on Ukraine’s terms, but to help Ukraine in the negotiations.
—–
In an article published in September, 2014 entitled Ukraine: More Pro-Russian Separatism to Come?, the author investigated whether other regions of the Southeast could create a separatist movement, concluded it was unlikely, but finished with this:
“Only three regions gave more than 75% of the vote to Yanukovych in 2010. The same regions have the largest share of Russian-speaking population. The same regions had highest support for separatist ideas and for Putin’s foreign policy, according to the polls. Crimea and Donbas actually are different from the rest of Ukraine.“
——
In an article about the failed negotiations in 2022 here is a realist concept of the final outcome:
“Ukraine has fought for its independence and won, much as Finland did in 1939-40. Admittedly, Finland’s independence came at the price of some territory. If we could think of the current Ukrainian achievement as a successful war of independence, we would be much less fixated on defining Ukrainian victory in terms of the reconquest of every bit of the map called Ukraine in 2014.”
https://thewire.in/world/why-peace-negotiations-between-russia-and-ukraine-failed
yes history and demography what do they matter, but as with south east asia, or the middle east, and now the caucasus, knowledge of the area, isn’t necessary to be a policy maker or a pundit,
so what have we gotten for our 150 billion dollar contribution to the Ukrainian economy, certainly no material advantage, gratitude, hardly, an accounting of where our many has gone, its hard not to be cynical, specially when the likes of zampolit raskin tell us World War Trans is the objective, then he sells us on the unicorn jamboree, that he concocted, out of January 6th, a facsimile of the Latvian Guard rising, that snared many social revolutionaries,
Citing 2014 again, sigh.
The realists didn’t think Finland could survive The Winter War against Vlad’s favorite, Stalin, and then there was The Continuation War. Stalin eventually prevailed and the term “Finlandization” resulted. Not gobbled up by the USSR but very careful and non-aligned. The Baltics weren’t so fortunate. But unforeseen by the realists, the USSR fell apart and those that were gobbled up or stiffelled or subjugated by the Russian empire (and the USSR) for some unreal reason want no part of the Russian Mir no matter what the realists think is good for them.
Finland and Sweden in NATO, how unreal. Ukraine in NATO, absolutely unreal, like the collapse of the USSR. Because the Russian Empire endures forever, really.
I didn’t include this previously, so here is the link to article on whether or not Russian separatism could ignite in other oblasts following the 2014 Maidan “Revolution of Dignity.”
He concludes no, that the Donbas and Crimea are unique in Ukraine.
https://fruitpol.wordpress.com/2014/09/25/ukraine-more-pro-russian-separatism-to-come/
Still stuck on 2014? Some significant events have happened since then.
And now that Sweden is in NATO and giving Gripens to Ukraine
Gripen in NATO: Sweden’s Anti-Russia Fighter – Military History Visualized
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_X5HXus33rA
I used to visit this site quit regularly before the 2022 ruSSian invasion of Ukraine, an invasion with as justification nothing but lies (*). Except occasional I no longer do because it has become to painful.
I never dreamt that it would be republicans, though no doubt a minority if one doesn’t count the fellow-travellers, who would support Putin actively or passively.
As far as I’m concerned according to their likes and the likes of the Brian’s the only crime the nazis ever committed was loosing the war. Otherwise all their arguments for Putin are arguments for Nazi-Germany (and the USSR of course as illustrated by Yalta and Potsdam).
(*) to cite one, ruSSia had to invade to prevent ‘genocide’. About that;
“In the year before Russia’s full-scale invasion, 25 civilians were killed, over half of them from mines and unexploded ordnance.” (wiki)
Ps. Since I saw this one;
“He concludes no, that the Donbas and Crimea are unique in Ukraine.”
Pretending it is about “Donbas and Crimea” is something ruSSian trolls love to do. Except, Zaporizhia and Kherson aren’t Donbas and they got annexed as well just like any other oblast would have been if ruSSia had managed to take it or retain it. According to the 2001 census every Ukrainian oblast except Crimea had a majority of Ukrainians, including Donetsk & Luhansk. So as for those ‘ruSSian’ majorities it seems genocide (soft/hard: Streiff of RedState has a link to a video in one of his articles where the ruSSian Zaporizhia gauleiter fully admits that he is expulsing Ukrainians who can’t accept the annexation, and does so for their ‘own good’) pays as long as one has the right kind of perpetrator (like a fuhrer Putin who thinks that by calling his victims ‘nazis’ he has the right to act like one) and the right kind of victims.
Census 2001:
– Donetsk Oblast – 4,825.6 (100%): Ukrainians – 2,744.1 (56.9%) / Russians – 1,844.4 (38.2%)
– Luhansk Oblast – 2,540.2 (100%): Ukrainians – 1,472.4 (58.0%) / Russians – 991.8 (39.0%)
– Kherson Oblast – 1,172.7 (100%): Ukrainians – 961.6 (82.0%) / Russians – 165.2 (14.1%)
– Zaporizhzhia Oblast – 1,926.8 (100%): Ukrainians – 1,364.1 (70.8%) / Russians – 476.8 (24.7%)
neo – Even if, and especially if, Trump himself is talking about how it is unlikely that the loans will be repaid, it is not honest for him to tout the plan as fiscally responsible. How much of a difference is there between “never” and “unlikely” really? This is well within the Overton window of politician’s lies, but it is dishonest nonetheless.