This is what I am thinking. It’s like they took all the vehicles staged outside of Ukraine and parked them inside Ukraine. So, it’s bad I guess, but no more bad than it was before, just the parking lot is closer. Which is, I guess, also bad.
Thrag
4679
If you want to point at where NATO fucked up, it wasn’t expansion, it was Libya.
CraigM
4680
Because small countries wish to avoid future bloody conflicts with larger powers and so align themselves for mutual security.
Its not like Estonia would have the resources to fight a war against Russia, so their best option is chose to align with Russia or with NATO. Or they risk conquest from Russia.
It’s kinda like the old story of the nerds grouping together to take on the bully, except in this case several of those nerds are actually jacked and ready to fuckin’ go.
My guess is the length of the baggage train is an indication that Russia is seriously trying to improve their logistical backups by giving better equipment staging areas and a closer backlog of equipment. This means they are building up to be better prepared for an attack on Kyiv, as they can last longer before the need for long range resupply.
I don’t know, it doesn’t exist. We’ve been through this before in this thread, I understand the legitimate security threat Russia felt/feels from NATO moving ever closer. However, I simply don’t see how anyone can draw a direct line to NATO in the conflict between Russia and Ukraine considering NATO membership wasn’t imminent and barely even on the table.
I also thought it was telling that in the lead up to this all the suggestions from the Russians for diplomatic assurances on Ukraine never joining NATO was directed at NATO countries and never involved diplomacy with Ukraine. Every time I watched various Russian representatives discuss this it was as if Ukraine was not a sovereign nation with its own agency. I’m not sure how they would be more likely to respect that sovereignty without NATO existing.
I don’t think so. He said at some point something along the lines that who doesn’t regret the collapse of the USSR has no heart, but who wants to create it again, has no brain. His beef is more with Lenin including Donbass into the Soviet Ukraine when it was formed. I didn’t read the primary sources, so I don’t know how accurate the claim is, but I did see it a few times in a bunch of secondary sources.
Don’t forget, it wasn’t just that piece. It was several of Putin’s speeches in the lead up to the attack, and the essay he published and other public statements made last year. It seems clear to me that he’s been telling us about his real motivations. Ukraine isn’t a “real” state, Ukrainian isn’t a valid identity outside the “Russian world”, any Ukrainian desire for independence is the result of outside manipulation by hostile powers, Ukrainians aren’t entitled to choose their own government.
Interestingly, if you had told me back in my military intel analysis days that we were looking at a Soviet Army convoy of X kilometers long on an asphalt road originating from Y region of the USSR, I could actually have given you a pretty good guess at the makeup of that convoy and which unit(s) it was from.
Now though? No idea. Especially when it seems discipline and unit formations seem so lacking.
I’m too ignorant to be that up on it, TBH. I’m coming from a world (in my head) where Europe was pretty much stable as a table, and that world has been completely upended. That there could be a European war of aggression and expansion has utterly shocked me.
Catching up, I now see that Russia, or at least Putin, has been living in a much more primitive headspace than I knew.
Thrag
4688
It’s (mostly*) easy to read primary sources and I encourage everyone to do it.
Don’t get me wrong, Putin mentions NATO expansion every chance he gets. He also mentioned his historical grievances about the break up over and over and over again over the years. He clearly views himself as the great man to right this historical wrong and reunite the Russian empire.
(It’s really annoying that some news articles still do not link to the thing they are reporting on, but the googles usually easily find videos or transcripts).
Here’s Putin’s latest. An english translation by Bloomberg. I’m sure a Russian one can be found just as easily. If one wasn’t a human living on this planet but someone reading a novel of it this would be some highly entertaining shit.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-24/full-transcript-vladimir-putin-s-televised-address-to-russia-on-ukraine-feb-24
I should also note this speech can’t be viewed in isolation of so many of his prior comments.
ShivaX
4689
Russia wanted to join NATO, Putin just didn’t want to go through the process.
The Washington Post quoted Maxar as blaming “cloud cover” for having to revise their estimates. I am not even making this up.
-Tom
I think this is a valid point. I can’t prove that no NATO expansion would mean no Russian invasions. I base my argument on the goodwill towards the US that existed in Russia in the 199x. The public opinion became much more hostile once NATO started to bomb Yugoslavia. And started to expand eastward. Putin wasn’t in power yet.
Great question! Starting a discussion of providing Ukraine security guarantees while keeping its status neutral.
No, not until Russia has nuclear weapons that would make the attack a suicide. But once this will become not a factor, Colin Powell will show a vial with the poison that was used against Navalny and Putin will become a second Saddam Hussein and Russia - a second Iraq. I saw an article in the Western media (sorry, I don’t remember where exactly) that discussed that the first strike from the US has a decent chance of disarming Russia, and I think it did wonders to Russian military’s morale.
First, it’s not (only) up to the small countries, NATO has to allow to a new member to join the alliance. And seriously, who did Montenegro needed the protection against?
My sincere apologies. The invasion has triggered my anxiety and I didn’t read the thread before jumping into it with both feet.
Thrag
4693
Let me make an addendum to my post encouraging primary sources. I watched almost every Trump press conference while he was president. So it can be taken a little to far. I still can’t be sure if I passed all the sanity checks.
It’s a little late to wait until they do attack, isn’t it? Russia/USSR has well deserved reputation for seeking to control neighboring countries, ask every Eastern European country that joined NATO just because of the Russian threat.
You are confusing things here. NATO doesn’t expand by conquest, it expands when a nation desires to to become a member. It’s voluntary. No one is forced into NATO (unlike the Warsaw Pact, which almost every member ran from as soon as they were out from under the Russian/USSR fist).
It’s defensive alliance. NATO hasn’t conquered anyone, though I will admit they screwed up Libya badly, though they were trying to do the right thing. Before the Ukraine invasion, their military forces, are actually pretty low compared to NATO GDP. Sure NATO is the greatest power in the world, but how do they use that power? What wars of conquest have they launched? Who was brought into NATO by force?
Not really, Be a democracy, get rid of corruption, agree to military standards and don’t be involved in an ongoing territorial dispute that could lead to war. I’m pretty sure that NATO would love to have a democratic Russia as a member. It would virtually eliminate the fear of a European war.
Thrag
4695
Now this is totally valid. And as I mentioned while not so much a big changer of public perception than ruling regime perception, clearly the NATO action in Libya somewhat rightly freaked other nations out since it was projecting power outside the alliance and even worse, outside Europe.
Still, while the idea that Russia, the leadership and/or the populace, might have felt some apprehension about NATO expansion is completely sane, the notion that NATO was moving into Ukraine make some sort of first strike against Russia is ridiculous barely above the level of the US biolabs in Ukraine conspiracy theory. NATO literally borders Russia already. We’ve had ICBMs and cruise missiles that don’t need even to be near the border to work for ages.
I mean, if you have anything new to add to it go ahead, wasn’t meant as a criticism so much as me noting to myself that it felt like I had typed a lot of this before. Honestly, if there really is a better argument for how there is a direct line from NATO expansion that didn’t involve Ukraine leading to Putin invading Ukraine I’d actually like to understand it. To me it just reads as
- Russia feels threatened by what seems to be aggressive NATO expansion to their borders starting 20+ years ago, but never including Ukraine.
- ???
- Russia forced to invade Ukraine
Banzai
4697
I though ukraine got security guarantees when they gave up their nukes in 1994?
