The Ukraine War

[Highgate]

When Ukraine agreed to give up it's nuclear weapons in 1994, the US, the UK, and Russia all agreed “to respect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine”. That was the so called Budapest memorandum.  It guess it doesn't count for much anymore.

When Gorbachev gave the reunification of Germany his blessing in 1990 (it was partitioned partly to prevent it from ever being capable of invading Russia again), he did so with an agreement that NATO would not expand eastwards towards the Russian border.  That agreement was forgotten after a few years by President Clinton. It seems completely understandable to me that Russians are anxious about the expansion of NATO (an organization that is obviously hostile to Russia) to it's borders...and in doing so NATO has been partly to blame for creating a pretext which the deplorable Putin was only too willing to use to further his own personal objectives.

A calculating ruthless operator, Putin seems only too eager to return us all to the bad old days of the former Soviet Union and the West battling for supremacy.  The only beacon of hope for the future is that his popularity with younger Russian has plummeted in recent years.

I guess his plan is to replace Zelensky with a puppet government, more amenable to Moscow's wishes.  Whatever is this war does...it certainly will expose Putin (who for some reason had always enjoyed some support on the far left.....as well as the far right) for the ruthless dictator that he always was.

[Gritstone Ram]

30 minutes ago, Highgate said:

When Ukraine agreed to give up it's nuclear weapons in 1994, the US, the UK, and Russia all agreed “to respect the independence and sovereignty and the existing borders of Ukraine”. That was the so called Budapest memorandum.  It guess it doesn't count for much anymore.

When Gorbachev gave the reunification of Germany his blessing in 1990 (it was partitioned partly to prevent it from ever being capable of invading Russia again), he did so with an agreement that NATO would not expand eastwards towards the Russian border.  That agreement was forgotten after a few years by President Clinton. It seems completely understandable to me that Russians are anxious about the expansion of NATO (an organization that is obviously hostile to Russia) to it's borders...and in doing so NATO has been partly to blame for creating a pretext which the deplorable Putin was only too willing to use to further his own personal objectives.

A calculating ruthless operator, Putin seems only too eager to return us all to the bad old days of the former Soviet Union and the West battling for supremacy.  The only beacon of hope for the future is that his popularity with younger Russian has plummeted in recent years.

I guess his plan is to replace Zelensky with a puppet government, more amenable to Moscow's wishes.  Whatever is this war does...it certainly will expose Putin (who for some reason had always enjoyed some support on the far left.....as well as the far right) for the ruthless dictator that he always was.

You are right. A lot of agreements seem to have been forgotten or ignored over the years.

[Comrade 86]

 

 

[1of4]

1 hour ago, Highgate said:

 

I guess his plan is to replace Zelensky with a puppet government, more amenable to Moscow's wishes.  Whatever is this war does...it certainly will expose Putin (who for some reason had always enjoyed some support on the far left.....as well as the far right) for the ruthless dictator that he always was.

 Why did he need to invade Ukraine to achieve this? Surely he could have done the same has he did in London and paid a couple of million to take control of the government.

Edited February 25, 2022 by 1of4

[Bris Vegas]

I think it will end with Russia annexing eastern Ukraine while holding major river cities such as Kiev and Dnipro. From a geographical point of view it looks like that could be the ultimate compromise.

 

[uttoxram75]

As individuals we cant do much but perhaps not calling in to your local BP for petrol might help....

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-60526891

Oil giant BP is under pressure from the UK government to offload its 20% stake in the Russian state-owned oil firm Rosneft, the BBC has been told.

 

[Cisse]

3 hours ago, GenBr said:

What can NATO do? They can't send troops or aircraft without starting World War 3, which they are not going to do. Perhaps they could send more weapons, but thats about the limit of any intervention capability that they have. Personally I think the Russians are going to find Ukraine is a lot more difficult to crack than they think and even if they do overwhelm the regular forces I'd expect they'd be facing a huge insurgency if they try to occupy the country.

What do you and the other Finns think about joining NATO now? I thought Finland had a gentlemans agreement with Russia not to join various western institutions such as NATO and in exchange they'd stay out of each others affairs, but it doesnt seem to have helped Ukraine very much! I know support for Nato membership was rising in Sweden, but it still seemed fairly low in Finland last time I saw a survey on the matter.

We have had that agreement but the thing is you can never trust Russians. Putin are not even the worst or most dangerous they have to offer. The older people are afraid that Russia will attack us if we join to Nato. And they probably will. However they will do that at some point anyway.

Russia wants all the areas and countries back that they have ruled at some point. They won't stop to Ukraine. They will go after Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Georgia and so on one by one. With or without Putin. They will also come after us at some point.

The corruption in Russia goes so deep that taking Putin out won't change anything. Their view of things haven't change in last 80 years.

[Gritstone Ram]

28 minutes ago, 1of4 said:

 Why did he need to invade Ukraine to achieve this? Surely he could have done the same has he did in London and paid a couple of million to take control of the government.

Lol that’s why this will get shut down. 

[Highgate]

25 minutes ago, 1of4 said:

 Why did he need to invade Ukraine to achieve this? Surely he could have done the same has he did in London and paid a couple of million to take control of the government.

Perhaps Zelensky is not corruptable?  I don't mean that regime change is his only objective.  I assume he also wants to Donetsk, Luhansk and other Ukrainian regions to be annexed outright.

[Leeds Ram]

2 hours ago, Carl Sagan said:

A very complex situation. And everyone should realize the first casualty of war is the truth. I didn't expect Putin to properly invade (expected much more of a boiling frog setup) but, now he has, what are his strategic aims? Probably to split Ukraine in half up to the river. 

It's a perfect storm. Biden is weak and oversaw a catastrophic retreat out of Afghanistan. Putin has been in power so long he's becoming unhinged and unchallengeable internally. Merkel has gone, leaving a newbie German regime plus her legacy of abandoning German nuclear power stations in exchange for mining lots of coal and buying lots of Russian gas, so putting the Russian economy into credit. NATO looked in disarray, with Turkey openly courting Moscow. NATO had previously committed to not expanding to the Russian border, but how can you deny the sovereignty of the Ukrainian people? 

My feeling is it should have stopped with Russia annexing Crimea which should have been accepted. In the  UK we're used to unchanging borders, but not on the Continent. Crimea was in Russia until 1954 when Khrushchev (from Kursk) thought it would be neat to give it to his "favourite republic". But the population there remains majority ethnically Russian and it houses the Russian Black Sea Fleet and in the 2014 referendum it seemed reasonably clearcut the Crimeans wanted to return to being part of Russia. Yes there were caveats, but Western polling also shows it's what the people want.

We have the Cuban Missile Crisis analogy in more ways than one. America didn't want nukes on its borders, but shouldn't that have been up to the Cubans? In the same way Russia doesn't want them on its borders pointing at Moscow and St Petersburg, but isn't that up to the Ukrainians? It's difficult but I just wish people hadn't been in such a hurry to shift from East to West, but that's easy for me to say in the West. The other link to the analogy is that if anyone missteps, there's the terrifying prospect of escalation. It's weird to see so many MPs calling for a no fly zone over Ukraine when this would mean NATO and Russian fighters in direct conflict. And the sad truth is also that our media doesn't half love a good war. "What a story!" is always  their attitude regardless of the eventual consequences. Just look at the ratings.

First impressions are it's not gone how Putin would have hoped/expected. His troops are facing fierce resistance and they haven't established aerial superiority. And NATO has come together unexpectedly even if the EU is blocking the removal Russia from the SWIFT banking system, and that's despite Ukraine's direct request. The sporting sanctions (and Eurovision) probably came as a surprise as these things are normally so apolitical. In my last job (only just left) I was due to go to St Petersburg in July for a maths conference and even that may now be cancelled, plus there's divisive talk between normally cooperative space agencies. The UK government has done pretty much as well as it could have (doubtless welcoming the distraction). Including being among the first to supply a lot of weaponry to Ukraine in the run-up, despite the Germans blocking this as much as they could. 

All we can probably do is containment and wait for it to play out. Is their a neutral broker (Switzerland?) that could instigate serious talks? But if so to what end? If Putin gets nothing it could be catastrophic for all of us in terms of creating a desperate situation in Russia and the possible collapse of his regime, where he might not care if the world burns with him. But obviously he shouldn't be rewarded for his aggression. I think the most practical solution would be for the Russian forces to retreat to their borders, but end up keeping Crimea to save face, with an agreement that Ukraine doesn't join NATO until 2035 or some such.

Sorry for the long post - thinking aloud.

The cuban missile crisis analogy doesn't hold much water. For a start, there was an agreement to remove nuclear weapons from said space. Second, NATO is a purely defensive arrangement in Eastern Europe, the missile crisis occurred at a period of strategic offensive relations i.e., the missiles could have been a gun pointed at the US's head, Ukraine joining NATO is trying to stop a gun being pointed to their head. Third, this manoeuvre is occurring as a part of a strategically expansionist Russian president. 

A no fly position is not a bad one. I'm not sure why everyone is saying because two powers have nuclear weapons that means no conflict at all can occur, that's not the doctrine of MAD or realist politics that position it. A no fly would begin an escalation yes but escalation is by definition necessary to stop further incursions. Russia cannot be allowed to dictate terms of other sovereign nations or carve up bits of other countries, that has already been attempted in Georgia and it's a policy that failed wholesale. At this point NATO and other organisations need to put a high enough price on this to make sure Russia doesn't do this again. 

I'd also add Merkel being gone doesn't matter one bit, she and her various coalitions indulged this nonsense from day 1 in the name of 'peace'. 

[Gritstone Ram]

7 minutes ago, uttoxram75 said:

As individuals we cant do much but perhaps not calling in to your local BP for petrol might help....

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-60526891

Oil giant BP is under pressure from the UK government to offload its 20% stake in the Russian state-owned oil firm Rosneft, the BBC has been told.

 

As a shareholder in BP Rosneft are good dividend payers. The high gas price is bringing in some good profits £1b per month I doubt a few tanks of petrol will make much difference. BP also have interests all over the world including USA. I think you need to look at NATO expansion and then think if this was hostile around the UK how would you feel? I’m no fan of Putin but I do see his point.

[EtoileSportiveDeDerby]

The West got a BIG problem with countries like China or Russia, they can do what they want to do and they know that the west will need gas and oil and cheap imports as well as selling to middle class Chinese. You just need to go to places like French Alps, Chelsea , Kensington,  French riveria, Turkey and the Russians really behave like they own the place. Not exactly appreciated as tourists but they got $$$

[uttoxram75]

9 minutes ago, Gritstone Ram said:

Lol that’s why this will get shut down. 

I don't see why. 

It'll only get shut down if someone posts personal abuse at the poster.

 

 

[Gritstone Ram]

4 minutes ago, uttoxram75 said:

I don't see why. 

It'll only get shut down if someone posts personal abuse at the poster.

 

 

It’s borderline political and assuming the current government were bought for £1m surely it would have been in Russias interest to put the only person more useless than BJ in power which they had the opportunity to do if 1 in 4 conspiracy is correct.

[1of4]

Not heard much from the UN security council. But with Russia being one of it's permanent members, I expect there won't be a lot of action from the UN.

[Eddie]

5 minutes ago, 1of4 said:

Not heard much from the UN security council. But with Russia being one of it's permanent members, I expect there won't be a lot of action from the UN.

You can bet your life they are penning a strongly-worded letter at the moment.

[1of4]

20 minutes ago, Gritstone Ram said:

It’s borderline political and assuming the current government were bought for £1m surely it would have been in Russias interest to put the only person more useless than BJ in power which they had the opportunity to do if 1 in 4 conspiracy is correct.

Whats conspiratorial about it? The tories have admitted that they have accepted money from  former ministers of Putin's regime.

[cstand]

19 minutes ago, Gritstone Ram said:

It’s borderline political and assuming the current government were bought for £1m surely it would have been in Russias interest to put the only person more useless than BJ in power which they had the opportunity to do if 1 in 4 conspiracy is correct.

Why would anyone would bring up current domestic politics into this debate its irrelevant and a distraction. Let’s hope it’s the last.

[Highgate]

42 minutes ago, Leeds Ram said:

The cuban missile crisis analogy doesn't hold much water. For a start, there was an agreement to remove nuclear weapons from said space. Second, NATO is a purely defensive arrangement in Eastern Europe, the missile crisis occurred at a period of strategic offensive relations i.e., the missiles could have been a gun pointed at the US's head, Ukraine joining NATO is trying to stop a gun being pointed to their head. Third, this manoeuvre is occurring as a part of a strategically expansionist Russian president. 
 

I think that is looking at the situation from one perspective only.  From an Eastern European viewpoint NATO would certainly be looked on a defensive arrangement.  But from the Russian point of view, and I mean even your average Russian civilian, NATO expanding to being right on Russia's border will undoubtedly be seen as a real threat and an offensive move by the West.

As for the Cuban missile crisis, it was never really just the Cuban missile crisis...it was also the Turkish missile crisis.  It was the American deployment of Jupiter ballistic missiles in Turkey, well in range of Moscow, that precipitated the Soviet response of positioning missiles that could strike the US in Cuba.  The crisis wasn't resolved until both the Cuban and the Turkish missiles were removed from their threatening locations. 

[cstand]

5 minutes ago, 1of4 said:

Whats conspiratorial about it? The tories have admitted that they have accepted money from  former ministers of Putin's regime.

Are you deliberately trying to get the thread shut down?