JohnInCarolina said:

Not Ukraine related, but this is a disturbing story on several levels:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/us-man-impersonated-agent-claimed-ties-to-pakistani-intel/2022/04/07/6f49f666-b6a9-11ec-8358-20aa16355fb4_story.html

good thing the USPS was on the ball..........

Good thing the USPS was not cancelled 

http://twitter.com/NatashaBertrand/status/1512566289461563392?s=20&t=lkSPxavCYqmhu78udMYukQ

JohnInCarolina said:

http://twitter.com/johnson/status/1512043471753949185?s=20&t=75piPQ6r3aVpppUK6ph9UA

I can't say that I like it but I do hope that it gets forwarded all over the US and Europe. I listened to a German bureaucrat making all sorts of mealy mouthed excuses on ewe tube this morning. I also recall that a certain previous president warned Angela Merkel directly and in public about the consequences of being dependent on Russian energy.

JohnInCarolina said:

http://twitter.com/johnson/status/1512043471753949185?s=20&t=75piPQ6r3aVpppUK6ph9UA

Damn. 

Gulfcoastguy said:

JohnInCarolina said:

Gulfcoastguy said:

JohnInCarolina said:

http://twitter.com/johnson/status/1512043471753949185?s=20&t=75piPQ6r3aVpppUK6ph9UA

I can't say that I like it but I do hope that it gets forwarded all over the US and Europe. I listened to a German bureaucrat making all sorts of mealy mouthed excuses on ewe tube this morning. I also recall that a certain previous president warned Angela Merkel directly and in public about the consequences of being dependent on Russian energy.

What I recall is Trump mostly complaining about Germany not paying its fair share into NATO while simultaneously signing a gas deal with Russia.

I don’t think Trump saw Russia as any kind of real threat at the time.  On the contrary, as has been widely reported, he wanted to get rid of NATO altogether.

Or threatened to do that if they didn’t pay 2% of their gdp for defense as required in the NATO treaty. The gas deal financed Russia’s arms build up and at the same time left Germany’s economy hostage to Russian gas. In fact Trump handed Merkle a white flag to use when the inevitable happened. 🤔 and what happened?

I am really not sure what point you’re trying to make with this.  

JohnInCarolina said:

Gulfcoastguy said:

JohnInCarolina said:

Gulfcoastguy said:

JohnInCarolina said:

http://twitter.com/johnson/status/1512043471753949185?s=20&t=75piPQ6r3aVpppUK6ph9UA

I can't say that I like it but I do hope that it gets forwarded all over the US and Europe. I listened to a German bureaucrat making all sorts of mealy mouthed excuses on ewe tube this morning. I also recall that a certain previous president warned Angela Merkel directly and in public about the consequences of being dependent on Russian energy.

What I recall is Trump mostly complaining about Germany not paying its fair share into NATO while simultaneously signing a gas deal with Russia.

I don’t think Trump saw Russia as any kind of real threat at the time.  On the contrary, as has been widely reported, he wanted to get rid of NATO altogether.

Or threatened to do that if they didn’t pay 2% of their gdp for defense as required in the NATO treaty. The gas deal financed Russia’s arms build up and at the same time left Germany’s economy hostage to Russian gas. In fact Trump handed Merkle a white flag to use when the inevitable happened. 🤔 and what happened?

I am really not sure what point you’re trying to make with this.  

Kayak said:

JohnInCarolina said:

Kayak said:

Ozzie_Isaac said:

I was explaining to my son today that this is how WWII started.  The world waited to stop Germany then too.  The world promised never again.  And yet, here we are.

Seems a bit over the top, don't you think? The rest of the world isn't in danger of Russia invading them; they can't seem to get past Ukraine. Do you ever point out all the other invasions and wars around the world, and terrify your child with them? No one is 'appeasing' Putin, but if you'd like a war between two nuclear superpowers, your son won't need to worry about much afterwards. You should be glad you live in a country that can invade and attack anyone they want and no one will say boo to us.

This seems like a fairly bad-faith reading of what Ozzie posted, but he can obviously speak for himself.

Do post further then on his intentions. "this is how WWII started.  The world waited to stop Germany then too.  The world promised never again." Did we promise to stop all dictators early, save the Jews in time next time, or just stop all wars in Europe? Which "again" are we again-ing?

Wow, pretty upset by discussions with my 17 year old son.  We talk about current events all the time, and we have since he was young.

We regularly discuss politics (I take counter example a lot to make him think).  In our house, if you cannot even hear a counter example then your beliefs are not very strong.  If you cannot argue for the other side, then you do not understand their position enough to disagree.

He was talking to me about Putin and the civilian deaths.  The news was showing the bodies, and talking about the Ukrainian citizens kidnapped and taken to Russia.  They were also talking about indiscriminate bombing and torture.

During this discussion we talked about WWII and the parallels.

Yes we have discussed Iraq and Afghanistan.  We also talked about various other conflicts including Korea and Vietnam.

HeavyG said:

Ozzie_Isaac said:

Kayak said:

JohnInCarolina said:

Kayak said:

Ozzie_Isaac said:

I was explaining to my son today that this is how WWII started.  The world waited to stop Germany then too.  The world promised never again.  And yet, here we are.

Seems a bit over the top, don't you think? The rest of the world isn't in danger of Russia invading them; they can't seem to get past Ukraine. Do you ever point out all the other invasions and wars around the world, and terrify your child with them? No one is 'appeasing' Putin, but if you'd like a war between two nuclear superpowers, your son won't need to worry about much afterwards. You should be glad you live in a country that can invade and attack anyone they want and no one will say boo to us.

This seems like a fairly bad-faith reading of what Ozzie posted, but he can obviously speak for himself.

Do post further then on his intentions. "this is how WWII started.  The world waited to stop Germany then too.  The world promised never again." Did we promise to stop all dictators early, save the Jews in time next time, or just stop all wars in Europe? Which "again" are we again-ing?

Wow, pretty upset by discussions with my 17 year old son.  We talk about current events all the time, and we have since he was young.

We regularly discuss politics (I take counter example a lot to make him think).  In our house, if you cannot even hear a counter example then your beliefs are not very strong.  If you cannot argue for the other side, then you do not understand their position enough to disagree.

He was talking to me about Putin and the civilian deaths.  The news was showing the bodies, and talking about the Ukrainian citizens kidnapped and taken to Russia.  They were also talking about indiscriminate bombing and torture.

During this discussion we talked about WWII and the parallels.

Yes we have discussed Iraq and Afghanistan.  We also talked about various other conflicts including Korea and Vietnam.

And then do you both decide to play a nice game of chess?

It is funny you say that. During the height of the pandemic, we played 1 game of chess a day.  Oddly enough, we stopped around the time he started beating me.  I enjoy chess, my son was humouring me.

Kayak said:

Sorry, I imagine you as having very young children. I guess we’ll just have to stick to the politics, then. Why do you see Russia as another Nazi Germany?

My intent was not to say Putin is Hitler and Russia is Germany.  There are similarities in action if not ideology.  (Although bombing Jewish memorials and civilian centers while proclaiming you are de-Nazifying said country does tend to bring up the discussion)

My view is more nuanced than that simple sound bite.

Putin is attempting to invade and capture Ukraine through the use of mechanized troops.  Clearly his troops have dehumanized the Ukraine populace, otherwise the rape, torture, and wholesale slaughter of civilians would not be possible.  This is widely understood to be the first step in his goal of reclaiming what he sees as the historical Soviet Empire.

Putin is not Hitler, but his methodologies on empire building are similar.  This is a very bad situation since we all have nuclear weapons this time around.  Luckily, Ukraine is holding their own and the Soviet ground forces are not the incredibly strong and disciplined military we were lead to believe.

Kayak said:

I'm not trying to defend Russia when I say this; as far as we know they are guilty of what you're saying. What I would say is that every army does what Putin's army is doing. Ours included. This is what armies do, it's what war is all about. There seems to be an innocent belief that we can have a 'clean' war where just the combatants get killed. This is a dangerous fantasy. There never has been and probably never will be. That would be a world where no one would mind a little war now and then, and war crimes would be an academic study at the military academies. You might know that it's estimated we've killed almost 400k civilians since 9/11, and done some torturing too. How would you describe that behavior?

By whom?  Nobody here, not that I can see.

This is what one calls a straw-man argument.

JohnInCarolina said:

Kayak said:

I'm not trying to defend Russia when I say this; as far as we know they are guilty of what you're saying. What I would say is that every army does what Putin's army is doing. Ours included. This is what armies do, it's what war is all about. There seems to be an innocent belief that we can have a 'clean' war where just the combatants get killed. This is a dangerous fantasy. There never has been and probably never will be. That would be a world where no one would mind a little war now and then, and war crimes would be an academic study at the military academies. You might know that it's estimated we've killed almost 400k civilians since 9/11, and done some torturing too. How would you describe that behavior?

By whom?  Nobody here, not that I can see.

This is what one calls a straw-man argument.

That's a bit of a stretch don't you think? I didn't say "You (Ozzie) believe this". Every day the news is full of stories about the latest atrocities, how could they have done them, why are they hurting civilians, etc. Apparently the Russians are unable to win because they seem to not be shooting anyone in uniform. Ozzie also made the comment about dehumanizing enemies as only a Hitlerish game plan. I am saying that that is everyone's game plan in war. That's the only way you get troops to do what you want, and the reality is that they always get out of hand. The Colonists did it in 1777, the Union in 1863, and the Greatest Generation in WWII. Kind of why the worst war crime of all is starting an aggressive war.