Russia and its “Special Operation” in Ukraine

[KentVillan]

9 minutes ago, avfc1982am said:

Greed is behind every war and as much as we like to think it isn't, we just kid ourselves. 

Same shit different day with the poor manipulated into doing the bidding of the rich for some ridiculous reason, that more often than not has been manufactured to fit some moral standard.  

 

Greed usually a big factor, but also status, fear, wounded pride, revenge, ethnicity, religion, ideology, etc.

Realistically East Ukraine is not a big enough prize economically to justify a war on this scale.

[avfc1982am]

21 minutes ago, bickster said:

This is an interesting read. The return of Putin shill Medvedchuck to the public arena.

Carnegie Endowment for Global Peace.

Putin is just going to use him as a propaganda mouthpiece for Russian TV. He's going to spout about how he speaks for the majority of Ukrainians who really want to be Russian but are too scared to oppose the Rainbow Nazi regime controlling Kyiv. You just know how it will play out the Russians are so predictable. If he ends up back in Ukraine something tells me it will be a matter of time before he's assassinated. A very short time.  

 

[avfc1982am]

8 minutes ago, KentVillan said:

Greed usually a big factor, but also status, fear, wounded pride, revenge, ethnicity, religion, ideology, etc.

Realistically East Ukraine is not a big enough prize economically to justify a war on this scale.

I agree, but disagree... Someone always gets robbed regardless of the apparent reasoning behind any mass conflict. It's the numero uno gift of conflict and every aggressor knows it. I want, I want, I want. Taking what you want is another thing altogether.

Whether it be life, Religion, Cullture, Wealth, Knowledge.... everything stems from greed. Everything that is a reaction whether pride, fear, or even revenge stems from initial greed, even in retaliation.  

 

[blandy]

Given all the mutterings and criticism of Germany, this might surprise a few

https://twitter.com/JamWaterhouse/status/1617543035860008962?s=20&t=yi-frgmsXOWHseXiZLJ2FAhttps://twitter.com/JamWaterhouse/status/1617543035860008962?s=20&t=yi-frgmsXOWHseXiZLJ2FA

[Chindie]

11 minutes ago, blandy said:

Given all the mutterings and criticism of Germany, this might surprise a few

https://twitter.com/JamWaterhouse/status/1617543035860008962?s=20&t=yi-frgmsXOWHseXiZLJ2FAhttps://twitter.com/JamWaterhouse/status/1617543035860008962?s=20&t=yi-frgmsXOWHseXiZLJ2FA

Get that going round some simpering Tory MPs and we'll be pulling support ASAP.

[avfc1982am]

3 minutes ago, blandy said:

Given all the mutterings and criticism of Germany, this might surprise a few

https://twitter.com/JamWaterhouse/status/1617543035860008962?s=20&t=yi-frgmsXOWHseXiZLJ2FAhttps://twitter.com/JamWaterhouse/status/1617543035860008962?s=20&t=yi-frgmsXOWHseXiZLJ2FA

I don't think people are questioning Germany over what they've done,  but more what they could do by greenlighting Countries to export their product to Ukraine. 

 

[bickster]

11 minutes ago, blandy said:

Given all the mutterings and criticism of Germany, this might surprise a few

 

Those are the not adjusted for GDP figures iirc

Also this table shows the split of types of aid and includes a %GDP figure

Canda has provided more weapons and financial aid that Germany and contributed a much higher % of its GDP

Germany is at about half the level of other countries, apart from France

And that chart doesn't show the Baltic states which are all at about 1% of GDP

[blandy]

14 minutes ago, bickster said:

Those are the not adjusted for GDP figures iirc

Also this table shows the split of types of aid and includes a %GDP figure

Canda has provided more weapons and financial aid that Germany and contributed a much higher % of its GDP

Germany is at about half the level of other countries, apart from France

And that chart doesn't show the Baltic states which are all at about 1% of GDP

Sure. I agree. It's the same source data. I just thought it interesting, as it surprised me a little that Germany has provided more Arms than France, for example.

[magnkarl]

47 minutes ago, blandy said:

Sure. I agree. It's the same source data. I just thought it interesting, as it surprised me a little that Germany has provided more Arms than France, for example.

France just likes to say they will give things, and then it doesn’t arrive. Germany isn’t as shady about it and outright admits they’re not giving tanks.

Poland, the Baltics, Scandinavia and Holland are miles ahead of France and Germany, if you look at GDP. In fact I’d wager that they’ve given more of their GDP to business with Russia in the same period.

[avfc1982am]

 

 

[Mandy Lifeboats]

Ti's but a scratch. 

 

 

 

[chrisp65]

Those figures on contributions have Germany 4th. But probably worth noting that the EU is second, and Germany is by some distance the biggest contributor in to the EU.

[KentVillan]

17 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

Those figures on contributions have Germany 4th. But probably worth noting that the EU is second, and Germany is by some distance the biggest contributor in to the EU.

Without per capita or % of GDP adjustment it’s pretty meaningless though? Naturally the biggest country in the EU is the biggest contributor to the EU, but if we think in terms of what each country is capable of doing, Germany has been weak.

Plus there is justifiable anger at them demanding Greece and co suck up severe austerity to protect the Eurozone, then when Germany stupidly decommissions its nuclear power stations and runs into a massive energy crisis, it wants to avoid the consequences of its own bad decisions (which lots of people said were bad at the time).

[bickster]

There's also the idea that Germany was more responsible than most for creating the Russian monster in the first place. Before the war Germany imported almost half of its natural gas from Russia and was always the country cosying up to Putin as a result of that relationship

[KentVillan]

16 minutes ago, bickster said:

There's also the idea that Germany was more responsible than most for creating the Russian monster in the first place. Before the war Germany imported almost half of its natural gas from Russia and was always the country cosying up to Putin as a result of that relationship

Which was partly a consequence of Merkel's disastrous policy post-Fukushima:

Look at the nuclear (red) vs natural gas (purple) splits pre-2011 (Fukushima) vs 2020.

[LondonLax]

Things are not going great for Sweden’s chances of joining NATO after a Swedish Kurdish group hung an effigy of Erdogan last week, then a Danish / Swedish politician burned a copy of the Koran outside the Turkish embassy on the weekend  

Suffice to say, Erdogan is not super keen to ratify Swedish membership after these stunts.

[chrisp65]

Getting rid of nuclear power is the only sane decision. Not the best idea to replace it with something that ends up making you beholden to Russia.

But yeah, ditching nuclear was a sound idea.

[LondonLax]

3 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

Getting rid of nuclear power is the only sane decision. Not the best idea to replace it with something that ends up making you beholden to Russia.

But yeah, ditching nuclear was a sound idea.

While you have nuclear plants operating and need a clean base load power it makes sense to keep running them for their practical life span while you transition.
Germany has actively shut them, then panicked and tried to restart some of them, then literally had to pull down wind turbines to make way for expanding coal mines in order to replace the power that has been lost.

[chrisp65]

3 minutes ago, LondonLax said:

While you have nuclear plants operating and need a clean base load power it makes sense to keep running them for their practical life span while you transition.
Germany has actively shut them, then panicked and tried to restart some of them, then literally had to pull down wind turbines to make way for expanding coal mines in order to replace the power that has been lost.

I’m not defending their methodology. I’m saying it isn’t stupid to ditch nuclear.

[magnkarl]

13 minutes ago, chrisp65 said:

Getting rid of nuclear power is the only sane decision. Not the best idea to replace it with something that ends up making you beholden to Russia.

But yeah, ditching nuclear was a sound idea.

I don’t agree. When a nuclear plant is up and running there’s very little reason to shut it down unless there’s a security risk. Pound for pound only water energy is close to the same carbon footprint. 

Shutting down nuclear to start with coal plants again is like cutting off your nose to spite your face.

We’re just lucky in the UK that we have a NATO country to supply our energy or else we’d never dream of shutting down anything, and we’d probably still be burning as much coal as Poland.

Judging by what I hear from Norway the cables going to Germany and UK are likely to get heavily regulated by Norway soon anyway. All they’re doing is importing ridiculous German/UK market prices to the coldest place in Europe.

Edited January 23, 2023 by magnkarl