Quote from: Branko on April 03, 2025, 06:57:51 AM

Quote from: paxmao on April 02, 2025, 11:51:01 PM

Again, let's pretend you know anything about me and play ball...

Xenophobia you mean... like if you call Rooniek to Brits? It is so funny that you speak of Xenophia, with your track record of hate. All nations have fought and done things that are morally wrong. Even right now there are very clear examples of it.

No no... on the contrary, I think that Ruzzians who want to live according to what Putin thinks Ruzzians should live have a perfect opportunity to do so.

Meanwhile you are complaining about other people who Ruzzian or not, would rather live somehow else. I do not know, maybe all of them are gay, or want to live in a developed country...

Don't play stupid, unlike, for example, Serbs against Croats at breakup of Yugoslavia, Russia was pretty benevolent
and let USSR dismantle peacefully, with simple condition to former republics...military neutrality. While Ukraine
played following that simple rule, did Russia attack them? Or anyone else? What about NATO, were they benevolent,
or instigate "color revolutions" in basically all former USSR republics?
Its pretty clear who's bad actor here

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZUbBU0OqCgE

Well, basically that means that the Former USSR Republics can be independent unless they decide to be really independent and make their own decissions on alignment or international relations.

I think there is a philosophical problem here. You see Ruzia as an imperial power that has a sphere of influence and dictates terms to the countries or nations around. What I see is a country with a GDP smaller than France, Germany, UK ... even than Italy depending on the year.

Basically, for me Ruzzia is a lightweight and due to the Ukrainian war has become even more of a lightweight by self-destroying more than 50% their army and likely around a million people for a relatively valueless chunck of agricultural land and perhaps a "landbridge" to Sebastopol and a good sea city - please, do not speak of "minerals", that is silly.

Such a country, in my book, is not an empire. It is just another mid-sized player that should not ever try to antagonise Europe.

Now, stating the obvious, the number of nuclear warheads does make a difference. It would be stupid to invade Ruzzia (significantly) or threaten the Ruzzian state to the point they are forced to use it. But at the same time, allowing Ruzzia to invade another country under the nuclear threat cannot be admitted as it would have no end.

Summing up, I think that Ruzzia is simply having trouble accepting that they are no longer the empire they think they are. In the old times we would be speaking of the Huns sacking Rome, in modern times, we are talking about a Ruzzia that will simply have to accept its new role.

How long it takes to accept that is how many people will die for it.