Arguing with Idiots: Russia-Ukraine Edition

Timothy Birdnow

On Facebook I'm arguing with a rather angry dope who believes nothing but what the media tells him about the Russia/Ukraine conflict.

Jeff Charles says:

People fighting for freedom from a tyrannical psychopath creates the only chance for happiness later. This shows just how much putin sucks. The US Russia and Britain are legally obligated ti defend ukraine. They should have kept their 1900 nukes

I disagree: They should have. But you do realize the CIA overthrew the elected government of Ukraine and installed a puppet regime. This is not a war of liberation or self-defense but a proxy war by the U.S. against Russia. Putin is a bad guy, but the Russians had a lot of legitimate complaints. NATO expansion. Biological weapons labs in Kiev. Ukraine daming the Dneiper to cut off water to Crimea. Incessant shelling of Russians. The suppression of Russian language among native Russian speakers (Crimea was Russian until Stalin gave it to the Ukrainian Soviet Republic.) Threats by Ukraine to cut Russian oil and gas pipelines to Europe, etc.

Jeff Charles shows what a genius he really is:

Asinine. The cia did not overthrow the govt that Russia literally invaded and installed. Russia sure as hell was not greeted as liberators. Many Russian speakers in Ukraine are so disgusted by Putin they’re learning Ukrainian.

Tim retorts:

Jeff Charles Sorry but you do not know what you are talking about - and I would be careful bandying words like assinine about with so weak an argument. The CIA most definitely did foster the Orange Revolution. The Ukrainians elected a pro-Russian President named Yanukavitch and the CIA came in and fomented the Orange Revolution to kick him out. That was well before the invasion of Crimea by Russia, which was done because the Russian-speakin

Jeff Charles snorts:

Pukin blew the Russian areas up he was supposedly trying to "save.” Stores - malls - apartments - hospitals - factories leveled. Not his business how Ukrainians vote or for who. He thinks he’s Peter the Great reincarnated grabbing land for Russia. Not complicated..” I don’t think he’s even pretending to save anyone anymore

Tim replies:

Oh, and Jeff you put great faith in the accuracy of media reporting, which I would recommend you take with a huge grain of salt. I rather suspect most of what we are hearing is hogwash. Your black-and-white mainsteam media view may give you comfort as it absolves you from any critical thiniking but in the end it makes you a puppet of those who want this war - and who seek the Great Reset and other things. I remember a time when the anti-war people were out and about and they used to chant "no blood for oil" and yet here we are fomenting bleeding for oil and gas and they remain silent because Russia is an official boogieman and must be defeated at all cost - even at the risk of thermonuclear war. Anyone with half a brain should know that Russia possesses the largest, most modern nuclear arsenal in the world and Putin IS a bad guy and will use them if he is cornered. But by all means let us ramp this up and push for "regime change".


Oh, and Jeff you put great faith in the accuracy of media reporting, which I would recommend you take with a huge grain of salt. I rather suspect most of what we are hearing is hogwash. Your black-and-white mainsteam media view may give you comfort as it absolves you from any critical thiniking but in the end it makes you a puppet of those who want this war - and who seek the Great Reset and other things. I remember a time when the anti-war people were out and about and they used to chant "no blood for oil" and yet here we are fomenting bleeding for oil and gas and they remain silent because Russia is an official boogieman and must be defeated at all cost - even at the risk of thermonuclear war. Anyone with half a brain should know that Russia possesses the largest, most modern nuclear arsenal in the world and Putin IS a bad guy and will use them if he is cornered. But by all means let us ramp this up and push for "regime change".

Jeff Charles retorts:

You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to see the war started when Russia invaded Ukraine and will end the minute they leave. You also don’t have to be genius level to see pukins army was not greeted as liberators and still are not. And finally pukin completely leveled the area he originally claimed to be saving.

Tim adds:

Jeff Charles So? You seem to think the war started when soldiers invaded, but in fact Ukraine had been shelling Crimea and the Russians for years prior. I guess that doesn't matter? As for the rest of that, so what? What exactly do you think any of this proves? That Putin is a bad guy? I have already conceded that.

But if you think it will be over when Russia leaves you are profoundly wrong. If it should happen - and it won't because it would mean the end of Putin and by end I mean literally and he knows it - the anger and resentment will fester for a generation or more. You need to learn the lesson of WWI and the Treaty of Versailles; had the Allies not rubbed Germany's nose in defeat (something the West did to Russia, I might add, after the fall of the U.S.S.R.) there would never have been a Hitler and the horrors of WWII.

If we insist on humiliating Russia the younger generation will seek vengeance. And no doubt will get it at some point.

This war could have been avoided through diplomacy and by keeping Russia's funding down via low energy prices. Biden insisted on jacking up the price of oil to force the West into his little electric toy cars, and Putin was flush with cash. The invasion of Georgia (for may of the same reasons) in 2008 ended because Putin ran out of money. But he was able to go home and proclaim victory and save face.

Sun Tzu said you must always leave a golden bridge open for your adversary so he does not fight to the death. We are closing all avenues of escape on Russia. This juvenile insistence on complete victory against the Russians is backing them into a corner.

The Israelis actually brokered a peace deal early on in the war and Biden and the U.S. killed it with endless objections. The Israelis said both sides were agreeable to it.

We are using Ukraine as a proxy to attack Russia here, and are keeping the heat on when we could just as easily cut a deal. How many deaths are worth your anger at Putin? How many lives are worth Green Energy and the Great Reset?

Look, I understand your point and was really mad about this invasion at the beginning too. But I was a long-time student of the Russians and understand their psychology, and also know that the Western media is all on board with this, which should give us pause. When were they ever on board with a major war, and U.S. involvement? That alone should make you realize you are being manipulated.

Putin is indeed a bad guy and the Russians are in the wrong to no small degree here, but they have their side of the story, one the media refuses to tell. Now why do you suppose that is?

Jeff Charles replies:

With expansionist psychopath dictators history has shown appeasement does not work and only emboldens them to take more. It is a mess but the world currently does not have any ideal answers. The US is legally and morally obligated to defend Ukraine.

Tim replies:

The world is full of psychopathic dictators, most of whom primarily trouble their own people because they do not have the power to project force very far. Certainly China is far more dangerous in that regard than is Russia. For that matter the United States has become an expansionistic entity run by a psychopathic would-be dictator. Should Russia and China invade America?

The fact that Russia didn't just roll over Ukraine shows they are not capable of invading Europe or conquering the world as you seem to think They would be formidable in a defensive posture though, and their nuclear weapons would be catastrophic, but they have never used them - yet - and nukes are only useful as a tool of blackmail, not of conquest.

Comparisons to Hitler and Nazi Germany fall very short. Germany was a fully developed modern industrial power, well educated and with a strong industrial base. It also was in a good position to attack other EUROPEAN powers. You will notice they failed when it came to crossing the sea. Britain held out because Germany couldn't project power across the Channel. After running wild for a short time in North Africa the Allies drove Rommel out.

Russia is poorly suited to invade anyone, and unlike the end of WWII when the Russian army was IN Germany they would have to fight their way through multiple countries that are armed and ready to resist.

Russia has no territorial expansionist ambitions, except to buttress their economic power, which means their oil and gas. the invasion of Ukraine works to that end. Ukraine was threatening to cut off oil and gas from Russia to Europe (and in fact it is now known that the U.S. blew up the Nordstream pipelines. https://global.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202302/10/WS63e5cadaa31057c47ebae19e.html, that was an act of war.) This war is all about oil and gas and has been from the beginning.

Your analogy is faulty, I believe. Putin is not in any way in a position to invade anyone outside of the immediate Russian sphere. And he doesn't really want to do so.

IF you want to force Russia to the negotiating table then you must get the price of oil and gas way down. That means ramp up drilling in the U.S. and other oil producing nations and quit pushing the idiotic "renewable energy" schemes.

At this point Putin cannot come home empty handed. And there will be no peace as long as we demand unconditional withdrawal.

BTW Do you know why Russia invaded Georgia in 2008? NATO threatened to expand into Georgia. Also the U.S. was pushing that so it could build an oil and gas pipeline that would circumvent the Russians and Iranians and cut them out of the energy market in Europe. This war is fundamentally no different. It's blood for oil.

Jeff, I understand your frustration but we need concrete ideas about this and not just angry finger-pointing, which is essentially what has been done here by the Biden Administration and the mainstream journalists. This can be settled, but we keep upping the ante, sending in increasingly powerful weapons and now sending in support staff. This is how we got into Vietnam.

And what is our overall tactical interests? What do we have to gain by prolonging the war and getting vast numbers of people killed? There is no appetite at all from the Biden camp for a negotiated peace.

That is because they have but one goal - to drive regime change in Russia and install another corrupt puppet government into power there.

This whole war is about making the world safe for war profits and the Great Reset. We have no national interest in this.

Yes, we did promise Ukraine that we would defend them (the Budapest Memorandum) if they got rid of their nukes. But we also promised (verbally) not to expand into the Warsaw Pact, which we have done repeatedly.https://natowatch.org/newsbriefs/2018/how-gorbachev-was-misled-over-assurances-against-nato-expansion Now we are expanding into the old Soviet republics - Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, and now Ukraine. We tried that with Georgia but failed because Russia invaded and extracted a pledge they would stay out of NATO. (BTW they did not annex Georgia.) So we should honor our promises in one instance but not another?

The best thing we can do for Ukraine is to help broker a peace agreement, one that lets Russia save face. This "no compromise" insistence is leading to inevitable war between Russia and the West. And possibly nuclear war.

We're fighting the wrong enemy anyway. China is the real danger to us. But while we're blowing vast sums of money in the Russian suburbs the Chinese are openly flying over our country and we aren't doing a thing about it.

This whole thing is a huge distraction. It's a distraction from Biden's political failures. It's a distraction from Chinese ambition. It's a distraction from open borders and the rising internationalist order. It's largely a red herring.

Any time the media and the Democrats and academia are on board with something you should seriously consider why. You can tell where you stand by those standing with you. Right now the Russia haters are all communists and radicals and New World Order types.

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 10:37 AM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
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