>>487045Let me preface this with i will not agree with any argument that can be made to prolong this war. So if you are raising the question about the legitimacy of territorial claims in order to find a reason to keep this war going. Don't bother, ending this war, preferably yesterday, is what i would consider a premise of this debate. Basically peace takes priority.
>Steps 1 2 3 4Ok lets do this again and fill in all the missing context. The current regime in Ukraine came to power via CIA regime change color revolution. That entailed gunning people down in Ukraine's capital city, that's basically sufficient reason already to no longer consider a government legitimate. A government comes from the people of a country not from the CIA. But that isn't where this story ends, it's just the beginning. They illegitimately banned religion and language. They enacted a hole slew of discriminatory legislation that disenfranchised a large part of their population. They shot with artillery and mortars at their own population, they banned most media outlets, they kidnapped masses of people from the streets, and then they also abandoned what was left of formal democracy. Let me iterate on this last point, it's never legitimate to do that. War can't be a loop-hole to abolish democracy. There are no exemptions to democracy.
You have to be drinking very potent ideological cool-aid to still consider, the regime that currently holds power in Ukraine, as legit after all that. I want to point out that Zelensky was elected on a very explicit promise to make peace with Russia and chart a course for Ukraine that was a middle way between the West and Russia. Neutral ground militarily and economic relations with both sides. Zelensky didn't have a mandate to fight a war. He had a peace-mandate which he betrayed the moment he withdrew Ukraine from the Istanbul peace talks, which was the last realistic chance for preventing a war. The Istanbul thing incidentally also preserved Ukraine's territory, meaning they would have retained the eastern part. (Crimea's succession from Ukraine happened with international observers present that witnessed no irregularities, so there is no basis for contesting that)
Basically democratic legitimacy was thrown out the window in Ukraine and it became an arena of might makes right. The neocons in the US, predominately the Kagen clan, wanted it that way because they thought a proxy war in Ukraine would enable them to bleed Russia which they consider a "great power rival" or something along those lines.
The Russians doing referenda in eastern Ukraine, is basically the only thing resembling democratic legitimization, in a otherwise democratic void.
Also the Ukrainian "government" tortured and killed Gonzalo Lira for youtube-rants. Fuck em.
>legally<when we regime-change countries, that is OK<when the Russian smash those, that is NOT OKWell on paper we have international law, but you're delusional, if you think you can apply that selectively to serve a political agenda. It's basically a gentleman's agreement that only works if all the big powers play along. The neocons in the US don't even give lip-service to international law anymore. They waffle on and on about a "rules based order" and legislatively attack a number of UN institutions like the ICC for example. So… we get anarchy between states and it basically falls back to national law. And the Russians consider the NATO east-wards expansion after 1990 as a breach of the agreement they had with the US for removing their forces from eastern Europe. So they're not breaking any of their own laws. You can't evoke international law unless it means every country has to color inside the lines.
>Weren't Ukrainian factions in bed with those US factions tho?It turned into a proxy war a decade ago, in 2014. 2022 was just a escalation. The US sided with fascistic elements , while the Russians sided with the social democrats and the communists in Ukraine.
>It's really difficult either way for Russia to claim any of this was an act of war against Russia.The neocons have think-tanks that published strategy papers that stated they aimed to provoke a war in Ukraine in order to weaken Russia and then make the Russian state collapse via economic sanctions. In what world, is trying to make the other sides state collapse, not aggression ?
>I don't discount the claims of national security concern altogether, but they're not strong enough to justify the invasion, only to make me somewhat more sympathetic towards Russia than I otherwise would be. Ukraine was a medium sized country between two big power blocks. As such they had 2 options:
<either remain neutralor
<get destroyed as the battle ground for a proxy war between big powers.The Russians offered Ukraine a deal where they would remain a neutral country, while the US did not, therefore the Russians were correct.
You are essentially trying to negotiate how close the US ought to be allowed to creep up on Russia. I'm growing tired of this, because it's an argument for giving the war-monger-gang a longer leash to play cold-war. I don't want cold war, i want detente. I want a peace dividend not rising military spending.
>It's a war between Ukraine and Russia.Yeah given how much NATO weapons stockpiles were poured into Ukraine, this is a ridiculess statement even with your ideological blinders.
>Whether or not you see the Ukrainian gov't as legitimate, and there are plenty of reasons to question its legitimacy,They tied people to posts for street-lights/signs in their underwear during winter and called them saboteurs.
>the US clearly had something to attach to ideologically; namely, a long history of Ukrainian nationalism You mean the history of where the "hero" of Ukrainian nationalism Stephan Bandera joined forced with Hitler, to among other things, holocaust the Jews. Maybe that's not something one should attach to.
>and anti-Russian sentiment.Basically Fascist being mad about getting crushed in ww2.
>Russia made a huge mistake by invading because that antagonism was thereHow ? They won, Nato lost
>and this protracted war has only made it worseprotracted ?
2 years certainly isn't a short war, but given that they depleted vast NATO weapons stockpiles, it doesn't seem particularly slow.
>whether Zelenskyy survives it or not, this will be a major problem for decades to comedecades ? do you own stock of weapons companies ?
I think this will get wrapped up in 2025
>If the US had nothing, no patriotic substance, to grab ontoWTF ? This thing was a racket that ran on bribes, and they imposed a draft, their recruitment abducted people as if they were slave-catchers , which proves Ukrainians did not want to fight. "Patriotic substance" my ass.
> So the Russians call the Ukrainians Nazis (some certainly are! Many aren't!)>the Ukrainians call the Russians orcsHow is that equivalent ?
Have you seen any green Russians with large canine teeth sticking out of their mouths ?
>the weapons flow uninterrupted. It's a proxy war for the backers, but for those fighting it it's just a war.Except that the Russians had a voluntary military while Ukraine didn't.
>It was never actually in question who had more might.So the neocons picked a loosing fight because of Geopolitical masochism ?
>And if they provoked this war then that was a pretty big success.But they lost. The US lost a lot of imperial leverage because the sanctions war caused a dramatic surge in de-dollarrization. Europe's economy was destroyed on top of it.