I'm not from the Ukraine but there has been news of something like this on a regular basis since 2014. It's kind of like South Korea/North Korea. On a near weekly basis there is big news about something bad potentially happening.
The belief that Russian mercenaries in the Donbass would be eventually relieved by conventional forces has been around since then, yes. Many were surprised by the fact that it was not happening, year after year. At some point the consensus in policy circles was that Putin must had decided to keep the area as a wild-west buffer.
The recent deployment near the border wasn't the first, although it was definitely an order of magnitude bigger - there were, in fact, questions on whether the exaggerated scale was so brazen and disproportionate (and unbalanced - their Asian border is now pretty weak...) that it couldn't be anything more than posturing.
Except Putin has been negotiating with all the other western leaders to avoid this for the past couple weeks, and each one basically failed. Doesn’t that seem different?
This isn't my point. My point is the GP said this has been forecasted for many years now so people stopped paying attention. However, these talks with other nations ARE new and were highly stressed as important to avoid war. That hasn't been the case for years now.
It was forecast for many years, the question many have is why it took as long as it did, I'm still not sure about that. I think it was maybe because Putin was counting on Trump winning re-election that he thought he had plenty of time.
As for the talks:
They were instrumental in getting away with the attacks, Putin played that for all it was worth, taking a leaf right out of Hitlers playbook.
I don't see what is unhinged about it: it was a pretty closely contested election and it could have easily happened. Which would give Putin a chance to do this without any fear of interference. Brexit certainly helped him as well.
So you're still pushing the crazy conspiracy theory that Trump was Putin's puppet?
The more likely explanation is, IMO, that Trump was just unhinged enough to actually do something, unlike the mellow Biden, who'll obviously just sit and wait (or, well, sleep).
Trump praised Putin at every turn (even did that again today and called the invasion "smart"). Went against NATO. Had closed door meetings and got rid of the transcripts. Asked that the US ambassador to Ukraine be fired. Wanted dirt on Biden in exchange for releasing the (congress-approved) military aid to Ukraine. And so on. An entire book could be written on this based only on public information.
Trump has an anti-war, contain the bully platform.
He introduced new sanctions for Iran and killed one of their highest ranking officers. Precision strikes instead of wasteful wars.
Turkey and SA are US allies, Trump just continued that long-standing policy, as does Biden.
> And even if you don’t believe that, Trump is currently okay with the invasion.
Quote? Trump said Putin's "pretty smart", which, judging by their progress towards Kyiv, and the lack of response by the West, well, you can't say it's not smart (at least in the short term... long term, remains to be seen).
For you and parent commentator: the topic of the thread is Ukraine's invasion by Russian imperial forces.
Let us not devolve into the Rorschach test that is Trump's administration and our personal interpretations. It serves no purpose but to feed relative trolls.
> I don't appreciate the gratuitous insult that we can't objectively discuss the actions of a past president.
Regardless of any point made on the subject, what one side considers objective, the other side considers biased and tainted. Your rejoinder on the existential insult (though a consequence of human nature) is noted -- and your wish shared that we could exist with any real semblance of objectivity. We primates aren't objective creatures when it comes to arguments that at least one side has turned its axioms into articles of faith.
For the record, I expect we agree substantively on an analysis of Trump's presidency, both in terms of motivations, outcomes, and impacts.
Also it appears the metadata of the video of his speech just before the attack indicates it was actually shot 3 days earlier, which illustrates even further that any resemblance of negotiations were just smoke and mirrors.
Or... you pre-record both 'attack' and 'no-attack' speeches ahead of time, because you know the actual moment will be very stressful and you won't have time.
'Negotiations as misdirection' makes literally no sense. Who would he be misdirecting? Nobody is coming to Ukraine's aid.
If he said for example a day earlier "I will attack" NATO countries could have moved a few troops to protect their embassies pre-emptively, which would have likely been a very shrewd de-escalation, as attacking NATO troops directly would have risked an unintended escalation.
After he has attacked, he has the initiative, and can threaten ww3 if any NATO troops enter the combat zone, and a few troops are not much use anyway.
> 'Negotiations as misdirection' makes literally no sense. Who would he be misdirecting? Nobody is coming to Ukraine's aid.
The US waited until the actual invasion began to impose serious sanctions. Misdirecting for a few days could easily have bought Putin enough time to make arrangements for both his personal and national finances. That's idle speculation on my part, but it doesn't seem terribly unlikely.
exactly right. fx levels, bond sales, gold stockpiling, this was planned for years in advance, in anticipation of financial sanctions. he has a very, very assymetric risk/reward in this war.
If Putin actually wanted to avoid invading a sovereign nation in violation of international law, all he had to do was... not invade a sovereign nation.
How is demanding the end of NATO via an outside party having veto control over membership "negotiating"?
It's very obvious that his demands are impossible. Putin is really a master at playing people. It's kind of shocking people are _still_ falling for it.
It's hard to know what is serious and what isnt.