kanisatha

So then would you say there should be no Article 5 response in case of a 9/11-style attack on any other NATO member (including potentially Sweden)? Or is this just for the US? I'm trying to understand your logic here because the 9/11 attack fully satisfied Article 5 conditions. Also, I vaguely recall that it was NATO, led by France, that invoked Article 5 after 9/11, and not the US.

Russia's position now is a very sharp contrast with its position a couple of months ago, when it explicitly threatened a military response to these countries joining NATO.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/04/06/bucha-barbarism-atrocities-russian-soldiers/ https://www.tweet247.net/news/world/in-bucha-ukraine-evidence-of-torture-beheadings-by-russian-soldiers https://twitter.com/maxbearak/status/1511947644788170756

A lot of the civilians murdered in Bucha were decapitated. Many had been tortured first before being killed. Sounds very much like Wagner and/or Kadyrov's thugs to me. But what's now happening in Mariupol and surrounding smaller towns is several orders of magnitude worse than Bucha. Estimates are that over 5,000 civilians have been killed thus far (just in the Mariupol area), with some 100,000 trapped and facing starvation.

I did spend a couple of days in Barrow, Alaska, in June, many years ago. It was indeed nuts; kids playing outside at 2 am!! But it was also so very interesting as a sociological experience. Plus, now I can say I have dipped my toes in all four oceans of the world!

Yes indeed, definitely the climate as well. And since we're on this topic, even though it is off-topic for this thread, I just have to ask because I've heard it said so very often: Do you guys from Sweden and Finland believe that your society and your people are melancholy by nature because of the climate in which you live? That the way you are and the way you live your lives, and even the way you express yourselves, are all driven by a pervasive sense of melancholy that permeates your society? The social and behavioral scientist in me has long been very curious about this claim.

Well in Russia's case, the physical isolation of living deep inside a huge landmass also makes their people more paranoid and xenophobic, as has historically been the case with Russians.

A valid point, but I would argue almost entirely because the overall population sizes are so very small. People get along with one another and are nicer to one another in small groups (because having shared values and achieving consensus is sooooo much easier). They become downright onery when lumped into large groups.

I would definitely fall into the category of "don't believe" and also don't accept.

It's great to see someone say this, because to this day many people, even intelligent people, keep being stuck on this mindset that military invasion is the preferred way for countries to get resources. Military invasion is a stupid way to access resources, and buying/trading for it is sooooooo much cheaper.

Certainly. But there is always the option of asking, instead of jumping to a conclusion ... unless that jumped-to conclusion is what that person wants to push as their narrative.

Saw a wire service report that said not only are the Russians looking to make sure that in Mariupol (and I suspect other areas) their atrocities will not be revealed like in Bucha by burning bodies, they're also looking to stage a massive false flag op to divert world attention away from the Bucha Massacre because that massacre is actually resonating with people all over the world. People are beginning to refer to Putin as the Butcher of Bucha.

Yup. It also says something more fundamental about Russia as a country. Russia is already one of the world's richest countries in natural resources, and yet they want to attack and destroy a smaller, weaker neighbor to steal what little that neighbor has. There is a certain psychosis involved in having such a mindset. Plus, it also shows that Russia has no confidence in itself to build a real economy, based on manufacturing, services, and intellectual property, and instead only expects the sale of commodities to be its future.

Re. the competence of the Russian army, it's always hilarious that some people in this forum are so wound up in their ideology that they cannot even recognize humor and sarcasm in a post.

Yup. We can now add Bucha to the annals of the Russian army's most glorious "battles." A month?! You are being incredibly generous. Right now, if Russia's nukes were somehow taken away from them, Russia would cease to exist as a state because every single one of their neighbors would be able to carve out for themselves as much of Russian territory as they want. Heck the Finnish army could easily double their country's size!

Interesting new base builder game: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1284190/The_Planet_Crafter/

More and more observers inside and outside Ukraine are beginning to say what happened in Bucha was not the actions of rogue soldiers or even a rogue unit of the Russian military, but rather the deliberate and premeditated actions of the Russian military based on orders that any Ukrainians who did not warmly embrace the Russian troops were "dirt" that needed to be "cleansed." https://www.reuters.com/world/russia-waged-deliberate-campaign-commit-atrocities-bucha-blinken-2022-04-05/

This is an astute observation. For a very long time now, I've been arguing that if China wants to invade and/or occupy any territory from other states, the most logical territory to seize is the Russian far east. But now they don't have to, because they can just buy it all, and probably dirt-cheap too.

I've been reading about this new AAM black program too. From what little info is avilable it looks incredible. An F-15EX will apparently be able to carry at least 12 and possibly 16. And the budget shows 2026 being the last year AIM-120D's will be bought, so this new AAM is entering full-rate production very soon.

China's lessons from Russia's Ukraine invasion: https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2022/04/what-lessons-china-taking-ukraine-war/363915/

This article provides the gritty, horrific details of what the Russian rabble did to civilians in Bucha, directly from the words of the people who got to witness these things being done to their loved ones: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/04/russia-bucha-killings-war-crimes-genocide/629470/?utm_source=feed

Yeah this is the fundamental difference here: anecdotal versus systematic crimes. In any war situation some individual soldiers will end up doing bad or criminal things. But that is a far cry from a situation where the government of a state involved in a war, as a matter of its official military policy and doctrine, deliberately and systematically commits horrific war crimes and atrocities. This is what Russia is doing in Ukraine. And it is documented fact.

And then there's this, which also came up as a story back in late February, and has been rumoured for some time. This may or may not be true, but is certainly very interesting to me: https://metro.co.uk/2022/04/03/putin-is-using-body-double-to-avoid-assassination-attempt-16396461/

Finland in NATO may get fast-tracked (as I predicted may happen): https://www.euractiv.com/section/politics/short_news/finnish-president-says-nato-referendum-no-longer-necessary/ https://www.airforcemag.com/finland-reassesses-nato-entry-in-wake-of-russia-ukraine-conflict/ https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/why-putin-faces-more-nato-arctic-after-ukraine-invasion-2022-04-04/

I'm sure there must be some 'let's play' videos out there you could check out.