[reitanqild]

You are probably downvoted for - voluntarily or involuntarily (I cannot judge) - running the errands of the enemies of the free world by suggesting that it is hopeless while it is absolutely not.

(Why is it not hopeless? Russian forces suffer large losses and their morale is breaking, after all, what sane person wants to shoot their peaceful neigbours and relatives? Russians are already taking to the streets to protest the madness one day into this stupid war, who would have expected such bravery from the already suffering Russian people? Half of the European population is already looking for anything they can do to support Ukraine, ordinary Russians raising up or to make Putin and his closest people suffer. Pro Russian trolls who were previously tolerated since we wanted to hear all sides are now kept down. The list probably goes on.)

Every free human is now at war, and for now, for us it is information warfare.

So lets make sure the madmen get nothing for free. Don't run their errands.

[MarcellusDrum]

The phrase "the free world" rubs me the wrong way. I'm obviously against what Russia is doing, any sane man would be. But as a middle eastern, the US to us has been 10x worse than Russia: They killed a million Iraqis, they killed Syrian civilians by bombing hospitals and schools. They overthrew a functional government in Libya, and they supported Syrian/Iraqi separatists (Kurds). They forcefully tried to build a military base in Lebanon. Not only that, but they also tortured, raped, and humiliated innocent Iraqis in Abou Gharib, without any major repercussions.

Just because the US did it, doesn't mean that Russia is justified or less wrong, both are wrong, and neither get to call out the other for humanitarian reasons.

[reitanqild]

All good points. I am ashamed for both some of the things that happened and that way too few has been held responsible.

Please forgive those of us who where tricked into it, too young to vote etc.

I'll try to do my part to prevent more of it.

Edit: as for the phrase "the free world", read it to mean "freer to those inside it" if that helps.

[avgcorrection]

> Please forgive those of us who where tricked into it, too young to vote etc.

Then you blame the voters of America when their government started an illegal war based on falsehoods.

[mvc]

Yes, UK and US foreign policy has been, and in many places around the world, is currently, ethically, morally questionable.

As a UK citizen, of voting age for 20 years now, I'm guilty as charged. I voted for Blair before the Iraq war, but like many others protested on our streets in the build up (and I haven't voted for them since).

Doesn't make us wrong about Putin though.

[dhimes]

I'm right there with you. I voted for Bush in 2000 based on his education platform; when it was clear the war was a major mistake that he wouldn't admit to, I tried to vote him out in 2004.

[avgcorrection]

So you’re to blame for an illegal war started after 2000? Because that was the initial, implied claim.

[randomsearch]

If you think the US has been worse for the Syrians than Russia’s indiscriminate bombing of its cities, I cannot take the rest of your argument seriously.

[MarcellusDrum]

The US overall has been worse to the Middle East overall than Russia is my argument. You knew that, of course, but you chose the vaguest claim in my argument, and ignored the rest which are also valid just to make yourself feel better. Which is fine, of course.

[reitanqild]

Reading this for a second time and sticking to what I said about being ashamed for many of the things the west did I'd also like to remind that Russia hasn't really done much at all in the middle East.

But I can remember stories from my childhood about Russians tying up Afghan fighters and driving over them with tanks to make an example, so again without defending drone strikes on weddings or Abu Ghraib or anything other spectacularly bad I

1.) think it wouldn't have been much better if it was the Russians who went in

2.) think the reason why the Russian government hasn't been involved in more badness in the middle east until recently has not been its peaceful nature but the fact that they have been cash strapped.

[env123]

Looking at history, Russia seems like the lesser evil here. It makes far more sense to have security concerns over your backyard. Attacking the local mosque on the other side of the river, because a Muslim robber came by is not self-defense

[wiseowise]

Ukraine is sovereign European country, not Russian backyard.

[bratwurst3000]

Tell that people living in ukraine at the moment. They certainly think the same way.

[MarcellusDrum]

Your first response is very respectful and much appreciated. As for this comment, you have a fair point. I don't doubt that if you ask Ukrainians right now, they will say that Russia is 10x worse than the USA, and they would be correct. Looking at the big picture, all current superpowers are genocidal power hungry tyrants, to various degrees.

[Aeolun]

While I think that’s true to some extend, I have the feeling that Afghanistan is regressing now, which means that it must’ve arguably been better than it was before. at least for some half of the population.

You can certainly question whether that was worth the cost.

[mellavora]

If you want to be historically (more) accurate, you might want to go back to Churchill's decision to extend UK power to this region of the world, in an attempt to get the UK fleet to move from coal to oil power.

You could also look at some of the responses and choices made by the people/cultures native to this region over the years since then. Yes, "cultures" is plural.

[mellavora]

I agree with your point that "the free world" seldom lives up to the values it proclaims.

The difference might be that at least it proclaims them, and good people like yourself can hold them accountable to those values.

[Chris2048]

> good people like yourself can hold them accountable

Seems to me you can't really hold the US military to account, any more (or less) than you can the US police. Maybe a win here-and-there for political PR, but overall no.

[trasz]

Lol, what? Remember when US Navy shot down a commercial airliner, killing some two hundred people? None of the responsible was punished for that; they got decorated instead.

[throwrqX]

I suppose then if Nazi Germany just killed Jews and other undesirables in Germany and didn't try take over Europe then we should just stand back and do nothing because otherwise millions of Germans would also die? I wonder why people here seem to consider violent dictatorships and other such governments in equal standing with democracies.

[oneoff786]

There are plenty of countries with active genocidal events going on right now. Should we invade all of them?

[throwrqX]

Well in a perfect world yes we would. However the world is not perfect, and most "white" people so to speak care more about white people than some Muslims in the Middle East or some Africans in Africa, that's just the reality of the situation. Hence why they're more interested in what goes on in European countries than in other ones.

[oneoff786]

So we go in, kill everyone doing the genocide, leave, and then another group takes power and starts doing more genocide.

Do we do it again?

[throwrqX]

In a perfect world we do that and develop a plan that allows the country to develop and hence stop the circular rot like that.

[cjbgkagh]

Genocide the genociders... what could go wrong

[wowokay]

Yes but at least the US had probable cause to go into Iraq. The world was pretty much behind that decision. We were attacked, civilians were attacked directly, none of that conflict would have occurred if Iraq or neighboring countries stopped their terrorism.

[rfrey]

The world was not 100% behind the US invasion of Iraq, or even 20%. The US had the world's support, after 9/11, to go into Afghanistan. The US was emboldened by that and attacked Iraq with very little global support, for reasons unrelated to the 9/11 attack.

[trasz]

What you’ve just said isn’t any different from Russian propaganda.

[wiseowise]

Uhuh, isn't any different from calling Ukraine fiction, that it basically never existed, everyone is neonazi. Annexing Crimea, East of country and then attacking under deluaion claims.

[FollowingTheDao]

> everyone is neonazi

No, but to say that the instigators of anti-russian sentiment in Ukraine are not mostly Neo-nazi's is ignorant. These articles go back years

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5SBo0akeDMY

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/10/azov-far-right...

https://www.files.ethz.ch/isn/136008/commentary_56.pdf

https://euromaidanpress.com/tags/azov-battalion/page/2/

https://www.jstor.org/stable/40871070

[graphpercolator]

I would question if you were alive at the time then because the world basically thought our evidence was bullshit to go into Iraq but we went in anyway and the evidence turned out to be bullshit.

[FollowingTheDao]

> Yes but at least the US had probable cause to go into Iraq.

Oh my, this is disturbing. What was the probably cause? WMD's? :^/

[cutemonster]

Assad and Putin intentionally bombed hospitals in Syria

Not the US. Maybe they did some time unintentionally, but with Putin it was part of his plans.

> they supported [the] Kurds

Of course, the Kurds and the US and Iraq were fighting together against Daesh (the so called Islamic State).

You're giving the impression that you like Assad, Putin, Erdagon, possibly Daesh as well. What kind of person are you, I start wondering.

Agreed that the US has done lots of bad things in the middle east though. (Eg helping the Talibans climb to power, supporting Saddam Hussein for quite long etc)

[jessaustin]

USA unsupervised services created Daesh, and supplied most of its weapons. This was done to destabilize Assad, and of course to enrich the weapons manufacturers. The idea that Assad and Daesh were ever allies is bizarre.

[cutemonster]

> The idea that Assad and Daesh were ever allies

No one here said they were.

You're misreading.

"Seems someone likes Assad, maybe X" does not mean "Assad and X are allies".

It's possible for someone to like both Stalin and Hitler although they weren't allies (in the end).

[vman81]

> They overthrew a functional government in Libya

That's not really an argument in itself tho.

[MarcellusDrum]

It is if you look at the state of Libya today. They overthrew Ghadafi for the sole reason of him being anti-Imperialist, killing and ruining the lives of millions in the process.

[Aeolun]

More or less. They overthrew Gadaffi, but the country tore itself apart.

I’m all for blaming the US where it’s warranted, but I don’t think that particular instance is it.

[MarcellusDrum]

I'd like (or hate, actually) to see what would happen to the US if a foreign power was able to fund a terrorist militia and overthrow their government. You have too much faith in the morals of humans who don't have a strong leadership that can hold them accountable.

[cloverich]

Obviously that's an important point, but OP's assertion has more to do with the cultural and practical history playing a role in the aftermath of a government falling. The US has been at relative peace internally for 150 years and has a relatively strong bent towards republican government. That's not something that can be quickly undone. The government "falling" in some countries is as simple as a particular leader being eliminated. In the US a leader being permanently removed from power on a regular cadence is not only normal but required. If someone came in and eliminated the current president (and his cabinet), the most likely outcome is we would just elect another. The second most likely is we would fracture into sub-nations / states, but still elect another. I don't see the scenario where we all start trying to kill one another -- there's very little difference between people across the US and most of us have family on both sides of the political spectrum / physical location.

[Dudeman112]

And yet the USA would be all pissy if some other country overthrew their government.

[amcoastal]

The difference is the voters of the U.S. punished the presidents who did those things with huge political defeats that have now made most oversea invasions and hawkishness very unpopular political positions at the moment. Russians have a much tougher road to hoe to do the same thing, but it needs to be done for the moral reasons you lay out here.

[trasz]

Not true, both got re-elected.

[Loic]

The most important part in what you wrote:

> no sane person wants to shoot their peaceful neighbors and relatives

and this is the case for all Russians even most of the ones in the army in Ukraine, right now. People do not want war. Period. For a human being to go to war, he/she needs to be heavily indoctrinated to the point of partially losing is normal references. Even today, with heavily indoctrinated armies, only a small subset of the forces are effectively shooting bullets.

War is decided by crazy leaders (and I am polite) far away from the lines.

[reitanqild]

Luckily this also favours the defending side somewhat I hope:

From listening to people who grew up with the veterans here in Norway I've learned that:

- Germans were told they came here to protect us against the British so they would - in the beginning of the war - shoot to suppress, not to kill. I guess Russian soldiers coming into Ukraine has been tricked to believe the "peace keeping" nonsense too and had a rude awakening.

- Norwegians however were already mad and shot to kill. I guess this holds true for Ukrainians too. This is natural and we've seen it in Afghanistan, Iraq etc too I think.

- German soldiers would cryingly admit to POWs already at the start of the war that they were absolutely not voluntarily there, they'd just be shot if they refused.

[ChuckNorris89]

>German soldiers would cryingly admit to POWs already at the start of the war that they were absolutely not voluntarily there, they'd just be shot if they refused

No shit they weren't there voluntarily, no sane people want to go to their death, but those were the rules for mandatory conscription for them back then.

Even today some European countries still have mandatory conscription, and while they won't shoot you for refusal, if you don't show up for conscription, military police will come to your house and arrest you, and if you run away, an arrest warrant will be issues on your name.

So yeah, you have to do your mandatory service, even if you don't want to.

[vidarh]

Ironically given the comment you replied to, Norway is one of them. I had military police trying to reach me the last few weeks before I moved to the UK to try to hand deliver a conscription notice as a necessary step before charging me if I again failed to show up (I'd ignored several prior notices).

I didn't leave because of that, but I did delight I telling them I was beyond their reach. Finally picked up the phone the very day I left.

My dad and uncle both served 3-4 months in prison for refusing as a matter of principle, and my intent was to do so too until we decided to move our startup at the time to London.

Of course the main reason for that conscription was the Soviet Union/Russia. It's gotten very lenient since I left in 2000, as the size of the Norwegian military has been scaled back to the point they only need a small portion of potential recruits.

[ChuckNorris89]

In Austria and Switzerland military service is also compulsory, but not really because of defense (Austrian military is a joke if push came to shove), but because it's an vast source of free labor for the state.

Unless you decide to go full career in the military, once you're done with the month long boot camp, if there's no war, national crisis or natural disaster that will get the grunts mobilized, the rest of the 5 months of service, are spent by the recruits dicking around on the taxpayers' money, doing useless busywork around the garrison.

And there's almost no way to avoid it unless you suffer from a severe physical or mental illness making you unsuitable for service, as even after you get out of prison for refusal, you'll be drafted back in.

PS: funny that you moved from Norway to London as many Brits I've met look up to Norway as a role model, so I'm really interest in your story

[vidarh]

> PS: funny that you moved from Norway to London as many brits I've met look up to Norway as a role model

If you're a lower earner, quality of life in Norway is much better, but if you're a higher earner, London is great. And at the time funding in Norway was tricky. But, yeah, I look on British politics with great bemusement and a some sadness - so many lost opportunities.

[reitanqild]

My grandfather on my dads side refused military and got away with prison.

My grandfather on ny mothers side served and helped hold the nazis back for a few days in his home country and maybe helped some people get away. He later had to surrender and spent a short time in a POW camp before being released.

I respect both very much but I decided to do as my dad and serve.

It absolutely felt like the right thing to do for me.

[vidarh]

I absolutely think there are situations where the right choice is to serve and I don't have an issue with people choosing to do so.

My main objection was not with the service in itself, but with it being compulsory under threat of prison. Of course today the "compulsory" nature of it is mostly a charade - if you want out it's trivial.

[amcoastal]

I'd sit in a jail cell before I got drafted into an unjust war. Doesn't seem like a hard decision to me. Now if you're repelling aggressive invaders, that's a different story.

[reitanqild]

FWIW going abroad has so far always been voluntary for drafted soldiers in most (all?) NATO countries as long as article 5 is not invoked.

I shyed away from education / officer training because I felt the risk of being sent on peace keeping to the middle east, but 20 years later I see I could safely have done it.

[amcoastal]

I'm in the US, we remember vietnam.

[tonguez]

"what sane person wants to shoot their peaceful neigbours and relatives?"

Apparently ethnic Russians were being killed in Ukraine (or they have been the last 8 years, but more serious shelling started on February 17, 2022) and that is why Russia invaded.

[CRConrad]

> Apparently

At least according to Putler's propaganda.

> ethnic Russians were being killed in Ukraine

Far, far more ethnic Russians were not being killed in Ukraine.

Sure, some of the instigators, perpetrators, and fellow travellers of the armed insurrection in East Ukraine are (or were) ethnic Russians, but they:

A) Are being killed for being armed insurrectionists, not for being ethnic Russians.

B) Are (or were) themselves killing ethnic Ukrainians in the course of their armed insurrection.

C) Probably themselves killed quite a few ethnically Russian members of the Ukrainian armed forces.

> (or they have been the last 8 years,

Yeah, exactly: Since they started an armed insurrection.

> but more serious shelling started on February 17, 2022)

Oh, what a convenient date.

> and that is why Russia invaded.

Putler says that is why Russia invaded.

Oh: And so do you. Coincidence?

[sidibe]

Luckily Russia had anticipated the increased shelling months before and therefore just happened to have 180000 soldiers surrounding Ukraine before this increased shelling happened right?