Nato members have pledged their support for an “irreversible path” to future membership for Ukraine, as well as more aid.
While a formal timeline for it to join the military alliance was not agreed at a summit in Washington DC, the military alliance’s 32 members said they had “unwavering” support for Ukraine’s war effort.
Nato has also announced further integration with Ukraine’s military and members have committed €40bn ($43.3bn, £33.7bn) in aid in the next year, including F-16 fighter jets and air defence support.
The bloc’s Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said: “Support to Ukraine is not charity - it is in our own security interest.”
…it is in our own security interest.
No one’s security interests are served by a new era of escalating tensions between Russia and the West. No country has more nuclear weapons than Russia. All efforts should be taken to prevent Russia from becoming desperate enough to use their nuclear weapons. By further isolating and encircling Russia, I think the chances of them using their nuclear weapons increases.
I didn’t say that. I don’t think the options must necessarily be limited to either escalation or appeasement.
Ok, I’ll bite - how do you imagine that? It’s pretty much down to Ukraine and all othet countries laying down weapons if attacked or fighting back and defend their territory. Would love to hear what you imagine being the 3rd option
By allowing Russia to expand it further provokes the west to use nuclear weapons. Huh, guess we’re at a deadlock. I guess Russia could give back what they stole.
I guess Russia could give back what they stole.
They should, but if they don’t, what should be done, knowing that no one’s interests are served by all out war between Russia and the West?
Russia’s annexation of Ukraine is a geographical one. It’s the last corridor of easier mobilisation in Europe. Should the western border close that door, they are quite trapped by borders and the Black Sea with exception of northern approach via Belarus, though a terrible and easily stoppable option.
Should they not have Ukraine, taking more territory in Europe is basically impossible and any dreams of a restored or Empirical Russia are well and truly dead. For all intents and purposes, they will be surrounded by unfriendly borders or impassable natural features. Even if they were capable of some sort of modern Blitzkrieg tactic—theyve proven that could never happen—it wouldn’t work.
I think it’s the other way around: Russia is aggressive but a show of strength would deter it. In other words, Russia isn’t desperate to avoid a confrontation with the West. Russia wants a confrontation with the West, and it needs to know that that’s a confrontation it won’t win. (China also needs to know that, and it’s watching the situation in Ukraine closely.)
That’s not to say that we should seek out such a confrontation with the goal of intimidating Russia. A high-stakes situation like that does have the risk of escalating out of control. However, the situation in Ukraine is already such a confrontation, initiated by Russia due to its belief that the West is weak. It would have been much better to avoid creating such a belief, but now is too late for that. The best we can do is to avoid reinforcing it and, from a pragmatic perspective, it helps that most of the risk is borne by Ukraine.
In short, the nightmare scenario is Russia invading a NATO country like one of the Baltic states. Then either there is a war between nuclear powers immediately or Western unity collapses and a war between nuclear powers becomes much more likely in the near future. Our best chance of avoiding that is to stop Russia in Ukraine, where we can do so indirectly.
Edit: Also people shouldn’t be down-voting you. You’re making a valid point that needs to be addressed.
I disagree. As the cold war showed, shows of strength escalate, they do not deter. I don’t believe for a moment Russia wants a confrontation with the West or that they believe the West is weak. I think they invaded Ukraine because they were scared of the West. They were scared of Ukraine’s rich agricultural land coming under the control of the West, and they were scared of NATO being on their doorstep. I think the invasion of Ukraine was an act of fear and desperation, and if we continue down this path, more acts of fear and desperation will follow.
The geographical argument for Russia wanting to take Ukraine is nonsense BECAUSE of the nuclear threat. Having a physical buffer zone or whatever is complete nonsense in an era where anyone who poses a real existential threat can simply be nuked out of existence and start the apocalypse. A few thousand kms of extra land does exactly zilch to change the calculus for the West starting a war with Russia. Russia wants Ukraine because it wants to make more money, and no other reason.
The scenario you describe has already come to pass. Russia has NATO on their doorstep since Finland joined, Russia’s chances of breaking through the Ukrainian army and actually capturing that agricultural land are rather low even if Western support for Ukraine drops significantly, and Ukraine is going to be friendly to the West and hostile to Russia even if it isn’t allowed into NATO. If this scenario is intolerable to Russia, then whatever would happen is going to happen.
I do think there is a small but significant risk that Russia will use nuclear weapons in Ukraine (a scenario where both escalating and not escalating are likely to be disastrous) if its army is driven back to the border but not if the war becomes a frozen conflict with Russia controlling the territory it currently does. With that said, I disagree that shows of strength don’t deter. Western strength deterred a Soviet invasion of Europe, and it deters a Chinese invasion of Taiwan. There definitely is a risk of escalation, but there always will be. The USA has tried being isolationist before, but it was still drawn into both world wars. It will be drawn into the next one if such a war happens.
What exactly was the west supposed to do though? They weren’t gonna stop at ukraine. They want to take Moldova, Georgia, maybe even parts of Finland as well before they joined NATO. Stopping then now and letting the countries join nato/eu would solve future invasions. Russia shouldn’t have to feel threatened if they stopped acting like a threat to everyone else.
Where do you draw the line? If you are happy to give up Ukraine to avoid a nuclear war, where do you stop? Can he take all of Eastern Europe? What about the whole of Europe? Everywhere except your country?
Putin is a bully, and you stand up to bullies.
Besides, he might have the most nukes, but given the maintenance costs for 5,000+ of them and the corruption in Russia, most of them probably won’t work.
Besides, he might have the most nukes, but given the maintenance costs for 5,000+ of them and the corruption in Russia, most of them probably won’t work.
I don’t disagree with the rest of what you said, but this is kind of a silly dismissal. First of all “most of them” don’t need to work. Only a few need to and vast numbers of people will die and the Earth may be poisoned for many years.
Yes, stand up to Putin. Absolutely give Ukraine NATO membership. But don’t act like there’s no risk here. There’s a huge risk.
I wasnt acting like there was no risk, 1 nuke is too many, especially when a dictator has his finger on the button. Russia might have the highest quantity of nukes, but i’d be surprised if they had the most working nukes as the US stockpile isnt far off Russia’s.
Regardless, I wouldnt let the fact Russia is a nuclear capable nation deter us from doing what is right.
That’s funny because Ukraine gave up their nukes and Russia signed the agreement to defend their territorial integrity. Russia’s feelings are irrelevant and if they want to nuke us all so they can get out of a contract they signed, that’s their problem.
Another thing is you can appease someone completely in reality and people like Vladimir Putin will just turn around and say it’s still not enough.
You may want to look up the Sudeten crisis/Munich agreement and how effective it was at preventing war.
Ok, I give up. I’ve been down voted to hell and told repeatedly by multiple people that I’m an idiot or a coward or a Russian bot for wanting a peaceful resolution to the conflict, so I’m going to defer to the expertise of all these people and concede the point. It’s not like my opinion was going to change anything anyway.
Good on you for trying. I gave up a while ago. A consensus has formed, at least on here and on most of the English-speaking internet and lines have been drawn. Contrary opinions are rarely tolerated. Thankfully the rest of the world isn’t as gung-ho on isolating Russia and is actually helping restore some balance, because at the end of the day whether Ukraine is a NATO country or a Russian protectorate in ten years time matters little in the grand scheme of things.
What matters more is that the global pecking order between great powers is disturbed and this will likely lead to frequent local and perhaps generalized conflict in the future. It would be helpful for more countries to remain neutral, so as to help maintain balance and independence, while limiting the reach of great powers, but under such intense competition for global dominance most countries have to pick a sponsor for better or worse. And Ukraine’s leadership has chosen NATO, naturally. Whether they could have remained neutral or not is for historians to debate. Right now, as the saying goes, the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
Do the US, Russia, and China have to be enemies? Yes, unfortunately they do. They have competing interests and the decline of the US is leaving space open for others. Hence also the focus on getting Europe more heavily militarized again. So that it can hold its own in the uncertain times to come. That is my understanding.
Peaceful resolution is not only the easiest thing in the word, it is 100% Russia’s choice…stop invading and go back home and try to make yourself a productive member of the world…start with your own suffering people.Russia was old news and no one cared before the invasions. If you are always treated like the bad guy, you have to put a lot of effort in to selflessly prove you aren’t and the world will take notice…or invade and get shit on and be the villain everyone said you are…
It’s not the world’s call here. Debate the people that actually can change this situation.
That’s the hivemind for you. Personally I don’t think you deserve downvotes for these comments and I don’t think you are a Russian shill. I replied to you because I understand where you’re coming from, and I was trying to get you to see things the way I see them : I actually held the same opinion when Russia annexed Crimea by force in 2014 even though people were already screaming that it was basically Hitler’s playbook. But the fact that Putin didn’t take that easy, huge W when basically the entire world went for appeasement, and instead decided to keep escalating convinced me that he is actually literally applying Hitler’s playbook (and backing it with mutually assured destruction, of all things).
It’s amazing to see how down voted a contrary opinion can be in this subject.
It’s a little easier to understand if you reversed the situation.
How would the US react if the Russians supported Mexico in joining a military pact against the US, so that the Russians could build military bases and install short range nuclear weapons in Mexico and point then at the US? What would the reaction be if Russian then spent billions of dollars financing the Mexicans from any kind of military aggression from the US?
You can’t threaten someone with a gun and not expect them to eventually shoot you.
It doesn’t matter how anyone feels about my opinion but the more we posture with violence, lies on all sides, anger and an unwillingness to step back and find sensible solutions … the closer we get to nuclear war and the end of civilization.
As an American I think that would all be reasonable…if the official US position was that Mexico has no right to exist, the Mexican people should be forcibly integrated into our society as 2nd class citizens, and the US Army was in the process of a “peacekeeping operation” in Mexico to carry all this out.
For all our flaws, we respect the borders of our neighbors and don’t have irridentist aspirations that belong in the 19th century. Russia is the aggressor here, and they have demonstrated that they have little interest in global peace or human rights, only increasing their sphere of influence.
Continually rolling over for thugs because it’s what avoids nuclear conflict will only lead to a global order based on thuggery, and it likely won’t even avoid nuclear conflict in the end.
I’m no fan of Russia … I’m just stating my opinion because I don’t want to die in a nuclear holocaust because everyone didn’t want to see reason.
There’s only one country in modern history that has spread global influence and threats in every part of the world, imposed, threatened, created and caused violence everywhere for decades while imposing their financial, political and economic powers on everyone everywhere for all of modern history …
… and it isn’t the Russians.
Ah, There it is, the thing that you ultimately wanted to say but tried to be coy about.
“America bad”
And here I thought the topic at hand was Ukraine becoming a NATO member, not AmErIcAn ImPeRiAliSm
I’m just stating my opinion because I don’t want to die in a nuclear holocaust because everyone didn’t want to see reason.
So you are willing to sacrifice Ukraine and its people so you can appeace a dictator for a short while and sleep soundly safe in your bed thousands of miles away … How noble your opinion is
Yeah, the Russians totally didn’t force other countries to adopt their economic system and extract their resources for their own gain.
Totally didn’t happen anywhere, especially not in Eastern Europe.
/s
I kinda wish the US, Mexico, and Canada were more unified though. I know we are cool, ish, but the American Union (Canadians super love it when you call them North Americans) or something less USA sounding would be kinda great.
This happened once with the Cuban crisis, and humanity still exists thanks to the level headedness of JFK. I’m not sure the situation is comparable as, afaik, no new nukes have been stationed in Europe after the end of the cold war. And it is useful to remind that nobody would have felt the need to join NATO after the end of cold war if they hadn’t felt threatened.
For your hypothetical scenario to make more sense, the US would have had to annex Baja California just a decade prior, then straight up have gone to forward invasion war with Mexico to annex more, bombing the shit out of the country including children’s hospitals.
In that scenario, fuck yes Mexico would be justified in finding allies to help them maintain sovereignty and protect themselves.
That’s what happens when nations invade one another.
Just putinists apologist nonsense. Just gaslighting the world … they backed us into a corner… they made us deny they have the right to exist as a country, invade them and commit atrocities against their population.
The call is coming from inside the house…
No threat to Russia except free prosperous Ukranians living across the Russian border, who speak russian and have deep ties to Russian population. This by far is the biggest threat to Putin’s health, hence the war.
Oh and the fact that Russia sold gas to Europe though Ukraine and needed to pay. But now Ukraine found a lot of gas in the Donbas also did not help.
I think your downvotes are because your “reversal” is not particularly valid, not because your opinion is contrary.
As others have said, it would need the US to first be invading Mexico before Russia or other countries start propping Mexico up militarily.
Cuba (country right next to the US) aligned itself with the USSR after Castro’s revolution, and the US has attempted to coup them, invade them, murder their leaders, then sink them in isolation and starvation. I’ve always defended that Cuba had the right of self-determination for their own foreign and domestic policy, and that the US was in the wrong for retaliating against them.
It would be extremely hypocritical of me to defend that Ukraine has no right to self-determine whether they want to be in a defensive pact or not, and whether they want to join the EU or not, just because a third country would like them not to do so - just as it’s extremely hypocritical of tankies and campists to say that Cuba had the right to choose their own future but Ukraine doesn’t.
Yeah, Cuba decided to choose sides in a (cold)war AND become a very real threat to US civilians. As was their right, as you said. Decisions have consequences.
The coups and assassinations were a means of punching them in the decision-makers so maybe the next ones would see the value of remaining out of the fight. The isolation and blockading was to make their population decide the fight wasn’t worth it and call upon their leadership to change stance back to at least neutral. We could have just hit everything they had with long range missiles and bombers and said “don’t join our enemies or else!” as their cities fell over and their island burned
They absolutely had the right to make those decisions and ally with who they want…and had the war gone hot, we would not have taken the time to pick off leaders here and there or blockade them and wag a finger. We would have carpet bombed cities that we heard rumors of leadership being near before entrenched soviet troops could have launched missiles from said cities (they wouldn’t care, it isn’t their country).
It wasn’t retaliation, it was striking a very real and very bad threat before it could get dug in and become permanent.
The parallel with Ukraine isn’t really the same. The US is an international bully and does some vile shit, but we, and our allies, don’t care about Russia (before this)…it was just a big sleeping threat to guard against (say…incase they start conquering neighbors…). Even if the US has bases inside a NATO Ukraine, we wouldn’t start shit with Russia or take their land…people don’t want another world war. Also, we already have all the capability and power to do whatever we want to anywhere in the world. Cuba was a threat because we were pretty much logistically untouchable when it came to prosecuting a war against us…Cuba changed that. These days, we can stuff more insane destructive power inside ONE of our cargo planes that reaches out farther than any plans for Cuba ever had. We don’t have to have a base next door to do war. We could ONLY have a base in Spain and still be an existential threat to Russia these days…and they aren’t taking all of Europe. Honestly, with how empty Russia is, we could set up launchers INSIDE their country and attack them if we really wanted to…
Sorry, I got way ranty…I don’t think your position is without some reason, but I can’t say, for as awful as it was, that Cuba was handled incorrectly given the time frame and threat. I also respect that you stick to your idea that “it is their right to decide” in any case. I just don’t think you realize how fundimentally different those scenarios are beyond a very surface level.
It’s all on Russia. Maybe if they weren’t terrible neighbors to neighboring countries, this wouldn’t happen. NATO doesn’t force countries to join, nor does it seek other countries to join. If the country wants to be a part of NATO, they have to apply. I’m tired of seeing this tired talking point.
False premise. “A military pact against”.
While it looks that way because Russia is a military invader and overall aggressor, NATO is a defensive pact. If the US decided to attack someone to be a dick, it doesn’t draw NATO in automatically…but if someone attacked a NATO member obligations trigger and everyone dogpiles the foolish attacker. Yes Russia was the boogieman use to get people to join, but it was not “against” Russia exclusively, it was against aggressors.
I get the cuban missile crisis parallel too. But this would be more like Russia and Mexico doing a “we will protect you if the US actually attacks” agreement and the US would just be annoyed with Russian bases that close and halt trade with Mexico as whiney punishment or some such. However, the US doesn’t seem to want to conquer Mexico, so it doesn’t parallel well to reality. Cuba was “let’s put offensive capabilities next to you during a war (cold…but it was a war)” that is self defense and very different.
No matter what, there will be hostile borders around the world and deterrence is all we can do to keep it quiet. Ukraine war would have never happened if it was in NATO, and the US woulda just let Russia sleep despite the strategic advantage of having Ukraine right there. The US has plenty of other horrible shit it does, we don’t conquer with military might.
I also know the story about how Putin tried to play nice with the world and got shit on and not let into the club fully, and this is part of him acting out for that. There is some very small legitimacy, or at least a logic to that claim…but you just don’t take countries anymore, especially if it makes you a threat to the EU.
It wasn’t relevant. The topic was not about USSR justifications for threatening US soil.
Seems kinda obvious…
Sucking Russia off is not a contrary opinion. I’m not going to entertain anyone saying that maybe Russia isnt in the wrong for Invading Ukraine, and maybe the countries providing military support for Ukraine to defend itself are in the wrong for maybe making Russia feel threatened. America does a lot of shit wrong, supporting Ukraine is not one of them in any way.
edit: added accidentally missed half of sentence
What if supporting Ukraine just ends in a loss with a hundred thousand more dead people and less territory; would that have made it a mistake to support Ukraine?
The main issue is that Russia feels that it cant let ukraine join nato, its “the reddest of red lines” and yet they are pushing us toward a direct conflict with russia.
No, the only mistake would be appeasing the dictator by letting him get away with delusional imperialist conquests.
Yeah if the US had invaded Mexico maybe it would be understandable if they sought Russian help. Your whole comment ignores the fact that Russia invaded a sovereign country in 2014 and continues to kill people every day there trying to take it over. There’s no arguing with bullies like Putin, we learned this lesson with Hitler. Burying them in the ground is better than appeasing them.
If the US invaded Mexico, I would fully support any and every country that supported Mexico in pretty much any way.
Wild that you call out posturing with violence, but seem fine to forgive actual violence.
How would the US react if the Russians supported Mexico in joining a military pact against the US, so that the Russians could build military bases and install short range nuclear weapons in Mexico and point then at the US?
This a convoluted scenario, as why would they do this in the first place? The US, as big of an asshole as it is, is not invading Mexico. Mexico is not the least bit worried about it.
Ukraine was very worried about Russia invading them, for years, for legitimate reasons. And what does Russia do to alleviate those fears? Repeatedly threaten them, then actually invade.
A gun happy neighbor you are complicated friends with is very different than a gun happy neighbor who is repeatedly saying they want your house. If the situation afterwards feels unfair, well, that’s Russia’s fault for getting there in the first place.
And if the U.S actually postured itself for invading Mexico, for heavens sake, I would want them to arm themselves to the teeth.
“I hope you know what you’re doing…”
No, there’s no possible way the NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, former Prime Minister of Norway, would know anything about European politics and military policy.
And there’s certainly no one he could consult on the matter.
There’s lots of things to worry about. The Earth has gone above an average temperature of 1.5° C since the Industrial Revolution began. We’re running out of fresh water globally. PFAS is everywhere and microplastics are in every man’s testes.
And you’re worried about whether or not someone who likely knows a hell of a lot more than you do about international policy along with all of their expert advisors know what they’re doing.
I wonder why most neighbours of Russia want to join NATO. Being an aggressive neighbour is the only reason. Russia wants to control their neighbours.
The purely defensive pact keeps on expanding.
Yeah, right after Russia invades one country, capturing and killing men, women, and children while threatening other countries. Weird…
I wonder why? What happened recently to get all these nations lining up to join Nato?
Following the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, many former Warsaw Pact and post-Soviet states sought to join NATO.
Weird that the nations previously under authoritarian rule suddenly wanted to be part of a defensive pact once they had their freedom. That’s such an unforeseen outcome.
I mean, can you believe fucking NATO man? They were such assholes to check notes expand by allowing countries in who wanted to be in NATO to protect themselves. NATO really should have just dissolved instead of expanding and giving former Soviet block states protection from Russia.
Lmfao stfu Tankie.
It’s a “coup” when I dislike it, and a glorious revolution when I do. /s
The CIA paid a million people to stand out in the could for months on end? Whoa, where do they keep all these actors?
They should feel that they lost the cold war and their kleptocracy isn’t conductive to expanding their already reduced sphere of influence, so they better make peace with the fact.
Please expand on your comment, it doesnt say much. As I understand it, a sovereign nation has opted to join a group under its own free will due in part to threats, invasions, land grabs and broken agreements by its nuclear capable neighbour.
You’re taking NATO at face value while ignoring the actions taken underground to pry apart any countries who aren’t friendly to the west. Why would the west need to fund operations like this if it was such a voluntary and clearly beneficial relationship?: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/nov/26/ukraine.usa
And you are acting like the actions taken by aggressive nations dont factor into this at all. Russia annexed Crimea, is it any wonder they want some sort of protection.
