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Ukraine V

Given that I don't agree with any of your three word slogans I suggest that you re-read my posts and not try to misrepresent them. If there is anything that you don't understand then please ask.
 
Klassik must be a naturalized American, like myself, since Klassik's language rythm is distinctly foreign.

Shall Klassik take that as a compliment? :D

Klassik is a native Texan.

Beneath all the bloviating, pomposity and long winded grandstanding, all I'm seeing is an echoing of Russian propaganda and, at best, a complete failure to recognise the true nature of the Putin regime. It's chilling.

Anyone familiar with American foreign policy will be familiar with Putin's as both look very similar. Actually, the US has been involved in more international misadventures than Putin has since Putin's time in power, but Klassik reckons those are easy to ignore since the misadventures didn't happen in North America or Europe. Russia and the US are both arms dealers and countries whose economies are heavily based on fossil fuels. Both have aggressive, meddlesome foreign policy. With all that in mind, it's no surprise that both countries have ended up in conflict with one another with Ukraine at the center of matters.
 
You can see that the words you say I have said do not appear where you said
I said them. It was very obviously about increasing arms to Ukraine, a which is different to your quote which is not what I said.

Nonsense. A difference without any distinction.

I have tried my best to communicate with you in a clear and respectful manner. In return, all I receive from you is obfuscation.

I wish you no animosity, but I see no point in continuing this conversation. The last word is yours, should you choose.
 
Shall Klassik take that as a compliment? :D

Klassik is a native Texan.

Oh, I don't think so. Perhaps a Tulan or Tyumen, though.


Hours later: This was prime posting time in good old Texas, relaxing in your double-wide as the sun sets over big sky country...I surmise that a dire barbeque emergency has kept you away.
 
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What I'm providing is a scenario to end the bloodshed. It may be successful or it may not be.
There’s a truly touching innocence combined with fresh thinking in your formulation. It deserves to be shared more widely than a Hifi forum. People in Poland will be delighted at your prospect of their vassalage being ended and that “they may have to be released from the EU”. In this dream, who’ll be making iron clad guarantees of their neutrality to Mr.Putin?
Thank you also for sharing the wisdom of Klassic.
 
There’s a truly touching innocence combined with fresh thinking in your formulation. It deserves to be shared more widely than a Hifi forum. People in Poland will be delighted at your prospect of their vassalage being ended and that “they may have to be released from the EU”. In this dream, who’ll be making iron clad guarantees of their neutrality to Mr.Putin?
Thank you also for sharing the wisdom of Klassic.
Sarcasm, passive aggressive tone and hostile posts are something you have complained about. @Klassik and @Super Bigote have always posted with utmost grace and civility, yet here you are, again, doing the very thing you say you want to see stopped.
 
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Sarcasm, passive aggressive tone and hostile posts are something you have complained about. @Klassik and @Super Bigote have always posted with utmost grace and civility, yet here you are, again, doing the very thing you say you want to see stopped.
So what do you think about SuperBigote’s New Iron Curtain idea?

For? Against? Has some good points?
 
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Then who is Dutch in the new triplicate membership group that are disrupting this thread? Baron?
The manner in which it’s done is eye catching, judging by a number of responses. Two ( is it two? they seem merged) join and with a third, tag team each other. There’s forum intercourse but no foreplay, straight into political threads, on manoeuvres without self introduction or much if any interest expressed in the more usual audio/music/photography etc.
 
I think Le Barn Door is British but has lived in the Netherlands for years having moved there for work - I think. His Hi-Fi is not up to much.
 
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This is at the heart of the issue. Based on the US's comments and history, there's little reason for Klassik to believe that the US is arming Ukraine for Ukraine to determine their course. The US seems intent on draining Russia the way they did to the USSR in the 1980s with Afghanistan. That was a long, brutal war with long-range consequences long after the war was over with that the US and the rest of the world is still dealing with. Arming Ukraine for Ukraine to fight for their self-determination is one thing, but arming Ukraine in order to use Ukraine as a pseudo-US Army is a whole different matter.
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I think this is your "money shot." Let's unpack.

Your entire argument appears to be based on nothing more than your emotional judgement call and personal anti-american animus.

There are no factual basis given, only "there is very little reason that I believe X."

What's more, even with prima-facia evidence of Russian continued genocide of Ukranian people and perhaps even more horrifically, Ukrainian national identity, you seem far more concerned with the future of Russia and that it not be "drained."

As an aside, given that you are apparently Dutch, I want to tell you that I was very desturbed by your country's passing your anti-burqa law. I consider that a descriminatory attack on religious and personal freedom of Muslims in your country.

It's obvious that the world's leading 'drainer' of Russia is Russia itself led by Drainer-in-Chief Vlad. I'm not sure why Klassik can't grasp this. And Team MMT (a heady collection of Corbynistas, Marxists, and Maduro fans) are obviously pro-Russia (but are careful not to directly come out in support of the Drainer-in-Chief). They live in a binary world of Russia good, America (very) bad. It's not exactly nuanced or revolutionary but here we are.

Anyway, good news that the US Senate has now voted to approve NATO membership for Finland and Sweden.
 
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It's obvious that the world's leading 'drainer' of Russia is Russia itself lead by Drainer-in-Chief Vlad. I'm not sure why Klassik can't grasp this. And Team MMT (a heady collection of Corbynistas, Marxists, and Maduro fans) are obviously pro-Russia (but are careful not to directly come out in support of the Drainer-in-Chief). They live in a binary world of Russia good, America (very) bad. It's not exactly nuanced or revolutionary but here we are.

Anyway, good news that the US Senate has now voted to approve NATO membership for Finland and Sweden.
Exactly. To ascribe an external locus of control to Putin’s behaviours is a grave error. He of course will claim he is simply reacting to external forces but the tell is in his lengthy history of statements about a Greater Russia, gathering in of former Soviet era colonial possessions and the explicit threats of violence he has uttered toward ‘anyone who might consider interfering’ with his conquest of Ukraine.
 
I'm sure everyone will agree that granting/allowing by default Hitler's annexation of 'German' territories worked very well, and, indeed, many inhabitants of these territories welcomed their new overlords. There no reason to suppose that allowing Russian expansion wouldn't work out just as well.
 
Putin had already gathered his invasion force on the borders of Ukraine when he sent his draft treaty ( ie. an ‘or else’ letter) to Washington in December. It contained a list of legally binding infeasible demands required to be met in an equally infeasible time frame and the ‘or else’ was military technical measures. The demands took no account whatsoever of the democratic wishes of much of eastern Europe, including Poland, the former Soviet countries of Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, and the Balkan countries, ie their right to remain in or join NATO. The demands went over their heads to the US. That in itself is indicative of Moscow’s view of their sovereignty.

The dodgy draft treaty proposal was not long out of laser printers in Washington before Putin, after a few days of lying about not attacking, ordered his invasion force to attack Ukraine with the consequences we now see. Unfortunately the best predictor of future behaviour is past behaviour and I don’t think a period of careful introspection and an inquiry into what we could have done differently so that Mr.Putin didn’t have to make this cry for help (invading a sovereign neighbour) is a wise choice.
 
So what do you think about SuperBigote’s New Iron Curtain idea?

For? Against? Has some good points?
Not sure. I think @Super Bigote was not offering a ready made solution as some seem to assume, more offering a suggestion that may, or may not work. I believe he said as much. I would guess that any solution would require a heavily policed border of some sort, but what sort, where and who polices it and who pays for it are all g going to be difficult questions that those on the ground will have to grapple with.

The question of what will Ukraine look like on the ground when this is over is one that seems to have been passed over. It seems highly likely that the US and the IMF will be heavily involved in reconstruction and where that has happened before, everywhere from Chile, to Iraq and including Sri Lanka after the tsunami, a programme of privatisation, deregulation and cuts to public services have followed and reconstruction undertaken in a way that is aimed at creating a financial environment to suit US commercial interests rather and the local population. The costs for the local populations and local business in these and many other cases have been significant both in financial terms and quality of life.

By then though, the baddie will have been defeated and everyone will have left the cinema, put a few coins in a Help Ukraine tin on the way out and will not worry if that money is going to build tourist hotels rather than rebuilding peoples homes
 
Here's what he wrote:

'I think that the best outcome would be a negotiated peace solution which involves NATO reversing on some of its expansion and the creation of another Iron Curtain which is formally agreed upon by both sides in the manner of that after WW2'.

Sounds like a ready made (if completely wrong and impossible) solution to me.
 
...another Iron Curtain which is formally agreed upon by both sides ...

ie an agreed border. Given one party would want it to be to the West of the Donbas and the other along the recognized Ukraine / Russian Border, that's a tricky one.
 


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