Thoughts and Comments on Current Russian,Ukrainian Conflict/War

[hball55]

Opposing viewpoints are great and can foster all sorts of discussion and understanding.

Blatantly false information shared as truth is not the same thing.
Calling others fascists or any of the other things you've tossed out as insults are also not the same thing.

There's an ocean of difference between the moderators removing things that break the rules and your rights being trampled by 'those in here with fascist tendencies'.

Round gave his opinion, just like the rest of us. You can ignore his opinion or argue against his opinion with your own opinion. Certain people who think they are arbiters of the truth are fooling themselves. Fascists get their way when they arbitrate what the truth is and decide to censor. I don’t pretend to arbitrate what is truth and what isn’t truth, but obviously fascists do and the dialogue suffers for it.

what was blatantly false?

 

[CalebJ]

Round gave his opinion, just like the rest of us. You can ignore his opinion or argue against his opinion with your own opinion. Certain people who think they are arbiters of the truth are fooling themselves. Fascists get their way when they arbitrate what the truth is and decide to censor. I don’t pretend to arbitrate what is truth and what isn’t truth, but obviously fascists do and the dialogue suffers for it.

what was blatantly false?

His posts were deleted by the staff, so we can go back and forth on what we remember them containing while accomplishing exactly nothing. I am inclined to trust that the staff is fully capable of applying the rules of the forum in a reasonable manner, and disinclined to call other members and/or the staff fascists. That is not (and never will be) a way to have a productive conversation.

 

[heada]

As long as a post doesn't violate the site TOS, then it should remain. Even blatantly false information. It is better to counter with the truth rather than suppress the voice.

 

[CalebJ]

As long as a post doesn't violate the site TOS, then it should remain. Even blatantly false information. It is better to counter with the truth rather than suppress the voice.

That's certainly a reasonable perspective. I didn't see everything that was posted - but one that jumped out at me was a reference to the current Ukrainian leader that crossed the line into Godwin's Law territory, so it explicitly crossed the TOS guidelines.

 

[afadeev]

If NATO attempted to enforce a no-fly zone over Ukraine, that would probably be the ideal provocation to get Putin to use his nukes. He already strongly hinted this a few days ago.

Nonsense.
NATO has more effective and better guided nukes than Russia. Any attempt by Putin to escalate the conflict to nuclear status would lead to instant retaliation and annihilation of his regime. Putin knows this full well, and will NEVER go there. He will saber rattle to deter future containment efforts, but that's as far as that will go.

If there is one thing in this world you can rely on, it is dictators obsession with self-preservation. Self-preservation even trumps their self-importance and ego-massaging. Even Saddam, no matter how belligerent and psychotic he was, didn't want to die. Saddam hid in all sorts of sh!t holes for ~9 months after he lost his country until we found him.

Putin would never do ANYTHING to endanger his ability to stay in power.
He may have a skewed sense of reality as to what he needs to do to earn a place in history, but he is not suicidal in any way. Thus, he would NEVER use nukes. He WILL threaten to do so and sabre rattle till cows come home, but will never touch them, since he knows that will be the end of him.

I know it's a total pipe dream, but wouldn't it be nice if the world would rise as one, and demand the removal of all nuclear weapons. I know, I know, Pandora's box only opens, never closes. But if Putin didn't have 6000 plus nukes he never would have done this.

In the history of the world, no technological advancement has ever been "forgotten". Once a discovery is made, it has been fully explored for its maximum productive as well as destructive potential.
w.r.t Putin's motivation, I am pretty sure he would have done this anyway, with or w/o any particular types of weapons in his arsenal. His Soviet predecessors moved in on Eastern/Central Europe without nukes (developed later), because they had the desire to expand their "sphere of influence" by military means. Putin is a Stalin/Hitler wanna-be (same totalitarian sh*t, different flavor), and he is following in the footsteps of his idols.

In a perverted way, his actions are perfectly logical. US did little to nothing in response to Russia's previous invasions: Moldova (1992, 2002), Georgia (2008), Syria (2015), Kazakhstan (2022), and Ukraine (2014, 2022).
If we did nothing to stop Russia earlier, in Putin's head, the US and the World are way over-reacting now!

How far is US willing to go to stop Putin now (as opposed sanctions that will take 2-10 years to work)?
I'm not sure, but the State of the Union address later today might provide some clues.

a

 

[kuririn]

Fascists get their way

obviously fascists do

Here we go again.
As I said many times on other threads, when one resorts to ad hominem or denigratory labels like fascists, Nazis, commies, poorly informed (not naming names, you know who you are) then it reflects on the weakness of that person's arguments. If someone had a strong case that can be supported through the facts and calm logical deductive reasoning then they wouldn't be resorting to name calling.
Oh. and please read and FOLLOW the forum rules. It would save the rest of us from wasting energy enlightening the uninformed.

 

[Orien]

US F-35s from Germany have been dispatched to bolster NATOs' eastern flank.
The Dutch have also added a couple of F-35s.
Ukraine has asked NATO to enforce a no fly zone but if they did we would have an all out war with Russia. Nevertheless it would be interesting to see how western fighters fare against Sukhois and MiGs. In particular F-22s and F-35s. I suspect our command and control is superior. It's not just about the aircraft.
F-22 Stealth Fighters: How NATO Could Enforce a No-Fly Zone over Ukraine? - 19FortyFive

Read Putin's speech he gave justifying the invasion then read Round's post. Virtually a word for word rehash. Being a Russian psy op troll would be a rule violation.. If you can't see that then I just hope you're not active duty military.
If it walks like a duck.

 

[Matt_The_RocketMan]

Question being, Russia does fail to capture Kyiv and other key cities....With Putin being most likely mentally unstable he may become like a child who does not get his own ways and possibly calls for heavy bombing of the cities rather than military ground ops potentially using unneeded nuclear weapons to claim victory

 

[jderimig]

Round gave his opinion,

what was blatantly false?

HIs claim about the Snake Island being false story could be true in fact. There is no evidence (sat photos) that indicates that island was actually attacked, but we have sat photos of everything else on the ground over there.

I wonder if the staff banned him also? He could be a real person with incorrect opinions like the rest of us could have occasionally.

 

[kuririn]

View attachment 507140

Hey. did you guys hear something?
Sounds like a little pest buzzing around.
Must be my imagination.

 

[ThirstyBarbarian]

Ukraine made a formal application to join the EU yesterday. It usually takes years for the process to be completed, so this is mostly symbolic at this point, and kind of a troll of Putin.

 

[kuririn]

I wonder if the staff banned him also? He could be a real person with incorrect opinions like the rest of us could have occasionally.

Admins have more info than we do, like the persons' IP address.
Maybe they know something more than we do.
In any case, from past experiences I'm confident in their even handed enforcement of forum rules.
Anyone who feels differently can find plenty of forums where they can argue about the conflict to their hearts' content.
And even rant and name call.

 

[heada]

Ukraine made a formal application to join the EU yesterday. It usually takes years for the process to be completed, so this is mostly symbolic at this point, and kind of a troll of Putin.

They also asked that it be approved in an emergency fashion. I'm not sure what rules are in place but even if the application is granted, what protections does that convey if any?

 

[boatgeek]

Question being, Russia does fail to capture Kyiv and other key cities....With Putin being most likely mentally unstable he may become like a child who does not get his own ways and possibly calls for heavy bombing of the cities rather than military ground ops potentially using unneeded nuclear weapons to claim victory

If the Russians start carpet bombing cities, I would expect NATO to enforce a no-fly zone for humanitarian reasons. We did much the same in Kosovo.

HIs claim about the Snake Island being false story could be true in fact. There is no evidence (sat photos) that indicates that island was actually attacked, but we have sat photos of everything else on the ground over there.

I wonder if the staff banned him also? He could be a real person with incorrect opinions like the rest of us could have occasionally.

I'm pretty sure I've seen official confirmation that the Ukrainians on Snake Island were not killed.

I don't have direct knowledge, but I would expect that the mods make a cost-benefit analysis. If someone is generating a lot of work for the mods by having a lot of posts reported, they're more likely to get removed and/or banned. I would hope that the mods would look at how much positive/rocketry-related content a user has created in addition to the content that generated the reports. IIRC, users who have been a pain in the butt get a time out before a permaban. OTOH, users who have no history of positive contributions and are a pain in the butt might get banned pretty fast.

 

[hball55]

HIs claim about the Snake Island being false story could be true in fact. There is no evidence (sat photos) that indicates that island was actually attacked, but we have sat photos of everything else on the ground over there.

I wonder if the staff banned him also? He could be a real person with incorrect opinions like the rest of us could have occasionally.

Round has been a registered member since 2011. Prior to his posts in this thread, his posts have all been in one thread that he created and has continually posted new information. Obviously his frame of reference is Russian but that doesn’t disqualify his opinions no matter what others say. However, they ARE using that as reason to call his opinions “propaganda” and censoring him. Who is to say what we are hearing from our news agencies isn’t propaganda . . . I would claim that much of what you hear on MSNBC and CNN is propaganda, depending on the subject, while others would say the same of FOX News. We could be disseminating propaganda without knowing it, so why not give Round the same consideration.

I doubt he came here eleven years ago, waiting for this opportunity to spread propaganda.

 

[jderimig]

Round has been a registered member since 2011. Prior to his posts in this thread, his posts have all been in one thread that he created and has continually posted new information. Obviously his frame of reference is Russian but that doesn’t disqualify his opinions no matter what others say. However, they ARE using that as reason to call his opinions “propaganda” and censoring him. Who is to say what we are hearing from our news agencies isn’t propaganda . . . I would claim that much of what you hear on MSNBC and CNN is propaganda, depending on the subject, while others would say the same of FOX News. We could be disseminating propaganda without knowing it, so why not give Round the same consideration.

My guess is one or two Karen's on this site got triggered by an opinion they didn't like and pounded the report button to the point of almost breaking their keyboard. They may have a bright future at Facebook, Google, the FSB or in China. Not the moderators best courage day.

 

[hball55]

View attachment 507140

Sounds like many posting here, just go to the Covid threads and see who posts most frequently the same expert opinions over and over, beating a dead horse, then see the same people offering their expert opinions on foreign policy here. The key word being OPINIONS, many of which parrot the talking heads of our news organizations. Are they being unwitting propagandists? Or are they just opining info they agree with.

 

[ThirstyBarbarian]

They also asked that it be approved in an emergency fashion. I'm not sure what rules are in place but even if the application is granted, what protections does that convey if any?

I honestly don’t know what practical difference it would make for the current war. It’s an economic union, not a military pact, so I don’t know that it offers any actual protections. Even if approved, it’s a long process to integrate an economy into the union. I think it’s importance for this moment is mostly symbolic. Putin doesn’t want Ukraine moving toward the west, so an application to join the EU is exactly the opposite of what he wants.

 

[StreuB1]

I believe that Ukraine is applying to become an EU member and Poland and the other countries are supporting an accelerated process is that (I believe) would give Ukraine the authority to hand over its airspace to another country to act as custodians (like the US did on 9/11).

This would then give the custodian full rights to the airspace. An intruder into the airspace would then fall under the purview of the ROL of the custodian.

This would give the ability for another country to assess unlawful incursions into that airspace and respond accordingly.

I believe that the rules could be bent in a way to make this viable.

 

[ThirstyBarbarian]

I’ve had several of my posts deleted from this thread too, and you don’t hear me bitching about Karens calling the “gazpacho police“ on me. Sheesh. Get over yourselves. This is a very touchy topic being discussed on a hobby forum, and I’m glad we can even have this discussion here at all.

 

[kuririn]

Could be senility setting in . . . my bet is on senility.

There it goes again!

 

[jderimig]

Round has been a registered member since 2011. Prior to his posts in this thread, his posts have all been in one thread that he created and has continually posted new information. Obviously his frame of reference is Russian but that doesn’t disqualify his opinions no matter what others say. However, they ARE using that as reason to call his opinions “propaganda” and censoring him. Who is to say what we are hearing from our news agencies isn’t propaganda . . . I would claim that much of what you hear on MSNBC and CNN is propaganda, depending on the subject, while others would say the same of FOX News. We could be disseminating propaganda without knowing it, so why not give Round the same consideration.

I doubt he came here eleven years ago, waiting for this opportunity to spread propaganda.

I am guessing he is Russian and proud of his country. His recent posts did not express pride in the invasion but regret He attempted to rationalize it, that is human. He laid some blame on the west but he is not alone, Thomas Friedman of the NYT does also. Do we ban and censor the NYT? He is probably influenced by the Russian media and messages and if he is wrong he is a victim of that. His posts should stand so we can understand the other side. Maybe by civil interaction (not censoring) he may be able to understand us.

 

[boomtube-mk2]

Ukrainians and Russians are one people?
Even if that statement were true, it is irrelevant.
Because you could say the same thing about Canadiens and Americans, yet I don't foresee U.S. tanks rolling into Ottawa anytime soon.

 

[GlueckAuf]

If the roads around here were that good I'd be ecstatic.

Here we go again.
As I said many times on other threads, when one resorts to ad hominem or denigratory labels like fascists, Nazis, commies, poorly informed (not naming names, you know who you are) then it reflects on the weakness of that person's arguments.

For the record, it was “poorly-informed friend”, and the post offered you respected, objective documentation (Forbes) to point out its basis. But if your sensitivities were offended, I apologize.

 

[kuririn]

I believe that Ukraine is applying to become an EU member and Poland and the other countries are supporting an accelerated process is that (I believe) would give Ukraine the authority to hand over its airspace to another country to act as custodians (like the US did on 9/11).

This would then give the custodian full rights to the airspace. An intruder into the airspace would then fall under the purview of the ROL of the custodian.

This would give the ability for another country to assess unlawful incursions into that airspace and respond accordingly.

I believe that the rules could be bent in a way to make this viable.

Having the authority and enforcing that authority are two different things.
Russia will not easily give up air cover for it's ground forces.
Enforcing a no fly zone will be a marked escalation.
I'll be very surprised if that happens.

 

[kuririn]

For the record, it was “poorly-informed friend”, and the post offered you respected, objective documentation (Forbes) to point out its basis. But if your sensitivities were offended, I apologize.

Don't worry, friend.
I'm not that fragile.
EDIT: For the record, the "credit" for why the US was a net energy producer one year goes to the covid pandemic, not any change in administration energy policy. Look at the graph. Modest increase in production. HUGE drop in demand/usage. Communities in lockdown. cars not on the road. Cruise ships not sailing. Airlines not flying.
And net energy production is not the same as energy independence., which was the topic of the statement I was addressing. If we were energy independent we would not be importing hundreds of thousands of barrels a day of foreign oil.
But, please carry on.

 

[heada]

Ukrainians and Russians are one people?
Even if that statement were true, it is irrelevant.
Because you could say the same thing about Canadiens and Americans, yet I don't foresee U.S. tanks rolling into Ottawa anytime soon.

Ya never know.....those sneaky canuks might try to invade the US.....for strategic maple syrup purposes or so they'd tell us. (all kidding aside, I consider the US and Canada as close as the same as possible. If Canada were to be attacked, I would expect 100% comittment by the US in their defense)

 

[PhilC]

I believe that Ukraine is applying to become an EU member and Poland and the other countries are supporting an accelerated process is that (I believe) would give Ukraine the authority to hand over its airspace to another country to act as custodians (like the US did on 9/11).

This would then give the custodian full rights to the airspace. An intruder into the airspace would then fall under the purview of the ROL of the custodian.

This would give the ability for another country to assess unlawful incursions into that airspace and respond accordingly.

I believe that the rules could be bent in a way to make this viable.

Sorry but I dont buy this idea. The EU coordinates the airspace regulations for its member nations, but each nation is responsible for managing its own airspace. The EU has no authority over military matters which are similarly the responsibility of each nation.

 

[boomtube-mk2]

[NM]

 

[jderimig]

Ukrainians and Russians are one people?
Even if that statement were true, it is irrelevant.
Because you could say the same thing about Canadiens and Americans, yet I don't foresee U.S. tanks rolling into Ottawa anytime soon.

Then debate him, don't banish him.