Russia is now bombing Ukraine

[ARPA]

On 7/7/2023 at 2:18 PM, Summon Dot E X E said:

 

Blumenthal is a disgusting ruble whore pretending to be virtuous independent journalist. 

[Squee]

On 8/23/2023 at 11:35 PM, auxien said:

 

[ignatius]

neat. 

https://www.kyivpost.com/post/21686

A Ukrainian armed forces unit at the forefront of the recent fighting to liberate the village of Andriivka has released drone footage of what it claims is Russian artillery firing on its own troops as they try and surrender.

[ambermonk]

The current Russian army has to be the most fucked up military in the history of the 21st Century.

[auxien]

38 minutes ago, ambermonk said:

The current Russian army has to be the most fucked up military in the history of the 21st Century.

most fucked up military in the history of the 21st Centrury so far

Edited September 16, 2023 by auxien

[ambermonk]

Technically true...

[decibal cooper]

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/us-european-officials-broach-topic-peace-negotiations-ukraine-sources-rcna123628

Quote

Nov. 3, 2023, 7:47 PM EDT

By Courtney Kube, Carol E. Lee and Kristen Welker

WASHINGTON — U.S. and European officials have begun quietly talking to the Ukrainian government about what possible peace negotiations with Russia might entail to end the war, according to one current senior U.S. official and one former senior U.S. official familiar with the discussions.

The conversations have included very broad outlines of what Ukraine might need to give up to reach a deal, the officials said. Some of the talks, which officials described as delicate, took place last month during a meeting of representatives from more than 50 nations supporting Ukraine, including NATO members, known as the Ukraine Defense Contact Group, the officials said.

[decibal cooper]

 

[o00o]

How high are the chances that Ukraine will be overrun by Russian forces if the U.S. withdraws financial support after Trump's re-election?

[chronical]

15 minutes ago, o00o said:

How high are the chances that Ukraine will be overrun by Russian forces if the U.S. withdraws financial support after Trump's re-election?

let's just not go there.. trump being elected again is spooky as fuck

[decibal cooper]

24 minutes ago, o00o said:

How high are the chances that Ukraine will be overrun by Russian forces if the U.S. withdraws financial support after Trump's re-election?

pretty low, I'd say. In that tweet above from the US NATO account it looks like public messaging is attempting to bring Ukraine to the negotiating table. Weirdly the US secretary of defense was in Kyiv this week pledging America's military support with an added 100 million dollar pledge, so it seems like mixed messaging.

A top military official in Ukraine also said that the war is now a stalemate, which Zelensky denies. Zelensky also said that Western powers are not urging him to negotiate, although it seems like American and European diplomats are in fact pushing in this direction. This guardian piece has a timeline of some of this stuff.

There have also been reports recently, though not in any Western presses as far as I can tell, that the former Israeli prime minister Naftali Bennett, who was in charge of negotiations between Ukraine and Russia weeks after Putin invaded, where he said that a viable peace deal was on the table at that time (which both Ukraine and Russia were open to) but that Boris Johnson in the UK put pressure on Ukraine to decline, telling him that Western powers would support Ukraine militarily and with financial aid. This article has an interview embedded that Bennett uploaded to his YouTube account. I have not checked it out yet, as the interview is like 5 hours long and is also in Hebrew, but there are time stamps it looks like on the sections about Ukraine.

Edited November 21, 2023 by decibal cooper
I messed up timeline of events, corrected

[ignatius]

haven't watched yet.. 

 

[decibal cooper]

https://www.hindustantimes.com/videos/west-pushed-ukraine-to-zelensky-aides-bombshell-admission-about-russias-war-details-101700922490891.html

Quote

Ukraine's top MP and President Volodymyr Zelensky's aide, David Arakhamia, has admitted that Ukraine wanted to end the war back in 2022 itself but it was the West that didn't let it go ahead. “Russia’s goal was to put pressure on us so that we would take neutrality. This was the main thing for them. They were ready to end the war if we accepted neutrality, like Finland once did. And we would make a commitment that we will not join NATO. This was the main thing,” Arakhamia told TV Channel 1+1. He also revealed how former UK PM Boris Johnson had convinced Ukrainian officials to continue the war. Watch for more details.

 

[Enthusiast]

6 hours ago, decibal cooper said:

hindustantimes

 

You'd be hard pressed to find a more pro-Russian propaganda outlet anywhere.

[decibal cooper]

it's reported elsewhere: https://www.firstpost.com/world/ongoing-conflict-could-have-ended-in-2022-if-ukraine-agreed-to-remain-neutral-kyivs-top-mp-13428982.html

I am not sure what this publication (Firstpost) is, looks like an Indian periodical.

This is also the guy, David Arakhamia, Zelensky's aide, speaking for himself:

There are translations in the comments, and one of them mentions negotiation meetings in Istanbul, and that was the major negotiation that Naftali Bennet, who I mention in an earlier post, was presiding over.

[Enthusiast]

You trust this guy? And this periodical you have never heard of before?

[decibal cooper]

16 minutes ago, Enthusiast said:

You trust this guy? And this periodical you have never heard of before?

I have been following the Ukraine-Russia war only recently and from a great distance (in America), so I am obviously missing a lot of important context on the culture, history, language, etc. of both Russia and Ukraine, but yes I am open to the idea that this guy is telling the truth. His name is David Arakhamia, who is a close advisor to Zelensky. This is from his Wikipedia page: "During the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, Arakhamia was part of a close circle of advisors who remained in the capital of Kyiv with President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.[14] On February 28, Arakhamia was named a member of the negotiating team sent to Pripyat on the Ukraine-Belarus border for talks on a potential ceasefire.[15] In April, he said Russia had agreed to almost all Ukraine's peace proposals.[16] He added that he had the "feeling that the US and the UK will be the last to join when they see that others agree"

I feel like his comments in the video, along with the NBC news article that I posted on Nov 7, the US NATO tweet, and the revelations of Naftali Bennet, who was leading the negotiations between Russia and Ukraine weeks after Russia invaded, indicate that Western powers are now trying to bring Ukraine to the negotiating table and that the war could have been avoided at it's outset. Conservative estimates are that 10,000 Ukrainian civilians have been killed, and also 60,000 Ukrainian soldiers (conscripted soldiers) have been killed. I also do not know the scope of the damage that has been done to Ukraine, but I imagine that many cities and towns are probably rubble now. I haven't looked into Russian war casualties but I bet they are high as well. 

I am open to having my mind changed, but what is the alternative, who do you think should be trusted at this point? Do you think that it is America and the west?

Edited November 25, 2023 by decibal cooper
changed "other" to "also" in 2nd paragraph

[zero]

On 11/25/2023 at 5:57 PM, decibal cooper said:

I am open to having my mind changed, but what is the alternative, who do you think should be trusted at this point? Do you think that it is America and the west?

those links to articles you posted both have a very heavy "it's all the west's fault" vibe to them, which is usually a red flag to me that an agenda is being pushed (i.e. propaganda). any sort of fact-based reporting should strive to be as neutral as possible, unless of course it's an opinion piece, of which the articles you linked to aren't being portrayed as such. bias in media is nothing new, but we all know it's been weaponized heavily thanks to this internet era of shit head politician social media fuckery we normal civilians have to deal with.

I saw this article earlier with the same Ukranian dude quoted, which seems to put a bit of a different spin on the intended message here: 

https://www.businessinsider.com/russia-told-ukraine-to-scrap-nato-to-end-the-war

the takeaway here should be is that you can't trust anything the Russians say about the war in Ukraine.

 

[decibal cooper]

1 hour ago, zero said:

those links to articles you posted both have a very heavy "it's all the west's fault" vibe to them, which is usually a red flag to me that an agenda is being pushed (i.e. propaganda). any sort of fact-based reporting should strive to be as neutral as possible, unless of course it's an opinion piece, of which the articles you linked to aren't being portrayed as such. bias in media is nothing new, but we all know it's been weaponized heavily thanks to this internet era of shit head politician social media fuckery we normal civilians have to deal with.

I saw this article earlier with the same Ukranian dude quoted, which seems to put a bit of a different spin on the intended message here: 

https://www.businessinsider.com/russia-told-ukraine-to-scrap-nato-to-end-the-war

the takeaway here should be is that you can't trust anything the Russians say about the war in Ukraine.

 

I appreciate this response, and regarding your last point I think that you are right on the money, but I would also add that the same should be stated for Western media. It's like the x files, trust no one. I agree with what you say about fact-based stuff being the best, but it is virtually impossible to come by. The only hope imo is to amass as many different sources as possible and try to detect where there are overlapping facts among the differing ideological lenses.

The business insider article puts a different spin on it, but it does not go into any detail about why Russia could not be trusted (specifically related to security assurances that Kyiv wanted in the negotiated deal), and it also reiterates the idea that Ukraine formally staying out of NATO was the key sticking point from Russia's point of view. I tried looking into this, but the only thing I came across was a wall street journal article from March 2022 which I could not fully access because of a paywall, but the headline and first paragraphs indicate that Kyiv would have agreed to neutrality if there were also commitments from the western powers for a UN type assurance that the West would help Ukraine defend itself if Russia reneged on the deal. Not really sure what to make of that, though, without access to the whole article.

Either way, from what I am seeing it looks like Ukraine is losing the war and that they will not win and that negotiations are likely, which puts everything back at square one when the war broke out but with huge losses on Ukraine's population and infrastructure. If this is true, then it benefits Russia. A lot of political commentators are saying that this conflict helped bring Russia and China closer diplomatically and in other ways (enriched uranium ways), and now they both get to sit on the sidelines of a middle eastern conflict which America supports unconditionally (and will most likely become even worse after the cease-fire and once ground operations begin in the south of Gaza). They get to sit on the sidelines and condemn western powers and look like the good guys.

Edited November 27, 2023 by decibal cooper
forgot to link wsj article

[zero]

39 minutes ago, decibal cooper said:

The business insider article puts a different spin on it, but it does not go into any detail about why Russia could not be trusted (specifically related to security assurances that Kyiv wanted in the negotiated deal)

Russia can't be trusted since it is a known fact that their leader is no different than a mafia kingpin. lying and Russian leadership go hand in hand. look at how this started. Vlad's own advisers lied to him about how easy it would be to take Ukraine. there was the lie about eliminating nazis. lying to their own troops regarding why they are even in Ukraine... that's why outside influence from China, US, etc. has to be forced upon Russia to get them to quit with this disastrous quagmire they have gotten into. they can't be trusted to come to the negotiation table, so other countries have to work on behalf of one side or the other to try and get this pointless war to end.  

the whole trust no one ethos only goes so far IMO. western media reporting is night and day compared to the state run propaganda machine. yes multiple sources are the best way to determine what's actually going on out there. but I wouldn't go as far as saying impossible to come by though. I'd like to think that outlets like NPR, BBC, Politico, Guardian, NY Times, are still credible outlets for information... if you don't trust any of it then that's cool. at least we have scientific fact, which so far hasn't let us down lol.

[cichlisuite]

14 hours ago, zero said:

the takeaway here should be is that you can't trust anything the Russians say about the war in Ukraine.

 

the west had proven well in the past that their official narratives concerning their involvement in any conflict in the world was also swayed into propaganda, or constructing reasons (and public opinion) to invade foreign nations. I don't see any difference between the two, to be honest. Can you trust anything that western coalition has to say about both Iraqi invasions and Afghanistan, for instance?

I think we can't trust any official narratives for that matter, and that is some heavy shit. Well, at least I don't. I can only, to some extent, trust people that have studied related subjects, been there, studied history of the involved regions, etc.

[zero]

7 hours ago, cichlisuite said:

I think we can't trust any official narratives for that matter, and that is some heavy shit. Well, at least I don't. I can only, to some extent, trust people that have studied related subjects, been there, studied history of the involved regions, etc.

I hear what you guys are saying...basically a very low percent of people trusts any of their governments anymore when it comes to their narratives. we certainly can't trust the official Russian version of events, and we can't exactly trust the other side either. so then it boils down to who do you trust more. in order to make that determination, we go to various outsider academics or non-profit groups to try and get all the facts.

this made me curious as to when did this phenomenon begin, since I don't think it was always this way. here's an interesting chart regarding declining trust in the US govt:

https://www.pewresearch.org/politics/2023/09/19/public-trust-in-government-1958-2023/ 

[Enthusiast]

On 11/25/2023 at 11:57 PM, decibal cooper said:

I am open to having my mind changed, but what is the alternative, who do you think should be trusted at this point? Do you think that it is America and the west?

 

The alternative is media literacy and using critical thinking.  If you can't tell the difference between fact-based reporting and agenda driven horseshit, or if you simply opt to suspend your critical faculties when presented with something that reinforces your already held worldview then it hardly matters where you get your news from. 

[may be rude]

 

 

Edited November 28, 2023 by trying to be less rude

[usagi]

12 hours ago, Enthusiast said:

The alternative is media literacy and using critical thinking.  If you can't tell the difference between fact-based reporting and agenda driven horseshit, or if you simply opt to suspend your critical faculties when presented with something that reinforces your already held worldview then it hardly matters where you get your news from. 

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