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[Journeywalker]

It wasn't threatened when it was a Russian puppet before the (western) coup. Now it's a western puppet so of course Russia goes crazy like everybody with a brain expected to happen looking at Russia's history (though some of it like Crimea did surprise people because of the swiftness/aggressiveness of the land grab).

So how far back are we going to go for the "start" of this increase in tensions? 2008? 1994?

And if you're going to just excuse Russia for doing what's "expected," why isn't the United States excused for doing what's "expected?" The recent actions of Russia are a wake up call that the Cold War never ended for them.

 

[LookAtMeGo]

Where there's smoke, there's mirrors.

 

[Joezie]

I think it speaks to the general bubble most of you have created and are happy to live in, many of my initial arguments are consistently whittled down to fit your agendas. For example, I say that Russias annexation of Crimea was not an escalation of tensions WITH the U.S, simply for the fact that Ukraine was not an ally neither was Crimea a part of the U.S. You, however, ask "Who is honestly going to argue that the annexation of Crimea and the poisoning/election meddling in Ukraine ISN'T escalation?". I never said that, what i said was that it was not an escalation of tensions WITH the US. Is every conflict in the world an escalation of tensions with the US? Ukraine was NOT a US ally, how can Russia escalate tensions with the U.S when it was fighting a completely different country unconnected in anyway to the U.S? anyone with even a passing glance of geopolitics would understand this, problem i think is that i give the general populace too much credit. If it makes you feel better then yes, Putin employs me personally.

You must've missed the part where Russia signed a literal treaty(of which the US was also party to) explicitly outlining their commitment to both respect Ukrainian borders(in which case if you didn't know, Annexation doesn't quite fulfill) and refrain from the use of force against Ukraine(which again, little green men also quite fails)

 

[Wolfgunblood Garopa]

is this supposed to make me feel bad about them or something? Sorry, I'm not capable to feel sad for bullies getting bullied... or in this case back-stabbers who spy on their "allies".

With the kind of criteria you list, you may just as well call the US a Mafia state... or many of it's allies in the middle east. This doesn't justify what's going on there, but let's not pretend it's a faithful and complete representation of the entire state.
When reading gaf you could get the impression that you're dealing with a North Korea-like dictatorship, which, no matter how much the media likes to paint that picture, is not the case (yet). You're still dealing with an (illiberal) democracy, a somewhat complex one at that. If this wasn't the case, measures against the country would look vastly different.

Educate yourself, start with Bill Browder and his testimony to the Senate last week. Russia is a mafia state, period point blank. Putin is using Russia as his personal bank. It is an entirely corrupt government that tortures and assassinates, and you can fuck right off with your comparison to the US.

 

[GTP_Daverytimes]

You must've missed the part where Russia signed a literal treaty(of which the US was also party to) explicitly outlining their commitment to both respect Ukrainian borders(in which case if you didn't know, Annexation doesn't quite fulfill) and refrain from the use of force against Ukraine(which again, little green men also quite fails)

I must have missed this, when did they sign a treaty? You mean the Memorandum on security assurance? When did that become a treaty?

 

[Dingens]

So how many journalists, or political rivals of the government in power end up dead in the united States?

Your whataboutism failed utterly

the US is not the focus of my answer? It's about the idea that a whole country can be simplified and summed up with a single term. Which it cannot. That's where my comparison came in. Based on the criteria you could as well call the US an evil empire (even though they tend to do their shit abroad). But would that be fair? For whatever actions the US takes, it also does good things. For everything Russia does, I'm sure it does something good... somewhere... probably.. maybe? Completely vilifying an opponent and buying into that is a slippery slope, as governments can and will use it to justify all kinds of crap.

Would the US public support a war with the Russia of 2008? Most likely not. Would they Support one with the vilified Russia of 2016? I'm sure you know the answer.

Educate yourself, start with Bill Browder and his testimony to the Senate last week. Russia is a mafia state, period point blank. Putin is using Russia as his personal bank. It is an entirely corrupt government that tortures and assassinates, and you can fuck right off with your comparison to the US.

I did not compare it to the US at all. I said based on the criteria you could make the argument, but it never said nor believed that the US was like Russia. That would be ridiculous. They may have a lot in common but are hardly the same.

 

[Lime]

RUSSIA escalated this conflict when they waged cyber warfare on our country

The solution is not to cut diplomatic ties. That just makes things worse.

Considering what has been going on in the past two years with multiple sources saying the Trump campaign was aided by Russians and the cyber attacks against the US.

How is cutting diplomatic ties a solution or an improvement on bettering the relationship between two nuclear powers?

Not a knock on you but I could see this exact comment being Trumps reasoning for vetoing the Russian sanctions bill from Congress

That just means that the whole "Russia is evil and should be punished at all costs" narrative is infecting liberals where they lose sight of what's good de-escalation and good diplomacy

Considering how compromised the American government is by Russian interests, I don't think a conflict is actually possible at this point. The fact that Trump isn't blowing up on Twitter about this when he overreacts to even the mildest slight is proof that there's no danger of the US standing up to this.

Trump will probably just blame the Democrats for attacking innocent Russia, and urge a lifting of the sanctions. It's flat out impossible he'll call out Putin on this and make the situation worse. At least, worse for Russia.

Forget Trump, think about what it means for international relations.

An escalation of conflict is inevitable when the other side has no interests in deescalation.

Thank god you're not in politics, especially when it concerns two nuclear powers.

 

[Journeywalker]

I must have missed this, when did they sign a treaty? You mean the Memorandum on security assurance? When did that become a treaty?

Good to know that Russia's going after Kazakhstan next. Thanks.

You're being obtuse. The US and Israel are not technically "allies." But it is understood that if Russia were to send in troops to Israel via their Syrian proxy, the United States would get involved.

Of course, the Russian propaganda line would be, "United States is escalating things by intervening in a conflict they have no business in."

And you would gladly spew that line here like the shill you are.

 

[GK86]