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sanctions wouldn't work as a deterrent. if you're getting punished for potentially doing something, might as well actually do it and try to make it worth it. the hope was the threat of sanctions might deter it, but didn't either.

Good post I'm just ruminating but the West has lost a lot of it's teeth to China,courtesy of the 1%ers here. So they may not need the West at all as long as the CCP would concur/consent

Yes UT and the LHN are evil and nobody should ever move to Texas.

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Anyway, now that Germany has killed NS2, will Putin respond by cutting off NS1 and the other pipelines into Europe?  It would harm them, but it would also harm his own country.

there will be some kind of political settlement and they'll work this all out imo. Europe needs that gas desperately and they are Russia's biggest customer. Russian gas is 40-50% cheaper for Europe to purchase than US liquified natural gas. That's a lot less. And north of 40% of Europe's entire natural gas supply comes from Russia. They need each other.

The US shouldn't have pushed so hard and for so long to bring Ukraine into it's orbit and pick it off from Russia. Since 1992 the US has spent $5.2 billion in Ukraine trying to "democratize" that country. The money this country just pisses down the drain on stupid shit is beyond ridiculous. No wonder why the national deficit is what it is. I have no clue why on earth they would even want a corrupt worthless useless country like Ukraine in their sphere of influence other than to f**k with Russia. I really don't. It holds zero strategic value to have it in our sphere of influence and to have them in NATO. Literally zero. Actually, less than zero because of the conflict it's causing right now.

And one of the main reasons why Ukraine hasn't been able to join NATO (aside from pushback from Russia and France and Germany blocking it at every turn) is that Ukraine is a spectacularly corrupt country- and after the US backed coup (which included supporting literal nazis) of a democratically elected government in 2014- it is still a hilariously corrupt country. And NATO doesn't let corrupt countries join- it's part of their mo- NO CORRUPTION! But I think corruption is just par for the course with the US though- whenever the US tends to get involved with coups or nation building- the governments that follow are hilariously corrupt- just look at the US backed propped up governments in Iraq and Afghanistan- both basically as corrupt as it possibly gets.

The US shouldn't have pushed so hard and for so long to bring Ukraine into it's orbit and pick it off from Russia. Since 1992 the US has spent $5.2 billion in Ukraine trying to "democratize" that country. The money this country just pisses down the drain on stupid shit is beyond ridiculous.

Doesn't the Apple of Sleepy Joe's eye have some stake their?

Europe is Heaven, so I heard

that's Iowa

Hope you're wrong but it sounds about right. The whole damn thing could get pretty ugly,perhaps Putin will be bitting of his nose to spite his face

I don't think he's thinking particularly long-term.  He's almost 70 and knows he doesn't have a lot of time left.  He might feel that he's waited long enough.

But I certainly hope the worst doesn't happen, and I especially hope the US keeps our troops out of it, if the worst DOES happen.

Ukraine can't be admitted to NATO while there are any disputes at all ongoing.  Putin knows this and continues to ensure disputes are ongoing.  That's been his strategy for the past 8 years.

But this looks different.  He doesn't want or need the regions that his invasion forces are "liberating."  There's no significant economic or strategic benefit to those two regions.

That's why I believe this is just the next step to a complete invasion. Putin wants Ukraine.  He wants its natural resources, he wants its people back within his domain.  He doesn't want two small regions.  He's trying to force Ukraine into responding so he can justify his next steps for complete takeover.  But even if they don't respond, I don't believe he's going to stop after annexing these two "independent" states.

He wants Ukraine.  All of it.  And he believes it's his right to take it.

You make a great point about conflicts/disputes- one I made a few days ago. Because hypothetically - Ukraine were to join NATO tomorrow- WWIII kicks off as the other NATO members would be compelled to defend Ukraine. Russia doing this crap helps ensure Ukraine isn't joining NATO anytime soon.

Even if there were zero disputes though, Ukraine still would not be eligible to join NATO. They do not meet the threshold when it comes to corruption. They are a spectacularly corrupt country.

Yanukovych was trying to stay neutral. He wisely dropped unrealistic NATO membership aspirations. Putin didn't "want Ukraine all for himself" before the US backed coup in 2014. There was no real evidence of that. Why does he want it all for himself now? My guess here is he's further mucking sh*t up in order to force some kind of solution and to ensure Ukraine never joins NATO. I hope he doesn't actually invade Ukraine take Kiev and start a real war because if that does happen unfortunately I think US will get involved and I don't want to see any more American blood and treasure spent on more pointless wars that have zero meaning to the US and it's people.