Hacker News Reader

Comment by reducesuffering | Hacker News Reader

> And NATO is nothing if not expansionist, continuing to grow -- hell, to exist -- long after its raison d'etre, the USSR, ceased to be

You say this like there hasn't been multiple unprovoked invasions by Russia in just the last 7 years...

View on HN

Have you seen how many countries the US has bombed in just the last 7 years?

We could go on for a decade about this without convincing each other. Probably not productive.

So I'll just say that if the situation were inverted -- if e.g. Russia was sitting in Mexico "promoting democracy" -- we'd be engaging in "multiple unprovoked invasions" too. Reagan and NATO told Gorbachev pre-collapse that there'd be no NATO expansion in the future. They lied. We've forgotten that. You think the Russians have? Should they?

Furthermore, the situation was inverted -- look at the Cuban missile crisis. Does anyone say that the US shouldn't have threatened to vaporize the island to get the Russians out of there? It's our backyard! Surely we were justified in feeling threatened.

I don't care for the Russian regime whatsoever, and Putin's a little Napoleon-complex turd. A weak, insecure little man. But I'm sorry pal, we're the ones threatening these people in their neck of the woods. NATO should've disbanded the day the hammer and sickle stopped flying over the Kremlin.

My claim is that you'd behave in the exact same way.

NATO is a defensive alliance. It's not threatening Russia. It's not planning to invade Russia.

Yes, it's moving eastward. (And yes, apparently we promised not to.) But why is it moving eastward? Because NATO invaded, say, Poland? No, because Poland desperately wanted into NATO. Why? Because they've had a taste (or a belly full) of Russian aggression, invasion, occupation, and even partition. They wanted into NATO because they're afraid of Russia.

So how are we the ones threatening these people again? The only threat we pose to Russia is to not let them push other people around. And if that's a threat to them, well, it says more about Russia than it says about NATO.

Again, from the Russian side, it was first Poland that joined, then talk of Ukraine joining. So an ever east-ward expansion of NATO. Meanwhile economic sanctions and exclusion. When that happened, Russia simply reacted. Much like the U.S. reacted to Cuba. Russian aggression is reactive and the predictable outcome of the behavior of NATO and Western economies.

> Again, from the Russian side, it was first Poland that joined, then talk of Ukraine joining. So an ever east-ward expansion of NATO.

So what? When the western-most provinces of Russia itself start revolutions to liberate themselves from Moscow, and promptly apply for NATO membership, will that also be NATO's fault; will you still refuse to see that it says more about Russia?

Russian aggression is "reactive"... To the reactions to Russian aggression.

Is it any wonder that Ukraine wanted to join NATO, given what happened with Crimea?

I'll make no judgment as to whether Crimea and its people are better off as a part of Russia or Ukraine (they very well might be better off a part of Russia), but invading and annexing is just not ok. (Same as if China decided to do the same to Taiwan.)

I just don't see the problem with NATO expansion. As a parent poster pointed out, it's a defensive alliance; if Russia has a problem with other countries promising to defend each other in the case that Russia wants to get aggressive, that's, well... Russia's problem.

> Is it any wonder that Ukraine wanted to join NATO, given what happened with Crimea?

You have the chronology exactly backwards.

Nope. "Is it any wonder that X, given Y?" says nothing about chronology. "Is it any wonder that she wanted to divorce him, given that he killed her?" would be an oxymoron under your erroneous reasoning; with your logic she would have to be dead before she could want a divorce. To reasonable people, the murder was obviously just the culmination of a long chain of events.

Well, as the joke goes, it's vodka's fault. Vodka made Russians take Crimea, but then again vodka is why Crimea was Ukrainian post-USSR.

> then again vodka is why Crimea was Ukrainian post-USSR.

And for about half of the USSR's existence before it collapsed... Possibly more of it than it was Russian?

Ok, name them. But remember Russia has never involved itself where it does not have deep cultural ties. Or where it's actually been invited, like Syria.

> Russia has never involved itself where it does not have deep cultural ties

On that basis NATO could legitimately support a military intervention by Kiev into Moscow. It was originally the Kievan Rus, after all.

>Kievan Rus' (Old East Slavic: Роусь, romanized: Rusĭ, or роусьскаѧ землѧ romanized: rusĭskaę zemlę, "Rus' land") or Kyivan Rus',[2][3] was a loose federation of East Slavic and Finno-Ugric peoples in Eastern and Northern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century,[4][5] under the reign of the Rurik dynasty, founded by the Varangian prince Rurik.[5] The modern nations of Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine all claim Kievan Rus' as their cultural ancestors

Copied from the Wikipedia, so if anything that suggests we need to bring back the USSR and reunite all the Slavs under one flag.

роусьскаѧ землѧ literally translates to "Russian land"

> if anything that suggests we need to bring back the USSR and reunite all the Slavs under one flag

Okay, taking that at face value, nothing says Moscow has to be in charge. And the Mongols once controlled Russian territory. Speaking of which, Moscow hasn't controlled its eastern territories for long--should we dissolve Russian influence east of the Urals?

Returning "historical" lands is the casus belli of every dictator. It's arbitrary, empty and infinitely extensible.

I was thinking of St Petersburg as the capital of the unified Russia, for historical reasons.

I like it. Maybe with a German-born Empress for some Ekaterinian flare—Angela Merkel, perhaps?

I don't think that's going to fly, the Germans really soured the relationship in 1941.

I served with some Georgians. The Russians invaded and stole half of their country while they were helping us in Iraq/Afghanistan.

Interesting that the US fled from Kabul, leaving Ukrainian and Georgian mercenaries, but taking service dogs with them. But, by all means, continue to believe in American good will. Anyone who continues to believe in the US is an idiot. Get real.

They were helping you to commit war crimes in Iraq/Afghanistan. They should have stayed at home, and cultivated a healthy relationship with Russia instead.

I would probably agree with the broader outcome of your argument, but I don’t think rationalizing the violation of territorial sovereignty through “cultural ties” is a very strong foundation. If the rule of law is to exist, borders have to be respected - they are known, measurable. Cultural ties has a long history of rationalizing invasion, and is demonstrably (from historic examples) a very nebulous and qualitative argument that can be molded to fit needs of the invader. Just because we speak the same language or have a similar hat style doesn’t mean I want your government controlling my town and its resources.

> But remember Russia has never involved itself where it does not have deep cultural ties

What a convenient way of excluding entirely relevant points of argument. Ukraine suffered the first forced change of national borders in Europe since World War II

Heavy cultural ties does not grant anyone a right to annex the territory of another sovereign nation

No, that would be Yugoslavia in the early 90s.

Forced by someone else, outside the nation whose borders were altered. The Yugoslavians changed their internal borders all by themselves.

> deep cultural ties

Those are some ties. It was less than 100 years ago that genocide was Russian policy. The Holodomor murdered 3.3-7.5 million Ukrainians.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor

No. It was Stalin's policy (his word was law). Stalin was a Georgian.

He ruled the Soviet Union, which

A) Consisted mainly of Russia and Russians, and

B) is claimed as predecessor by the current Russian regime.

It's not as if Georgia ever claimed Crimea, Siberia, and the Baltic states on the premise that "They were once ruled by Stalin, a Georgian, so they belong to us".

It's hard to say if your desperate non-sequiturs in defense of the kleptocratic Russian goon regime are more funny than pathetic or more pathetic than funny.

Both Georgia and Ukraine "invite" (plead really) NATO and the US to help them. They know that unless they have a Putin lapdog as head of state, they will face and have faced brutal consequences.

A significant proportion of Ukraine's population does not want Nato or the West. They want Russia... so much so that there is an ongoing civil war in Ukraine, and there are self-proclaimed republics in the East of Ukraine

> and there are self-proclaimed republics in the East of Ukraine

"Self-proclaimed"... With some help from a bunch of little green men.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com