Oddbean

Jeff, do you think Texas would be allowed to simply declare independence and then say Washington should allow it? what would if a gang of mexican criminals usurped power in a place in America and then Mexico armed and funded them for years and said, well guys, you should just let them be part of Mexico. absolute nonsense. Donbass and Lugansk were turned into absolute shitholes under little dictators and none of it would have been possible if Russian hadn't been funding it.

There would have been no conflict or invasion at all if the US & NATO weren't trying to damage Russia by imposing a financial & monetary blockade, politically controlling their closest & most economically important ally, & blowing up their natural gas line (which would have ensured peaceful economic trade relations with Europe). The US is willing to drive up energy costs in Europe & leave people freezing, as well as risk nuclear war, in order to overthrow a country that is no threat to anything except dollar dominance. Donbas was already ethnically Russian because of migrations that happened during the Soviet Union. That part of Ukraine is particularly economically & strategically important to Russia. The people there in recent years actually voted to join Russia & Russia said no but did offer a peace deal to Ukraine that would help them to secure independence. Zelensky has banned all political opposition, nationalized all media in the country, & has imposed a draft so that he can enslave people to fight this war for the US (even people who are opposed to the entire conflict). The violations of the agreement not to move NATO east were almost completely ignored by Russia until Ukraine was involved, which Russia repeatedly said was the brightest of red lines. The US goal is to overthrow Russia so that the US can break up the BRICS alliance & further prevent anything but dollars flowing for oil, which would allow them to further tax the entire world with inflation.

There has been no and could be no "peaceful coexistence" with Europe. In case you missed it, Ruddia has been committing assasinations and assassination attempts in Europe for the past decade. The GRU has been blowing up infrastructure and military assets in Czechia. Russia backed the Catalonian separatist movement, and the German Greens thst havd worked constant to abolish German nuclear energy and with it, German energy independence. Russias hacking groups has been performing cyberattacks on the West for over a decade. Russia is a pariah state and a sponsor of terrorism.

NATO says that they are willing to 'fight to the last Ukrainian' How fucking arrogant. War is a racket, Smedley Butler has the last word on this, but people never fucking listen to a lesson that should have been learn't 100 years ago.