OldSolduer
Army.ca Relic
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Like the Maples Leafs and the Blue Jays - they are following the nation's lead.....Christ, do we ever love to shoot ourselves in the foot.
Like the Maples Leafs and the Blue Jays - they are following the nation's lead.....Christ, do we ever love to shoot ourselves in the foot.
Don't forget the Argos, blowing it in the finals after dominating the season.Like the Maples Leafs and the Blue Jays - they are following the nation's lead.....
Some/many in NATO know that they have been under attack by Russia using hybrid warfare since at least 2014…Russia is already at war with NATO and has been for some time. NATO is just willfully blind to anything other than sustained kinetic action.
2004 if not sooner.Some/many in NATO know that they have been under attack by Russia using hybrid warfare since at least 2014…
I was being perhaps a bit generous to the ex-KGB Apparatchik turned Czar…2004 if not sooner.
Ever since March 24 1999 when NATO started bombing Yugoslavia without security council approval (such a badly designed system!) thus ending the believability of the NATO stance that they are a purely defensive alliance. That placed in the future wannabe tsarina the belief that NATO was an active enemy military with designs on the motherland. Once his satellite/puppet buffer states were no longer there, and worse had joined the enemy, that cemented that opinion. With the 1000 plus year history of invading armies from all directions and now having few easily dependable physical barriers or sacrificial buffer states, that fear while misplaced in our worldview was logical in his worldview. (we really need to stop assuming everybody shares our beliefs and perceptions of motivations and objective reality). Multiple warning signals were sent over the years culminating in the 2008 speech to NATO in Bucharest.2004 if not sooner.
Well, they can either leave Ukraine or bring it.
They can't handle a bunch of rapidly trained Ukrainian brigades ripping through their border regions. I highly doubt they want the smoke that comes with a NATO No Fly Zone over Ukraine.Well, they can either leave Ukraine or bring it.
Russia’s choice.
The only aspect I’d have added to that was that NATO acted in the FYR with UNGA approval and Resolutions.Ever since March 24 1999 when NATO started bombing Yugoslavia without security council approval (such a badly designed system!) thus ending the believability of the NATO stance that they are a purely defensive alliance. That placed in the future wannabe tsarina the belief that NATO was an active enemy military with designs on the motherland.
Once his satellite/puppet buffer states were no longer there, and worse had joined the enemy, that cemented that opinion. With the 1000 plus year history of invading armies from all directions and now having few easily dependable physical barriers or sacrificial buffer states, that fear while misplaced in our worldview was logical in his worldview. (we really need to stop assuming everybody shares our beliefs and perceptions of motivations and objective reality). Multiple warning signals were sent over the years culminating in the 2008 speech to NATO in Bucharest.
Subsequently he used NATO's rules against them for the first time in Georgia thus essentially permanently stopping any chance of joining NATO. Ukraine then was a compliant satellite with Russian leanings so only soft power and hybrid operations were started to ensure its allegiance. With each additional invasion - Chechnya twice, Ukraine twice and arguably Moldova - the belief that NATO was a fundamentally flawed organisation with little appetite for kinetic action or tolerance of casualties/costs and an inability to think let alone plan for the strategic long term was reinforced. In his world, all NATO wanted was financial coercive control, resource extraction and profits.
So logically he used the current wests belief in unfettered free speech and naivete with great power machinations to establish and imbed agents and influence idiots throughout the west to keep their political elites and populations misinformed or confused and divided amongst themselves. The lack of critical thinking skills amongst most populations, decreasing international 'literacy' particularly in the US and the rise of social media made Russian info operations his most cost effective weapon. And they excell at them.
Chechen's being well, Chechens
Why do you say 2004? (It's 5am and I'm bagged tired...my brain is probably missing the obvious)2004 if not sooner.
2004 was a pivotal year in Russia. It was the start of Putin’s Second Term, and while he had been working on consolidating power even in his first, the where some fairly instrumental issues that allowed him to make major changes by the end of that year:Why do you say 2004? (It's 5am and I'm bagged tired...my brain is probably missing the obvious)
Oh there definitely was some Chechen terrorism going on on top of Putin’s little campaigns — but most of the pre 2004 actions were limited to internal Russian ‘changes’. I do believe 2004 is when he decided that in order to really restore Russia he needed to conquer the West as well.If we were paying attention, I would say 1999. That was when the FSB bombed apartment buildings in Russia, which Putin blamed on Chechens, which they used as a pretext to retake Chechnya and flatten Grozny. This propelled him into the Presidency, starting his rise as a Tsar in all but name.
I admit at the time I bought the Russian stories about Islamic terrorism, etc. It wasn’t for a few years later when journalists, activists and former FSB agents started getting whacked did I readjust my outlook.