I’ve tried to search for opinions on what’s going on in Ukraine, but most posts are incredibly old. I’m not too educated on the matter myself (well, aside from keeping up most of the time with what cities are under whose control and all of that). I haven’t really heard much about the geopolitical side of things, and it’s hard to know what’s disinfo or not; That’s why I’d like to ask: What is your stance on the Ukraine war?
the end of the USSR was a disaster
If you downvote this comment and you aren’t a lib, why are you in this community.
The war is a proxy war between NATO and Russia that started in 2014 after the Maidan coup. When NATO threatened to allow Ukraine to join, it was a major escalation that demanded a response from Russia. In that sense, their SMO is an act of self-defense. I unequivocally support Russia on this, not because I agree with the Russian government’s domestic policy or long term vision for the world, but because NATO is the greater evil, and if they successfully contain Russia, then China is next, and we may never see a free world in our lifetimes.
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So we’re just gonna ignore that the US admitted to installing Porochenko lol okay
Colonialists gtfo
read more lenin ☝️☝️☝️
You might want to heed your own advice, and throw some Stalin in too.
I know exactly what you mean behind your innocent-looking comment. Do you think lenin was stupid? If lenin was here now i’m pretty sure he would recognize the obvious: The contradiction between usa, and the world’s continued existence.
I must be gullible, because I thought that person’s comment meant that we should read Lenin’s work regarding imperialism. Like how we should want both imperialist countries to weaken as much as possible so that the workers can find a chance to take power. Only issues is that the true imperialist nations that have an interest in this war, NATO/US, don’t have much to lose if Ukraine fails.
Any chance you could write out a deeper analysis on how this situation deviates from Lenin’s writings on wars between imperial powers? Or at least point me to a source that talks about it more? The only things that really jump out to me are what I wrote about in the first paragraph.
Difference is, Russia is not imperialist, so it is not an interimperialist war but a national bourgeoisie country resisting the global imperial hegemon (which didn’t exist yet in the time Lenin wrote that book), so it would also require reading Stalin’s later clarifications and Mao’s about contradictions.
Seriously, Lenin would be furious if he knew all those dogmatics interpret his work totally ignoring the conditions.
Thank you for the sources, i’ll be sure to check them out. I’m still new to reading theory and all that.
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You’re projecting again. I didn’t know you were a mass murderer, but with your contempt for humanity, it kinda makes sense.
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USA is controlling ukraine’s government. They want to kill as many ukrainians and russians as possible. They must be stopped. Also, boris johnson prevented peace talks. To hell with him.
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You are smoking projection
Do I support innocent civilians dying or workers being sent to fight and getting killed? No. Do I support stamping out of Nazis? Yes. Russia has a right to security guarantees on its border which the west has continually undermined for the last 30 years. Ukraine is being use as pawn to destroy Russia and Russia made the ugly decision of striking back. I welcome the downfall of NATO.
I welcome the downfall of NATO.
Considering Russia’s invasion has directly lead to the doubling of NATO’s border with Russia (via Finland joining), the soon to be member Sweden, as well as many NATO countries spending more on defense, I fail to see how Russia’s invasion has done anything but strengthen NATO.
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But fuck the people of the Donbas being shelled endlessly and starved for the better part of a decade by the Ukrainians amiright.
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USA sent an undercover army in 2014, not russia.
Always projection.
As long as the US continues to exist in the form it’s in, it will either be at war or in a proxy war and people will be dying.
Big picture is, if Russia and Ukraine make peace, the US will start a new war somewhere else by invasion or proxy immediately afterwards.
So I’m not 100% on board with the sentiment that the war must end at any cost. We don’t get peace if the war ends if it means the US will just kick off another one.
War is bad. But any scenario that diminishes US hegemony and its ability to wage war (whether that’s in a peace treaty or in ongiong conflict) is preferable, because we’ll never have peace in this world while those warmongers in DC are allowed to continue.
This has been my take lately as well. If peace happens on any terms other than USA realizing it has lost it’s hegemony the killing will just move somewhere else. If the war is able to continue until its conclusion It quite likely will mean an end to American imperialist wars which have killed tens of millions since WW2. That this war has also gotten BRICS+ out of the thinking stage and into action means that further millions will be saved by ending USA’s ability to unilaterally sanction whomever it chooses.
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Here is an article about it from ProleWiki, which is associated with Lemmygrad and has some of the same admins.
That wiki always impresses me
The first gulf war is an interesting thing to look at. Saddamn told the US state department he would invade Kuait because they were cross drilling into Iraqi oil fields and we’re traditionally a ‘part of Iraq’.
State department said we don’t care
Of course, they did care and used that as cassus belli to attack Iraq and ‘contain’ Saddam which was the original intended consequence.
The war in Ukraine is the same. The neocons in the US have wanted Ukraine to open it’s markets to blackrock and Goldman Sachs forever. They helped foment the coup and selected Ukrainians president. They knew Russia would invade if Ukraine started the process to join NATO.
The US wanted this war. It was a trap for Putin and because he is an idiot he fell for it. The goal is to weaken Russia , sell us LNG to Germany at 200% markup and flood Lockheed and Raytheon with billions of dollars. It’s a win win for the US because no American boots on the ground they get to fight Russia via proxy until the last Ukrainian.
I’m totally against the war and old enough to understand the only way it ends is with a negotiated settlement.
It was a trap for Putin and because he is an idiot he fell for it.
You should read less NYT.
“Damned if you do damned if you don’t” is not a “trap.” Being lied to over and over is not a “trap.” Putin was backed into a corner. He didn’t want to fight but in the end it was either fight or let nazis and NATO live on Russia border and genocide Russian speaking civilians until they were ready to invade Russia itself.
If Putin is “an idiot” how did he manage to insulate Russia’s entire economy from sanctions? He spent the whole time he was trying to avoid the fight also making contingencies for when the fight happened.
The war is hollowing out the EU. They have lost access to cheap Russian energy and so their manufacturing capability is being gutted. All they have left is their Financial capital and without industry to back it up it will disappear before they can rectify their energy situation. European companies are already moving to China.
While the MIC is gaining short term profits from the war overall it will be a major loss. Furthermore the war has shown the global south the need for an alternative to $US. BRICS+ will be direct competition for american dollar hegemony destroying its value. Any $ gains the MIC makes it will have to pay back ten fold to the global south who they traditionary exploited for raw materials. The global south will have alternative buyers that will give them fairer prices in $ which will cause $ to lose more value. On top of all that it has shown how flawed NATO weapon systems really are, how they fare against much cheaper weapons from Russia, and how slowly they are produced. Any nation looking at purchasing weapons supplies is going to consider Russia because they are better value for money by factors of 2 digits and they wont have decades long wait lists.
The material reality of things on the ground in the war and in economies of the nations involved is completely contrary to your post.
I agree with a lot of your points, it was a ‘fucked if you do fucked if you don’t’ situation for Putin and actually I’m not even sure about the Great Man theory of history so even if someone else was leading Russia they would probably still have responded the same way. I don’t know, it still feels like a trap though. And of course the dialectical analysis shows that by cutting Russia off the swift system the BRICS economic integration just intensifies and accelerates de-dollarisation.
But I stand by my comment about Putin being stupid. Calling it a police action without stating exact goals means he’s already lost the information war. There also is no way to win this war unless he goes shock and awe and literally destroys the entire country. Which is not the goal. So the Russian military cant destroy everything to force a solution, and the US is loving it, just pouring infinite money, tanks, jets, climbing the escalation ladder. They intend to outspend Russia and force a domestic coup. Which also won’t happen.
So it’s a lose lose for everyone except the military industrial complex, Goldman Sachs and US LNG exporters
But I stand by my comment about Putin being stupid. Calling it a police action without stating exact goals means he’s already lost the information war.
But he didn’t do that. Putin said exactly what the SMO was supposed to do. Putin has some serious flaws but being stupid isn’t one of them. Stop reading the NYT. “because x is stupid/incompetent/insane/evil” is the weakest analysis you can do. It is almost never true and just shows that you don’t understand the situation. It’s marvel movie level thinking.
The stated aims of the SMO are Defence of the Donbas separatist states, Demilitarization, Denazification, and forcing Ukraine to stay neutral. Since Ukraine and the west proved they are pathological liars Russia’s game plan changed a little and now they have incorporated the break away states into Russia proper but the other goals have stayed the same.
Ukraine’s army will eventually collapse. They can’t stand up against Russia forever. They cant recruit soldiers fast enough, The west cant manufacture weapons fast enough and even if they could they wouldn’t want to give them away to a failed state. When that happens all that remains is tearing down some nazi monuments and installing a puppet government.
Again the MIC and LNG exporters win is a short lived boost that will ultimately accelerate their own downfall. Their wins are at the cost of their allies. USA are cannibalizing Europe to prop themselves up. This is only a win if you don’t look past the immediate future.
The stated aims of the SMO are … Denazification
Putin returned the Azov battalion leaders and fighters to Ukraine in a prisoner swap. If Azov are Nazis, as is commonly stated, Putin is doing a very, very poor job at denazification in Ukraine.
What was he supposed to do? Let Russian POWs be shot and tortured while azov nazis get treated like humans?
The plan isn’t to hunt down and kill every nazi. Its to make a society where nazism is strongly discouraged. When Ukraine surrenders there will be prison sentences for nazis in Ukraine like there are in Russia.
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Lol you live in copeistan
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Russia is currently fighting a war is with a client regime that US installed in Ukraine after overthrowing the democratically elected government in 2014. I generally agree with the reasoning for why Russia decided to start a preventative the war that Mearsheimer gives here.
While Russia has a reactionary capitalist regime, it is acting as a bulwark fighting against US global hegemony right now. NATO has been forced to devote practically all of its resources to the proxy war and this created room for the Global South to finally start shaking off western hegemony. We are seeing a major global realignment happening with countries moving off the dollar and BRICS rapidly expanding.
The war has also derailed US plans for containment of China, and it’s clear that China is taking advantage of the additional time that Russia bought it. I expect that by the end of the war we will likely see the reverse moment of when USSR collapsed, and US led capitalist world order became dominant. This time around, it will be the capitalist order that crashes, and it will be replaced by socialist one led by China.
Prior to 2014, Ukraine has usually had Russian-friendly governments. Some more than others, but relations between the two countries were generally close, if sometimes strained.
In 2014 there was a coup in the Ukraine (or a revolution, or a series of protests that resulted in the president stepping down, whatever) called Euromaidan. These protests involved Neo-Nazi paramilitary groups (which are very common in Ukraine) marching in the streets. The government that emerged afterwards was solidly anti-Russian.
Separatists in the Donbass region (Eastern Ukraine, the parts that Russia is now occupying, which is about 50% Russian) immediately began trying to secede. Elections stopped being held in these regions, solidifying the anti-Russian government. Crimea, which is almost 100% Russian, was retaken by Russia with almost no resistance.
The Ukrainian War started in 2014 when the post-Euromaidan Ukrainian government began using artillery, snipers, and fascist paramilitary volunteers against the Donbass separatists. 2022 was just when the Russians decided to get involved.
The Russian government claims that the invasion was in order to “De-Nazify” Ukraine. The motivation to protect the Russian ethnic minority was also clear, but since Russia is a multi-ethnic federation, saying this sort of thing is a political no-no in Russia.
In reality, Russia invaded because Ukraine was considering membership in NATO. In 2008, Georgia was similarly considering membership in NATO. Russia then invaded and liberated the provinces of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which remain independent to this day, and stationed troops in these regions permanently. This was done because, if they allowed Georgia into NATO, it would require NATO to defend Georgia; since NATO membership requires approval of all existing members, there is always going to be at least one member who is not eager for immediate war with Russia. This is the same thing that is happening in Ukraine: Russia is permanently occupying parts of Ukraine so that, if Ukraine were to join NATO, NATO would be obligated to “defend” them against Russia.
I think you may be downplaying the Denazify part of it. The fact that Ukraine has continually glorified genocidaires, put up monuments to them, incorporated neo-nazis into their government, armed them, and are supported by NATO, is something the entire world should be alarmed at. For example, Canada’s deputy PM is a descendent of them and condones their actions, which is extremely troubling. Poland and the Israel regime have also condemned Ukraine in similar ways for this.
One of the main reasons for the original secession of the Donbass was like you said outright attacks, and attempting to “Ukrainize” the area language wise, which is absurd considering how similar the people are.
Unsurprisingly the country that was invaded by Nazis doesn’t like Nazis doing genocide on their border
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Right, so Israel and Poland are just fucking idiots for making a diplomatic incident over Ukraine’s constant reverence of people who perpetuated the Holocaust? the fact that there are doofuses like you denying this is just another reason why it is a problem. hell, look at this list of monuments to just 1 SS guy, and that’s just in Ukraine, not counting the ones in other countries or other Ukranian nazis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commemoration_of_Stepan_Bandera
Anyways, stay mad. The Nazi corpses thankfully keep piling up.
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Anyways, stay mad. Kiev is older them Moskow.
Muh heritage. Nazi talk. Mask off.
By that logic the capital of the world would be Jericho or Damascus.
The Russian government claims that the invasion was in order to “De-Nazify” Ukraine.
This is really overstated. That reason was given amongst many others. The mass liberal media seized upon it and amplified it to ridicule it, even though it has a solid basis. Stating that was the reason for the invasion is simply false.
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Nato was never the aggressor? You didn’t hear about the 15 countries they expanded to since 1991 that surround Russia?
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I appreciate that you mentioned that vice news series, it’s always nice to see something new. But, you’re absolutely wrong about the EuroMaidan protests, neo-nazis played a huge role in it. Check out this article that also includes photo and video evidence regarding it: https://www.salon.com/2014/02/25/is_the_us_backing_neo_nazis_in_ukraine_partner/
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- Your definition of nazi means that Americans are nazis.
- Having an open nazi battalion in your army is the definition of institutionalized.
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I take China’s stance: please let’s fucking talk this over because we’re only doing more harm right now
But for this war to end Ukraine has to stop being outright nazis in service of imperialism. We need organizing of armed dissidence inside Ukraine. We need conscripted soldiers fragging their imperialist commanders stat
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USA is the imperialist. You are the imperialist apologist.
there was this story i read a long time ago about an american soldier in iraq, talking to an iraqi interpreter who is smoking a cigarette, the american asks him why they were fighting each other (iraq and kuwait) despite them looking the same, dressing the same and, speaking the same language.
so the interpreter takes a long drag of his cigarette, (something along of the lines of) “they’ll keep killing each other until they get tired of it and go home.”
i may have gotten the countries wrong, but I know I got the general main line of the story remembered.
I’m new to lemmygrad, but i think that the general principle of Marxists Leninist is to liberate the working class. Then I think everything else breaks into strategies and etc which of course people have different stances on like moves in chess
some liberals feel putin is to blame, some people say nato expansion, and some lads are saying the 2009 recession was never properly dealt with - that we are now facing the contradictions of capitalism in the form of war.
at the end of it all, the war sucks and most likely foretelling of more conflicts (and subsequently more suffering)to come. (regardless the way the media wants to frame the war, it is the people who suffer)
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hi, you are correct in an interpretation - my understanding is that the way marxists tend to analyse subjects is through how the broader system in general functions.
Trying to think of an example i probably would say something like, the story of the scorpion and the frog, while some would interpret that the fault of the drowning of the pair was due to the venom in the scorpion’s stinger or the individual scorpion.
mean while the marxist would interpret that it was in the inherent nature of the scorpian to doom them, and from their interactions at the beginning of the conversation the dominos began to fall. the last domino in the chain being the perishing of both. (or you could go even further and say new life would spawn from the remains)
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i think we are at a misunderstanding, the story of the frog and the scorpion was not a interpretation of the ukraine war, but an attempt of how marxists analyse systems that spawn results such as wars.
it was to help be an abstract explanation of a way of thinking, and not suppose to be a 1 to 1 representation of the war.
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it could be interpreted that a principle of Marxism is to question everything, it is a way of thinking critically, it results in people developing multiple different understandings, and while there is “truth” in everything, arguably only one understanding is “correct”.
A way that the multiple interpretations can be understood is akin to the fractured groups that call themselves the followers of Christ (ALTHOUGH MARXISM IS NOT A RELIGION, it is a way of thinking critically).
There exist the Jehovah witnesses, roman Catholics, and protestants. their opinions differ so greatly in the interpretation of the bible to warrant breaking off from each other to form a new group but would still unify with each other under the symbol of the cross under existential threat (or seeking community in place hostile to christians).
We as Marxists, have different interpretations - while there exists only one “correct” answer, and of course we like any other group that have existed for atleast a century have those who call themselves Marxists but whose deeds would be considered abhorrent by the majority of “principled” marxists.
I would say from my limited readings that the main directive of the marxists is to liberate the workers of the world from the injustices of capitalism, how to get there is another story.
tl;dr people read marx, people think, people have thoughts, only one thought “right”, which thought right???
https://lemmygrad.ml/post/687025
You can check out this post from about a month ago with a lot of good analysis and discussion in the comments.
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Nazis are more than a villain in the Captain America movies buddy. They actually exist, in the real world even, and aren’t just a meaningless buzzword.
Sorry to tell you this, but smugness is not actually more important than education. I suggest you try doing a bit of the latter, instead of relying solely on the former. But who am I kidding? You’d dismiss everyone here as “nazi tankies” or something and smugly smug about your day supporting western imperialism because they’re the “good guys” in the movies.
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Here’s a good one for you:
Hmmm that’s an interesting take. I had never seen the conflict from that angle actually.
I think they should have focused more on the economical aspect of the war, but still it was eye opening for me when they said “Arf arf arf arf arf arf!”
That type of crap might fool redditors, but you’re gonna have to try a lot harder here. And yes, Ukraine is filled with nazis to the brim. Courtesy of the US.
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It matters not what the Majority of Ukrainians are, its what the majority of the Armed forces and government are that causes this problem. Its all fine and dandy if majority of Ukrainians aren’t Nazis, but what matters is that their army is absolutely infested with them, and no sane nation will sit idle while a Nazi infested army murders people who speak your language and is vehemently hostile towards you.
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What a way to tell us you know exactly nothing about recent history except what some western TV told you.
Revolutionary defeatism
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Dudes rock
It’s when you live in the bad country and want it to lose a war
That was consise and very well written. I wish everyone was as good at writing things clearly as you.
