Ukrainian foreign minister Kuleba to Western countries: "We offer you the best deal: you don't sacrifice your soldiers, give us weapons and money, and we will finish the job."
It's obvious, and either many congressmen are an agent of a foreign power, or are truly dumb enough to not realize the unspoken obviousness of this simple fact.
Prefix: I ended up ranting/venting a bit... our government is so frustrating at times:
From a US perspective, it is more a time for other countries to step up in this regard (as they have been), as while continued funding and support from the US will happen, it may be a long time from the US (maybe even 2 to 4 years if this election cycle doesn't oust/block some of these nutjobs that are either beholden to outside powers, or don't understand anything outside our own borders).
I'll take this time to say what many keep unspoken, because Ukrainians have the balls to actually voice it to the world:
No offense to Ukrainians, I want them to win, but even a loss in Ukraine after a sustained long drawn out battle, is of benefit to any country Russia considers an adversary, a place to oppress, or a country were attractive resources. Ukraine should be supported in their opposition to this invasion for as many years as it takes, no matter what. Twenty years, fifty years, however long; there should be no metric of 'it's been 2 years, and Ukraine hasn't won; are they just wasting our money?'. That is just a dumb concept.
I'm not sure we should be dismissive of politicians trying to reduce interventionist foreign pokicy in the abstract. The "US as world police" paradigm is a difficult angle.
From the US perspective, it's expensive AF, delivers erratic results (see Iraq) and it's created a lot of enemies over the years, basically handing Russia and China a support base on a silver platter.
On a global level, it does seem a bit weird for everyone to come calling to one nation for support, which doesn't really encourage a multi-voiced and spirited debate if everything breaks down to "whoever has US backing wins".
There's definitely a "we wrote a cheque we no longer want to cash" lock-in factor on this conflict, but maybe it's also time to stop writing so many cheques.
Could Americans, just for once, take responsibility for their own shitty politicians and politics, rather than blaming it on foreigners? This "foreign agent" bullshit is basically the same kind of conspiracy theory scape goating that Republicans do with Qanon, and it's bordering on fascistic in it's attitude.
This is just Zelenskyi's government in Kyiv sacrificing everyone else to maintain the notion of a Ukrainian state for the wealthy elite who (coincidentally) live in Kyiv. Look at where the rich are. Look at where most conscripts are from.
Ukraine is split into the ultra wealthy (Kyiv), the moderately well-off (Dnipro, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, Kharkiv), and everywhere else (which is remarkably poor). Kyiv has more than double the GDP/capita of the next richest administrative region. This war devastates the eastern economic centers and solidifies power in Kyiv... And for what?
Ukrainian nationalism have sent hundreds of thousands of men and women to their death for no clear gains. Now, they want to send hundreds of thousands more, because the lives of Ukrainians mean nothing to the people in the white ivory towers of Kyiv. Is the sacrifice of more Ukrainian lives worth it to pursue the Western ideal of crushing Russia (so that the West can collectively focus on the Middle East and China instead)?
Ukraine isn't fighting "crush Russia" or "consolidate power," they are fighting to exist as a nation. They are fighting to not be part of Russia, and if you claim Russia doesn't consolidate wealth into a small few while sacrificing their poor as cannon fodder, you're unabashedly lying.
Now, do Western nations take advantage of this to severely weaken with no personal loss of life or territory? Absolutely. But just because it benefits the West doesn't mean it doesn't also benefit Ukraine.
Ukraine is never going to win this war no matter how hard western libs keep praying.
This is the fate of any country that sells itself out to the imperial core including the EU states who facilitated this bloodbath instead of peace and diplomacy.
I hope Russia does take over the whole of Ukraine because I don't trust a Ukraine left to its own devices after this humiliating defeat.
I love how it's always gotta be "Russian troll farms" with you settlers. It can never be your own sick-and-tired countrymen. Can never be any of the masses of subjects-of-empire you've gentrified, redlined, and incarcerated out of house and home. Can never be the rest of a world sick of Five-Eyes genocides.
It's always gotta be a faceless troll farm with you genocide-addicted, responsibility-lacking, settler-assed Devils; 'cause if you can just sideline all resistance as 'paid-for troll farm posting', you don't have to do any kind of self-reflection. You don't have to stop and demand better of your leaders. You don't have to stop and question if everything you and your ancestors have been told and have been doing for the past 400 years has been wrong.
I can't wait for your comeuppance to land. I really can't. I don't even care if I'm caught in the crossfire anymore, I want to see you collectively catch what you have coming that bad. Please get Replaced already.
"Getting hollowed out and left in the cold" has been Occupied Turtle Island's modus operandi for what, the past 50 years if not longer? If I were to sit here and list out every country that the Five-Eyed Empire has couped, vassalized, weaponized, then cut loose, often with either a SEAL team or a drone-based execution of their leaders, I'd be here literally all fucking day.
Tell me how exactly Russia benefits from the prolonged war with amounting financial cost and casualties that future generations of Russians will pay?
Russia is experiencing demographic crisis before the war, and many men either fled or died, and the country have become beholden to China, Iran and North Korea. And Russia has only issued partial mobilisation, but imagine if the entire country then mobilised more for total war just to try to beat another country that is 1/10th the size and couldn't do so for two years.
Ukraine mobilised for total war already and they're willing to die for a bigger goal and for their homeland. Are you yourself willing to be complicit to your country's decline for handful of rubles that is depreciating in value over time?
Russian sanctions boomerang effect means a year of stagnation for Europe in 2024
The boomerang effect of the Russian sanctions on the EU member states is having a mixed impact. Germany, France and Italy are worst affected as the pain from the changes in energy and input supplies impact their economies, dragging them down into recession, while the less dependent on Russia like Spain and Portugal are already showing signs of recovery, according to ING analysis.
Overall Europe is headed for a year of stagnation that could be worse than in 2023. By contrast Russia reported growth of 3.5%, according to the preliminary results. And on January 18, an ebullient Russian President Vladimir Putin said that growth could come in at over 4% after revisions. The Russian Ministry of Finance (MinFin) also revised its GDP growth outlook for 2024 up to 3.5%, much improved from the earlier Central Bank of Russia (CBR) forecasts of around 2% for this year.
Currently, sanctions seem to be doing more harm to Europe than they are to Russia.
Incredible how you can state basic obvious truth and get mass downvotes. The fact that so many people still can't comprehend that Ukraine can't win this war shows the sheer power of western propaganda.
North Vietnam couldn't beat America. Afghanistan couldn't beat the Soviet Union and then beat America. And, of course, Ukraine couldn't resist a Russian invasion for years.
If Russia can lose, then Ukraine can win, and Russia can definitely lose. By some measures, they have already lost. If this war was to "stop NATO expansion" then they lost when their aggression caused Finland to join. If their objective was to reenforce their image of dominance in the region, that has failed spectacularly.