These are exceptional circumstances calling for extreme measures. Ukraine is still supposed to be a democracy and hence is supposed to lift those measures in peace time. — Olivier5
US citizens have currently limited say on anything their federal government does, least of all in foreign policy. — Olivier5
pollsters poll people. Supporters are people and so are funders. You are saying that the government needs the support of the people,and all that is true. — Olivier5
Via polls, via their financial support, their discipline or lack thereof, and their physical engagement as soldiers. — Olivier5
How is the UK fairing there, BTW? Would you qualify your current governance system as 'optimal'? — Olivier5
Matters that have moral weight tend to relate to issues of "humanitarian" needs or virtues. Either the behaviour in question can be shown to lead to some material harm to human welfare, or it is non-virtuous in some way. Moving a border (in general) is neither. — Isaac
'Moral' is a word in the English language, I don't have a private definition of it. — Isaac
in the specific case of Ukrainian and Russian border, your generalisation doesn’t seem to hold, Russians could argue that moving the border is meant to protect Russian minorities in Ukraine from persecutions. Ukrainians could argue that preserving the border is meant to preserve all the material resources in that Ukrainian region which are relevant for the wellbeing of Ukrainians. — neomac
The weird thing this is that prominent dictionaries like marriam-webster, oxford and cambridge do not mention the word humanitarian in their definition of moral nor vice versa. — neomac
the unsupported generality that there's some moral weight to national identity alone. It is a means to an end, not an end in itself. — Isaac
Moving a border at tremendous cost of human life is not an efficient, or conscionable method of either protecting minorities or securing resources. War has catastrophically failed to do either, in virtually all cases. — Isaac
Yes, they all take the much more parsimonious route of simply referring to 'right and wrong'. I thought that would be an unnecessarily cumbersome intermediate step. — Isaac
If you prefer, consider my use of broadly humanitarian or virtuous actions as being those that are considered 'right' and their opposites 'wrong'. — Isaac
The government of Ukraine are, unilaterally — Isaac
Not sure if your distinction between ends and means wrt national identity is morally relevant.
For example I see no mention of such distinction here:
Article 15
Everyone has the right to a nationality.
No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his nationality nor denied the right to change his nationality. — neomac
if Russians mange to annex and see acknowledged the Donbas regions, it's likely that the Russians living there are not going to suffer from alleged genocide and persecutions for generations to come. — neomac
I still fail to understand how you calculate efficiency: what's the formula you are using? — neomac
what do you mean by "broadly humanitarian"? do you mean human rights as in universal-declaration-of-human-rights ? Or do you mean human rights as in universal-declaration-of-human-rights and pacifism (or rejection of war)? Or yet something else? — neomac
Well, you argued otherwise upthread, saying that the soldiers were the primary actors — Olivier5
we agreed that a government at war needs the support of its people in the rear — Olivier5
Note that the people does the fighting too. — Olivier5
If you think nationalism is a moral cause then I can't stop you, but I don't think you'll find many people using the word that way. — Isaac
I don't see how. My knowledge of history is not exhaustive, but the longest actually genocidal regime I can think of might be something like the Khmer Rouge or maybe Stalin's regime. Neither lasted for "generations". — Isaac
I'd be broadly supportive of the idea that mis-governance is responsible for more death overall than war — Isaac
I can't see how this is remotely complicated. Human welfare isn't an undiscovered planet, or some misunderstood facet of quantum physics. We've been around for millions of years, we know what we need. — Isaac
And for our country, this is ultimately a matter of life and death, a matter of our historical future as a people. And this is not an exaggeration: it is true. This is a real threat not just to our interests, but to the very existence of our state, its sovereignty. — Putin · Feb 24, 2022
And in the end, if nothing at all can be done, the aim is the same: to destroy them, to wipe them off the political map.
[...]
Russia is simply upholding its right to exist and to develop freely. — Putin · Oct 27, 2022
we agreed that a government at war needs the support of its people in the rear
— Olivier5
We agreed no such thing. You argued that the US populace had no influence on government policy, then argued the exact opposite for the Ukrainian populace. I just pointed out the incoherence. — Isaac
It seems clear, however, as Michael Millerman notes, that Putin's speech is fully embracing this Dugan world vision. — boethius
Alexandr Dugin is really a "Putin whisperer" in the way he has promoted this semi-fictional historical view of Russia and it's role in the World. That Putin's speeches are many times long historical presentations just reek of Dugin's attitude. It might be confusing for a Westerner to follow some Putin's speech that start's from talking about the Rus and the Middle Ages, then goes on to the Russian Revolution and the Great Patriotic War. We in the West might skip that as just "nonsensical jargon", but it truly reveals the imperialist heart of Russia that both Putin and Dugin admire. This is an ideology of an Empire and thus genuine imperialism. Talk about a man on a mission. The references to culture wars, to Russia being very Christian and so on are just to try to lure the far right in the West.It seems clear, however, as Michael Millerman notes, that Putin's speech is fully embracing this Dugan world vision. — boethius
Novorossiysk (Black Sea) and Rostov-on-Don (Sea of Azov) are more or less on a stretch of Russian coastal real estate from Veselo-Voznesenka to Adler (close to the Sochi Olympic Park). Rumors will have it that Putin spent a bit to develop Taman (just east of Kerch) since 2008, also on that stretch.
Maybe Putin should have used resources to further develop Novorossiysk and Taman for example, instead of spending them on (starting) a costly war ... bombing killing destroying shamming re-culturating. :up: But when you're the top dog Russian autocrat that's not enough apparently, and so an old-fashioned land grab it is. :down: There'd instead be less destructive jobs, perhaps praise instead of people fleeing, lost tanks, bodies, a Ukraine with increasing Russo-haters, heavy international sanctions, real threats. — jorndoe
I'd like to know what existential threat NATO was/is to Russia.
A fair assessment can (ought to) take place without going by any one particular person's story (Putin, Biden, Mearsheimer, Stoltenberg, Zelenskyy, and Winnie-the-Pooh came to mind while typing). — jorndoe
the question here was ... — jorndoe
I'd like to know what existential threat NATO was/is to Russia. — jorndoe
The references to culture wars, to Russia being very Christian and so on are just to try to lure the far right in the West. — ssu
Are we deploying missiles near the US border? No, we are not. It is the United States that has come to our home with its missiles and is already standing at our doorstep. Is it going too far to demand that no strike systems be placed near our home? — Putin · Dec 23, 2021
the revival of nationalism, not only in the West (e.g. the patriots in America), but especially in the rest of the World at large including Russia, China, India, Brazil. — neomac
Ukrainians, Crimean Tatars and Chechens lament centuries of oppression and/or persecution from Russia. — neomac
Better just to erect a massive fence to keep the bloodthirsty Orcs Russians in their place. — Isaac
Yep. Very popular. So's football. What's that got to do with morality? — Isaac
And in what way does changing a border solve any of this? — Isaac
The deaths you're referring to here - Ukraine, Chechnya, Crimea - are all the result of disputes over fucking borders and of the kind of racism about so-called ethnic groups that you are so vehemently flag-waiving for. — Isaac
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