Countries are unable to wield power responsibly, even when they are not hampered by great power politics as they are today, like the United States during the unipolar moment. What makes you think more centralized power would do the trick?

If countries are unable to wield power responsibly, even when they are not hampered by great power politics as they are today, like the United States during the unipolar moment. What makes you think more centralized power would do the trick? — Tzeentch

Because it worked in the case of child labor in the US. Individual states couldn't outlaw child labor without crippling themselves economically. The answer was for everyone to do it at the same time according federal law.

This is essentially the second biggest obstacle to doing something about climate change: lack of central authority to make everyone act in concert.

The US just outsourced child labour to third world countries, though.

Here you go. Draw your own conclusions.

The US just outsourced child labour to third world countries, though. — Tzeentch

Which would be impossible if it were outlawed by a global government.

Long, drawn-out fart noise.

Then who would make your stuff? It's all made in countries that pollute and have bad working conditions.

Then who would make your stuff? It's all made in countries that pollute and have bad working conditions. — Tzeentch

Which would be impossible if it were outlawed by a global government. See how nice?

See how nice? — frank

How is not having stuff nice?

Long, drawn out fart noise.

↪unenlightened
Long, drawn-out fart noise. — frank

↪Tzeentch
Long, drawn out fart noise. — frank

Yes, Frank. Repetitive, rude, and yet in the end, meaningless.

People cannot work together without a boss wielding power is your position, and it is indefensible, because most people most of the time just do get on with things cooperatively. Languages actually thrive better without a boss. Science itself rejects the boss in favour of open and equal discourse. In the case of environmental degradation and global warming it is absolutely the bosses of industry and government who are refusing to act while people all around are calling for action and trying to do their bit, and this in the face of a massive propaganda campaign trying to minimise climate change and ridicule and delegitimise any protest or demand for change.

Was I supposed to get that from the Tim Jones song?

There is no post goal shift. The UN resolution expresses the majoritarian will of its voters (the West/US among them) as much as a democratic election expresses the majoritarian will of the voters: if one political candidate would violently rebel against the results of such democratic elections despite their legality or without legally appealing against them, this political candidate would be defiant of what has been ruled as expression of people’s majoritarian will. So concerning the Russian “special military operation”, there is a UN resolution which has a normative legal force and such resolution widely expresses the will of the West/US. And yes the international law resolution against the Russian “special military operation” LEGALLY JUSTIFIES the western policies of the West against Russia. — neomac

Again, "normative legal force" is just pseudo-intellectual bullshit. Are you adding "normative" to "legal force" because you are aware there is no actual legal force involved in the situation? Or do you just have no idea what you're talking about?

In terms of the situation, legal justification for military action under the UN system requires a security council vote, which Russia obviously vetos.

As for the votes you're talking about in the general assembly of the UN, they have no legal force in military matters, and they didn't even represent a majority of people on the planet, so are not the "people's will" which seems important for your argument.

Now, if you say number of people doesn't count because countries joining the UN agree to the 1 vote per country rule ... sure, but they also agree to the security council and veto system on any military issues.

An international law based justification for intervention in Ukraine would require Russia to sign off on it, which they obviously haven't. You may say that's not fair, not "normative" according to your moral standards, but that's not how the law works. If you make a legal system where a minority has asymmetric power and favouritism, perhaps it's not fair but it's still legal.

For example, the US senate represents a minority of voters due to the states with lower populations having the same amount of seats. So, the US senate does not represent a "people's will", and US senators act in "defiance" of the people's will and are "normatively" unjustified according to your own argument, but the way the US senate works is still legal despite this defiance.

You keep talking about “justification” without clarifying what you mean by it. To me the term “justification” is pretty general and it expresses the idea that some relevant shareable rational requirement is satisfied. — neomac

Although "rational requirement" means nothing in this context, just pseudo-intellectual bullshit that the pseudo-intellectual, usually of the "economics" variety, adds to statements to make themselves feel better about their lack of knowledge of the topics they come to conclusions about, I do agree with your key word "shareable".

Indeed, justification can be anything you mention, but the essential element is we are justifying it to others with some relation to the concept of "justice" that's universal in some way. Of course, what sorts of theories and arguments can be used to justify an action is wide open, the common element is that justification is towards others; arguments we want other to agree with.

"Regardless of justification" in the context I use it, refers to the US/NATO, or you own, justifications to others about the policies. You've made it quite clear you are on the "side of the West" and simply want the West to win. That is not a justification to me, or to other third parties that need not pick a side (India, Africa etc.), and certainly not less Russia.

Now, you may accept that what you want you cannot justify to others (although it maybe still useful to your purposes to fool them into believing the actions are justified) and have a separate internal justification for your actions. In this case, within your own head, there becomes two uses of the word justification; one use is essentially how you try to trick others, say a public position on the matter, and another use is why you are actually doing what you're doing, say a private position. So, in this duelism it can make sense to talk of your justifications for trying to convince others of your justifications which are not your real justifications, but it serves your real justification if others believe your justifications for other reasons.

For example, being the "Hegemone" maybe your "private position" and you may justify that by saying having more power is a "rational requirement" of all "rational agents", but since this applies to everyone else, you cannot simply justify your actions seeking more power simply because you want more power, as you recognise other actors want the same power: i.e. that you want more power is not a justification for others to give you more power. So, you think to yourself "how can I justify these actions" and then create arguments, for example protecting a "rules based order", that you may recognise are insufficient justifications but the gullible may believe them, or then one's opponents are perhaps at least flummoxed a bit in needing to deal with them.

If I clearly stated several times what you attribute to me, you can easily quote myself, but I don’t see any such quotation. Besides your understanding of my claims is under question, your serial misinterpretation of my claims is intellectually creepy, so using the word “clearly” is no assurance of your understanding at all. — neomac

This is insanely clear:

So what? There are three reasons your question is failing to take into account:
1. We are in the middle of the war so we don’t see the end of the war nor the full consequences of such war. The Soviet–Afghan War lasted 10 years, could anyone see the end of it and the following collapse of the Soviet Union while they were in the middle of it back then? No, because they didn’t happen yet.
2. Russia was complaining about NATO enlargement since the 90s, did Russia see NATO enlargement stopping for that reason? NATO/US can be as determined as Russia to pursue their goals in Ukraine at the expense of Russia. And since Russia, especially under Putin, took a declared confrontational attitude toward the hegemonic power, Russia made sure that NATO/US will deal with Russia accordingly as long as they see fit.
3. The end game for NATO/US involvement in this war doesn’t need to be to stop Russia or overturn its regime. But to inflict as much enduring damage as possible to Russian power (in terms of its economic system, its system of alliance, its capacity of military projection outside its borders, its its technology supply, its military and geopolitical status) to the point it is not longer perceived as a non-negligible geopolitical threat to the West. — neomac

Point 2 applies what you obviously actually believe: "And since Russia, especially under Putin, took a declared confrontational attitude toward the hegemonic power, Russia made sure that NATO/US will deal with Russia accordingly as long as they see fit".

As I pointed out at the time, if US hegemonic status is a justification, which you clearly state it is, then if Russia wins the war then it's just asserting its hegemonic power over Ukraine, and likewise justified. If the US can't stop Russia then clearly it isn't a global hegemone, as it was unable to determine the outcome of this even that happened on the globe. US may, nevertheles, have a larger sphere of hegemoning than Russia, but it is not global.

In particular, your point 3 is extremely clear "the end game for NATO/US involvement in this war doesn’t need to be to stop Russia or overturn its regime. But to inflict as much enduring damage as possible to Russian."

Your "end game" involves zero consideration of Ukrainian welfare nor any notion that it would be justified, in terms of your international law arguments that are in any case wrong, to seek such an outcome. The goal is quite clearly to simply harm Russia as a power competitor.

Which, whether the war is even doing that, would be an interesting question which I'm happy to debate. It could be the war is harming Russia, but it could also be Russia will come out of this war with a far more efficient and powerful army, more autonomous economy and new international banking system and so little reason to ever stop "defying the West" (had Putin implemented the sanctions himself this would have certainly caused serious domestic problems, but since the West did it for him, it's easy to say the West doesn't want to do business with Russia ... sort of what sanctions mean), rapidly replace any equipment, and all its neighbour's far less (rather than more) willing to "defy" Russia, seeing as they clearly can and will do what it takes to destroy your entire economy and the West clearly doesn't have a solution to the needing gas problem.

So, if you want to stop advancing propaganda, we could discuss what you actually believe, which is that the US / West can and should use this war to harm Russia in pure power competition terms. Ukrainian welfare doesn't matter, nor any other justification, just harming Russia.

The problem with your position is that historically wars, even extremely harmful wars in the short term (such as the American civil war, or WWI or WWII), generally result in any non-losing-party having far more powerful military at the end of the war.

Indeed, even losing parties can radically increase their real military power, such as Germany after WWI still had all sorts of "war experience" benefits even if physical war fighting capacity was essentially dismantled, despite this and the high casualties it is applying the experience and lessons of WWI that Germany could then rapidly rebuild their military power and fight WWII.

However, in the case of the war at hand, there is little probability that Russia will lose. At best, it "won't win".

Furthermore, in your hegemon's got to hegemon, you don't consider at all China.

Viewed as a proxy war between Russia and the US, perhaps US is winning something at some expense (at the expense of the destruction of Ukraine), but viewed as a proxy war between China and the West, China is winning a great deal at no expense; indeed, if the first view is correct, the West is weakening due to this war as well as Russia, an otherwise regional competitor.

So, if this war with Russia is satisfying some "rational requirement" of a global hegemon, there should be some argument as to why this helps against China, a more economically powerful adversary.

For, if China is a larger threat to US hegenomic power, which was the basis of all this talk of "pivoting" to East-Asia for over 2 decades, then optimum hegemomic strategy would be to "divide and conquer" the would be Russia-China alliance, and certainly not expend immense material and political capital in trying to harm the weaker of the two in such a team.

And again, Ukraine does not have nuclear weapons so MAD does not apply. — boethius

Again, that the use would result in NATO making a conventional attack on Russian forces in Ukraine is believable enough to make the use a very, very bad decision.

And would the Ukrainians suddenly surrender? I'm not so sure.

How convenient that Mearsheimer is talking in Hungary.:smirk:

I think that Ukraine turning into a nuclear conflict would make NATO involvement a lot less likely, actually. And Mearsheimer has made that point aswell.

The only country in NATO that is invested in Ukraine is the United States, and even they aren't invested to such a degree that they're willing to risk a protracted land war or even a nuclear conflict.

Which is a synthesis of my criticism of the West's intervention in Ukraine. If Iraq and Afghanistan and Libya were now vibrant democracies, benefits of the Wests reconstruction and tutelage of these places far exceeding the cost of the war to bring it about, then by all means go help Ukraine become a happier place. However, the West simply has no track record of actually fulfilling our promises, but rather abandoning our allies. — boethius

But @boethius, the West isn't intervening in Ukraine as in Iraq. And in Libya there are quite many countries all around meddling in it's internal problems (also Turkey, Russia, Egypt, Qatar,...). Ukraine is basically getting arms and intel from the West, but it's doing the fighting all alone. So

No, actually where the West can fuck up big time isn't now (of course, if they just abandon Ukraine to face of Russia all alone would be that fuck up), it's later. The West can fumble after this war in the promised rebuilding of Ukraine. Done lousily that can simply increase corruption, which the Ukrainian people hate. And simply if it disregards it's own requirements, values and laws in case of Ukraine. The rebuilding of Afghanistan is a prime example how these things go bad.

I think that Ukraine turning into a nuclear conflict would make NATO involvement a lot less likely, actually. And Mearsheimer has made that point aswell. — Tzeentch

And Medvedev has made that point.

So you think then Russians or Putin will just ignore warnings as fake? What if you then after using tactical nukes the Ukrainians won't budge, China gets angry and suddenly the rest of your Black Seas fleet gets attacked and sunk?

Putin has lost his strategic surprise that he had in 2014. A response to Russia using nukes is something that the Western leaders and NATO have had to think now.

So you think then Russians or Putin will just ignore warnings as fake? — ssu

The Americans ignored Russian warnings as fake for 15 years.

It's entirely possible they will ignore warnings if A: the stakes are high enough and B: they expect the Americans are bluffing.

What if you then after using tactical nukes the Ukrainians won't budge, China gets angry and suddenly the rest of your Black Seas fleet gets attacked and sunk? — ssu

Who knows?

It's unlikely the Chinese will alter their stance towards Russia much, regardless of what happens in Ukraine. Their shared rivalry with the United States is likely what will determine their relations for the coming decades, and by provoking conflict in Eastern Europe the Americans pushed the Russians into the arms of the Chinese even further.

Also, it is not "my" Black Sea fleet. Don't start again with trying to frame me as partisan.

A response to Russia using nukes is something that the Western leaders and NATO have had to think now. — ssu

I highly doubt that Western leaders are willing to enter a protracted land war in Eastern Europe and/or nuclear conflict just to save face for the Americans after they overplayed their hand in Ukraine.

The only country in NATO that is invested in Ukraine is the United States — Tzeentch

That is not the case:

Bilateral Aid as percentage of GDP from nations

The above combined with shared forms of support and totals allotted

Ukrainian refugees in the EU.

I highly doubt that Western leaders are willing to enter a protracted land war in Eastern Europe and/or nuclear conflict just to save face for the Americans after they overplayed their hand in Ukraine. — Tzeentch

If Russia uses nukes in Ukraine, the whole Russian army in Ukraine and in the Black Sea will be annihilated by NATO strikes, thus ending the war quickly and neatly. This has been communicated to Mr Putin already.

Again, that the use would result in NATO making a conventional attack on Russian forces in Ukraine is believable enough to make the use a very, very bad decision. — ssu

First, this is no longer making the point that nuclear weapons are somehow not useful militarily, so I think we agree there, that there are useful.

We also seem to agree that NATO would not retaliate with nuclear weapons, why would it?

As for conventional retaliation, this is really a problematic thing. You don't just casually destroy Russian forces. The options are fairly limited.

For example, let's say you launch a conventional attack on Russian military bases in Russia ... how would Russia be sure this is a conventional attack and not a nuclear first strike? So, it's not so easy.

Sending in boots on the ground into Ukraine ... does any Western nation actually want this? No one disputes Ukrainian forces have suffered high casualties, far higher than is the usual tolerance for Western armies. When does "teaching Russia a lesson" turn into just getting stuck in a quagmire with Russia with no options to actually defeat Russia, just continuing exchange of offensives without any clear outcome?

Also, if the Russia declares Ukraine free-to-nuke, and then nukes NATO forces in Ukraine ... does it really fear a nuclear retaliation? This is not even clear, so not only is it not clear that any NATO country even has the appetite for a full scale conventional confrontation with Russia in Ukraine, it's not clear whether they have any reasonable followup to being nuked in Ukraine, which, in this scenario, Russia just demonstrated it is willing to do, so it a fairly common sense followup to say they will not distinguish Ukrainian and other forces that are in Ukraine.

Certainly, there are plenty of reasons not to use nuclear weapons we would agree on (domestic politics, China and India's reaction); however, that Russia is reasonably deterred by conventional military means, or reasonably deterred by nuclear means, or believes nuclear weapons are not useful, are fairly weak arguments.

But boethius, the West isn't intervening in Ukraine as in Iraq. And in Libya there are quite many countries all around meddling in it's internal problems (also Turkey, Russia, Egypt, Qatar,...). Ukraine is basically getting arms and intel from the West, but it's doing the fighting all alone. So — ssu

Sending funding (basically bankrolling the entire Ukrainian military payroll), sending weapons, providing intelligence, covert meddling, are all in themselves interventions.

You are going back to the idea that we are not morally responsible for the outcome because Ukrainians want to fight and die, and if it's a total disaster for them that is the obvious outcome that we clearly see coming ... then that's fine. We can rediscuss this idea we aren't somehow "intervening" in Ukrainian agency, it's somehow all Ukraine and we aren't a party to the conflict, if you want.

However, my argument was simply that the West has no track record of intervening militarily in countries and producing vibrant democracies as advertised. There is no reason to believe that's ever seriously intended in the interventions so far that have catastrophically failed on this humanitarian metric, and so there is no reason to believe that is the intention now with regard to Ukraine, and there is even less reason to believe that will somehow magically happen.

No, actually where the West can fuck up big time isn't now (of course, if they just abandon Ukraine to face of Russia all alone would be that fuck up), it's later. The West can fumble after this war in the promised rebuilding of Ukraine. Done lousily that can simply increase corruption, which the Ukrainian people hate. And simply if it disregards it's own requirements, values and laws in case of Ukraine. The rebuilding of Afghanistan is a prime example how these things go bad. — ssu

No, the West can definitely fuckup now by actively obstructing peaceful resolutions, encouraging hundreds of thousands of deaths and injuries and millions of traumatised and disrupted lives and the complete destruction of Ukraine which Zelensky does not hesitate to tell us is being done for "your values" (i.e. the West, not necessarily good for Ukraine) and to protect Eastern Europe (not necessarily good for Ukraine).

That we won't help rebuild Ukraine in any sense remotely commensurate with the damages our weapons have helped cause ... goes without saying. Obviously we won't do that.

That's not what I mean. The United States has been pursuing NATO membership for Ukraine for over a decade, to expand its sphere of influence and to limit Russia's.

That's great power politics.

Other NATO/EU nations have no such interests. Whether they win or lose in Ukraine, it doesn't matter. Only to the United States it matters, and the Ukrainians of course.

If Russia uses nukes in Ukraine, the whole Russian army in Ukraine and in the Black Sea will be annihilated by NATO strikes, thus ending the war quickly and neatly. — Olivier5

If NATO could end this war "quickly and neatly" they would have already done so.

If NATO could end this war "quickly and neatly" they would have already done so. — Tzeentch

Likewise, if Putin could use nukes in Ukraine, he would have already done so.

Given that the Russians likely achieved their primary strategic objectives during the opening stages of the war (Donbas and landbridge to Crimea - limited objectives that correlate to the low number of troops the Russians deployed) it is highly unlikely that initiating a nuclear attack has even seriously been considered, but if you want to believe that I suppose I can't stop you.

it is highly unlikely that initiating a nuclear attack has even seriously been considered, — Tzeentch

I agree. Putin is not a fool. He knows he can't do that. Talks of nuke use are rhetorical.

Talks of nuke use are rhetorical. — Olivier5

So far, yes.

If Russia were to start losing the war, I believe they no longer would be.

Other NATO/EU nations have no such interests. Whether they win or lose in Ukraine, it doesn't matter. Only to the United States it matters, and the Ukrainians of course. — Tzeentch

By only framing it as a matter of a U.S. agenda, you fail to see or hear how much other nations want Russia to lose. They have all said as much and have put their money and resources where their mouth is. Many of the refugees will have no home to return to if Russia keeps all the annexations made so far. The rest will have no place to return to if the country is made uninhabitable. If Russia partitions Ukraine as you propose being all they want, the benefits of aggressive invasion will be established, especially if it leads to the withdrawal of sanctions and the return of business as usual.

While you and Mearsheimer fuss with the pieces at your game of Risk, others have a lot to lose should Russia succeed.

By only framing it as a matter of a U.S. agenda, you fail to see or hear how much other nations want Russia to lose. They have all said as much and have put their money and resources where their mouth is. Many of the refugees will have no home to return to if Russia keeps all the annexations made so far. The rest will have no place to return to if the country is made uninhabitable. If Russia partitions Ukraine as you propose being all they want, the benefits of aggressive invasion will be established, especially if it leads to the withdrawal of sanctions and the return of business as usual. — Paine

Sending "political signals" to Moscow and other countries about the consequences of aggression is so hypocritical even the most deluded European leaders couldn't sincerely believe that. I don't know if you've noticed, but the United States and European countries have been meddling non-stop in other nations' affairs, invading wherever they pleased, leaving behind chaos and smoking ruins wherever they went.

Perhaps such rhetoric is aimed at propaganda-fed domestic populations.

If all of this is about sending messages, how many dead do you suppose it is worth to get that message across?

Lastly, what message do you suppose is being sent? "It is only ok when we do it"?

You know what message that is? "Might makes right" - and it seems Russia took it to heart.

Alas, rounds of hypocrisy abound. Machiavelli lives.

I was not, however, addressing the purity of their hearts but your claim that only the U.S. (and some peasants living in the wrong place) have something to lose if Ukraine goes tits up.

Other nations have more than a rhetorical interest in the outcome. The security crisis in Europe is real. The economic crisis is real. The refugee crisis is real. It is all very well to analyze what all parties did to get us to this place. But to depict Russia as merely defending itself is to turn a blind eye to what they have been doing and what they are capable of.

Being only capable of thinking in terms of absolute hierarchies leave only orders of rank to be perceived. Everything else fades into the mist.