@itxtme:

 

I have stayed out of this topic on here as I found how this topic was moderated was disingenuous. 

 

I've spent a bit of Sunday morning searching for examples of this "disingenuous moderation" @itxtme mentions.

One comment by someone else early on was, "Although him and his government are drug addicts, nazis and he is Jewish. Israel has a large population of Russians and Ukrainians, Jews. Friends."

The person was later blocked from posting in this thread.

Another example was "Can we rename this thread 'Western propaganda enforcement' and be done with it. None of you really care." followed by "The [Russian] atrocities are alleged." 

This user was permanently banned.

@itxtme, you don't need to worry about it. I am using my "disingenuous moderation" powers and blocking you from posting in Politics again.

freitasm: 'Western propaganda enforcement'

Ran into someone like that recently, a group of us were discussing the Russian use of 60-year-old Soviet antiques in Ukraine and he made some comment about "it depends on whose propaganda you believe".  The thing is the discussion was about satellite imagery showing boneyards full of rusting tanks pre-invasion and severely depleted boneyards with tank tracks leading to the nearby railhead afterwards, that's not propaganda, it's third-party photos of what's actually happening.

Admittedly we do get a western-view biased picture of things, but there's a difference between being sceptical of some stories and just swallowing Russian and far-right fantasies wholesale.  For example at the start of the conflict an Austrian friend of mine asked "why are we spending billions of euros supporting Ukraine? They're just as corrupt as Russia, if a year ago you'd asked whether they wanted to reform the Soviet Union with Kiev as its capital they'd have said yes", which is a valid point, Ukraine wasn't exactly a model democracy before 2022.  However there's a big difference between trying to de-skew the reporting a bit and expressing an opinion, and just repeating Russian and far-right propaganda verbatim.

Edited to add: Forgot to mention Austria is neutral and not a NATO member, so there's a strong history of staying out of other people's wars which would have influenced that opinion.

itxtme:

 

The whole world, but especially the western world need to take a good hard look in the mirror.

 

Really? Without the ‘Western world’, there would be no Ukraine anymore. It must be permissible among ‘friends’ to at least occasionally raise the question of efforts to negotiate peace before further begging for weapons is authorised ad infinitum. What do you think will happen after Donald takes office in January?

Is the corruption of Russian adjacent countries just co-incidence ?
Or is the common factor of Russia causal ?

This does not happen in isolation, and benefits Russia.
Corruption being a useful mechanism for Russia to control, destabilize its neighbors.

Putin put up with the obvious skimming of Oligarchs, Shoigu and others, through to Prigozhin.
While they produced more results/loyalty than they skimmed. Similar to a Mafia Boss.
Having and 'open window' policy on the rest.

I daresay that much of Moldova's, Romania's problems are down to the lovely criminal paradise of Transnistria that Russia setup.  

Ukrainian people have strongly come out well before 2014 that they wanted a future with EU and EU anti-corruption Government structures that would come with this. 
Then in 2014 it all boiled over when a Government and leader in a golden palace, bent the knee to Russia.
They were fed up with this, not some large bandit clan happy as another Russian Kleptocracy.

Tinkerisk:

 

 What do you think will happen after Donald takes office in January?

 

He'll tell Zelenskyy he's made a beautiful perfect deal with his good friend Vladimir who wants only the best for his people and the world, and so Ukraine will need to accept [produces map with new border drawn in Sharpie] the loss of all this land that was always actually Russia, and that Russia has offered to absorb the rest of Ukraine into the Russian Federation as a semi-independent state. "Isn't it the most perfect deal, Boromir? The Russians are sending a plane to pick you up in the morning and take you to Moscow for a victory celebration party!"

SaltyNZ:

 

"Isn't it the most perfect deal, Boromir? The Russians are sending a plane to pick you up in the morning and take you to Moscow for a victory celebration party!"

 

On a beautiful dacha with a beautiful window overlooking a cliff.

Actually he'll never get that far, here's footage that fell out of a time warp of Zelensky's private jet on its way to Moscow.  A copy of Putin's statement about the incident was also recovered:

First of all, I want to express my sincere condolences to the families of all the victims, this is always a tragedy. He was a man of difficult fate, and he made serious mistakes in life, and he achieved the results needed both for himself and when I asked him about it – for a common cause, as in these last months.

Sweden preparing for war - PDF download.

More information: Sweden, Finland and Norway release new advice on surviving war

Si vis pacem parabellum, I guess...

Nordic Nations knowing Russia well have kept their military service going.
So did not scale back or eliminate to the degree that rest of Europe did. 
https://carnegieendowment.org/research/2024/07/europes-conscription-challenge-lessons-from-nordic-and-baltic-states?lang=en

Of course the Nuclear measures of having iodine tablets, and supply of food has always remained an issue with Russia having the odd accident.
Weapons testing and other unexplained low level radiation events.
So even in peace time.
Nothing like having noisy objectionable neighbors.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nyonoksa_radiation_accident

Blueberries seem to be a big thing in Sweden.

The Swedish checklist recommends potatoes, cabbage, carrots and eggs along with tins of bolognese sauce and prepared blueberry and rosehip soup.

An interesting, thought provoking insight into the Russian approach to Ukraine and why the way the West might try to reach a resolution to the war probably won't be successful. 

https://youtu.be/lYPXO7GMHuk?si=d3Vz57eHdbbpho6K

Some well reasoned thoughts on why Putin may not like Trump's solution for Ukraine. 

https://youtu.be/b133D26kTWs?si=yTmAJGJb_LEnMSl4

neb:

 

Edited to add: Forgot to mention Austria is neutral and not a NATO member, so there's a strong history of staying out of other people's wars which would have influenced that opinion.

 

Except for the minor detail that it triggered the start of the First World War. 😉