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PaperclipPerfector  3d ago (text post)   15335 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 6, 2025

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Where does this logic lead you other than genocide of the Russian people and complete destruction of Russia as a nation?

This is the exact logic that the US has used for every ridiculous war we've gotten into for the last 70 years.

A whole range of possibilities. There are choices between "give them what they want" and "we have to exterminate them all".

It's worth pointing out that the breaking of the Nazi and Imperial Japanese war machines did not require the genocide of thier respective peoples.

Ummm... Maybe not the complete genocide of their peoples. But certainly the destruction of millions upon millions of civilians, the castration of their independence and self respect as nations, and a permanent pall of suspicion cast over any effort to emerge.

I think it's true that the Axis war machine was broken without genocide, but after the war both nations had their borders redrawn at bayonet-point, with Germany being split in two and millions of Germans forcibly relocated. Hundreds of thousands of them died and others (including civilians) were sent to forced labor camps. This policy was (in part, at least) approved by the "big three" (UK, US, USSR) during the Potsdam Conference and wasn't just something the Russians "got away with" after the Iron Curtain came down, and Western countries, including the US, UK, and France used POWs as forced labor until the late 1940s. Similarly in Japan, the Kurils were occupied by Russia with American assent and the Japanese inhabitants removed. It seems fair to say that no genocide was committed, but it might be worth remembering that what we would today call ethnic cleansing was a part of the Allied postwar strategy.

Similarly in Japan, the Kurils were occupied by Russia with American assent and the Japanese inhabitants removed.

Even bigger than that was the removal of ethnic Japanese from Manchukuo, as well as from China proper

Oh interesting, although I can't say I am surprised. Do you have numbers on the removals there? I think there's an intuition to look at what happened in Manchukuo or Poland and say "well [some of] those people wouldn't have been there if it wasn't for [Axis actions] so it only makes sense to kick them out." But that's not true of what happened in Kaliningrad, or the Kurils.

You can stop a nation from invading its neighbors without committing genocide and destroying the nation. The US has also done this, for more than 70 years.

Do you sincerely believe Putin would just stop at Donbas and the Crimea, with no further designs on Ukraine or any other neighbors?

How many other countries has he invaded since the Ukraine war began? If he had any interest in other territories, why hasn’t he tried to take them?

If you made this comment in 2016 you'd be asking why he hasn't tried to take Kyiv yet.

Regardless of that Russia is not in a good position even if it desired to do so. Russia failed it's security commitments to Armenia in 2022 and Syria in 2024 in all likelihood due to funneling the vast majority of its military resources into Ukraine, starting a second invasion would severely diminish its ability to prosecute the war effectively in Ukraine. Even if fighting in Ukraine ceased tomorrow Russia would still want to let its economy cool, and rest and rearm before attempting even a fairly modest invasion.

Well, the current special military operation has been going less well than expected, and the West has already shown willingness to bleed Russia through Ukraine. Opening another front immediately would seem unwise.

Why do you think Putin just wants a piece of Ukraine and then he'll be satisfied?

let's see

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