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naraburns  nihil supernum  1yr ago (text post)   34900 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of January 30, 2023

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I don’t think the US can be exhausted. We are not a poor nation. Exhaustion perhaps if Ukraine runs out of troops. But then you still have an option of Polish boots on the ground who have no interest in Russia on there border and plenty of past grievances.

Personally I think the west losing would be a huge negative. It puts a lot of national security guarantees under threat. Even our enemies like Iran benefit from international standards. Russia losing isn’t necessarily bad for the average guy but bad for Putin.

I don’t think the US can be exhausted. We are not a poor nation.

Exhaustion as in "according to polls stopping funding Ukraine gives us 2 extra percentage points"

Public opinion has to have a direct effect

on voting to sway politicians. The American public will never vote for one guy over another because he wants to send 1/1000th less of the yearly budget to Ukraine.

I want to stop funding Ukraine. Think it’s absurd when facing these massive deficits we are borrowing about 100b to fund Ukraine. Yes it isn’t causing the deficit but it sure ain’t helping.

What is your source on the US borrowing $100 billion to fund Ukraine? The total aid according to this article is worth only $50 billion, and most of that is in-kind (old weapons stockpiles etc.) and not financial.

Here says 66b was approved by congress prior to the Omni bill at end of 2022 which promised another 48b.

https://www.factcheck.org/2022/12/u-s-aid-to-ukraine-explained/

Granted, maybe some of it is in kind. But still we’ve committed to use over 100b of assets.

But still we’ve committed to use over 100b of assets.

Note that it is much, much different from "we are borrowing about 100b to fund Ukraine". To the point that "we are borrowing about 100b to fund Ukraine" claim is untrue.

I agree it was overstated but “much, much different” is also an overstatement. A bank for example takes into account assets.

As I understand, vast majority of what is supplied to Ukraine is either

  • intended to fight Russia in the first place

  • scheduled to be disposed or would be decommissioned soon

  • without clear purpose anyway (for example confiscated smuggled weaponry)

  • send as live testing of previously untested weapons

  • send to demonstrate just how great USA weapons are (speculative, but that may be one of reasons for HIMARS)

  • in multiple above categories

I mean, personally, as a left-winger, I'm glad some of our bloated defense department budget is finally get put to use for a good reason for once. If we have to "spend" (ie. send basically our leftover equipment in the back of the garage to Ukraine) a stupidly small amount of GDP to turn Russia into a wreck, win-win.

I’m not sure turning Russia into a wreck is a win-win (do we really want a de stabilized nuclear power)?

I just wish we’d cut military spending (including Ukraine spending).

As other people have pointed out, a Russia engaged largely in their own internal political (and possibly actual) knifing each other in the back over the failures of the Ukraine invasion is a nation that's far less able to cause issues on the world stage, even if somebody to Putin's right comes to power. Because it may take a decade-plus for said new guy to centralize his power the way Putin did. After all, Putin wasn't Putin until the end of the 2000's, really.

Russia, despite it's myriad of issues, has basically zero chance of becoming a "failed state" the way say, you could argue Syria, some African countries, etc. are, because Russia is still, by global standards, fairly wealthy with a lot of resosurces. They're currently messing that up, but they can mess it up to a far larger degree and still be OK (of course, the US can mess up to about 1,000x more degrees and still be fine.)

Now, obviously, an actual civil war in Russia would be bad, but that's honestly, incredibly unlikely to happen.

The issue is more “nuclear weapon(s) fall(s) into the wrong hands in a chaotic situation.”

do we really want a de stabilized nuclear power

Russia has been least dangerous to its neighbours when least stable and powerful: 1921-1938, when it was still devastated from WWI and its elite was eating itself, then 1992 to 2007, when it was an economic and political mess. The long term strategy of successive generations of Russian leaders, going back far beyond living memory, has been to develop a frontier of buffer vassal or neutraliased states as far as possible, stopping only when encountering resistance. Thus, Russia is only not a danger to its neighbours when it is weak.

Selfishly, I am not a neighbor of Russia. But if Russia for example became a failed state with a large deposits of nuclear warheads, that seems like a problem that could affect me.

I’m not sure turning Russia into a wreck is a win-win

Depends on comparison

do we really want a de stabilized nuclear power

They already destabilized themself by invading Ukraine, preferably they would not be also victorious.

I really doubt it. Maybe if there were Americans dying on the ground for nothing like Iraq.

But Biden's party hates Putin and the MIC is very good at finding enough slack in the democratic process to continue working, except when there really is an overwhelming, bipartisan counter-reaction (like Iraq).

Rest of the time they seem to get away with throwing arms and funding at the conflicts they want.

I don’t think the US can be exhausted.

I would just say Iraq and Afghanistan.

We won Iraq. It’s a Democracy. Afghanistan still 20 years. So possible but long.

So the people of Iraq, that hate America and wish for nothing more than to see it destroyed, can now vote and this is a win for the US because? Not that this is an actual worry since Iraq, by some think tank standards, has not been less democratic since they starting measuring the country in 2006. And is categorized as "authoritarian", ranking 124th out of 167.

I'm reminded of the color revolution in Egypt and the democratic upheaval in the country that resulted in the most backward Islamic rule in recent times to win control over the country because, contrary to the words of liberal-progressive English speaking university students that could give interviews to CNN on the ground, the voting majority was anything but. This then lead to a hastily organized military coup to correct the record of the peoples will. Democracy indeed.

I guess I am asking what on earth 'you' won.

And that still took 20 years.

Yes, that's what scares me.

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