@Steve__Connors@Insidiator69@BMarchetich That is ridiculous. If you believe the Feb 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine was an unpremeditated response to Feb 2022 Ukrainian attacks on separatists waging civil war for the past decade, you are more deluded than those who think Russians are irrational aggressive brutes.
@Ratwood1917@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich I can imagine multiple reasons. He may think: to blame NATO looks reactionary (weak); historical justifications are more difficult to rebut by a West that supports Israel on similar grounds; that lying to Western intelligence has value regardless of the lie.
@shoegazerr_@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich I think we are going in circles. I wish you well and hope Ukraine remains independent and Ukrainian people stop dying in this awful war. I think being clear-eyed about the past 30 years of geopolitics is important towards that end. Be well
@shoegazerr_@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich The key thing is to separate your moral judgement - The Russian invasion of Ukraine was criminal and evil - from the mechanical judgment of realist IR - if you threaten a powerful nation they will likely make counter threats.
@shoegazerr_@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich Look, if you don't want to honestly engage with the substance of the realist critique of NATO expansion, that's your prerogative, but if you believe Russians are intrinsically aggressive brutes who do things for no reason, don't be surprised when your analysis inevitably falters.
@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich Soviet expansion was done by defeating Nazi Germany. "No european country has ever threaten the rule of Putin" is false- you simply don't accept that NATO expansion was indeed an open and undisguised threat to Russia. This is the crux of your contempt for Mearshimer
@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich Yes, I understand that some think that when Russian power expanded it's "Soviet Expansion", when Western power expanded it's "countering Soviet Expansion". Heads I win, tails you lose logic.
@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich thought Russia wouldn't invade *at that moment* because it was strategically shaky. Indeed the initial invasion was repulsed. He always said NATO expansion raised confrontation risk- clearly correct, except to anti-Russians who think they are intrinsically aggressive.
@shoegazerr_@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich The USA was not able to subdue Vietnam or Afghanistan. Are they not a great power? You're working backward from your opposition to Russian aggression. It will not help your cause to be blinded to geopolitical realities.
@shoegazerr_@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich I'm sorry, if you think the country with the largest nuclear arsenal in the world, that has the demonstrated ability to withstand the combined sanctions power of US + Europe, is not a "great power", you're fooling yourself.
@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich You're asking me if the military coalition created to contain and ultimately dismantle Russia as a great power, which has thousands of nuclear weapons pointed at Russia, is "threatening Russia"? And you're asking this seriously?
@shoegazerr_@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich If you characterize anything about Mearsheimer's thought (not sure why you call it "you guys" but whatever) as "assuming the best of them" you fundamentally don't understand what he thinks about great power politics.
@TheDataAP@Insidiator69@BMarchetich thought Russia wouldn't invade *at that moment* because it was strategically shaky. Indeed the initial invasion was repulsed. He always said NATO expansion raised confrontation risk- clearly correct, except to anti-Russians who think they are intrinsically aggressive.
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