# In defence of Russia **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 6, 2022, 12:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166 "2022-08-06T00:49:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 36
**Author:** ![Kedikat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed655f/32.png) [@Kedikat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kedikat)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/701 "2023-01-06T04:48:43Z")
For christ sake can you people at least look up what U.S. and other western folks and for instance the RAND corporation has stated as useful purpose to use Ukraine for? Or did that not come up in your twitter feeds. Do some research. ---
**Author:** ![Kedikat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed655f/32.png) [@Kedikat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kedikat)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/702 "2023-01-06T04:49:18Z")
Worthless reply. Look up proxy war. ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 4:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/703 "2023-01-06T04:56:33Z")
No, I didn’t make the stupid claim, so I’m not looking for evidence to verify it. That’s your job, since you made the claim. If you can’t back it up with a reliable source, I’ll assume it’s more of your bullshit. ---
**Author:** ![Kedikat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed655f/32.png) [@Kedikat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kedikat)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/704 "2023-01-06T05:10:30Z")
Took me a couple minutes. Maybe you can take the many hours I have, to really see the reasons for this horrible war. Unfortunately the corporation miscalculated fucking around with another country. > **[Nonviolent Ways the United States Could Exploit Russian Vulnerabilities](https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB10014.html)** > > Despite its vulnerabilities and anxieties, Russia remains a formidable opponent in a few key domains. What non-violent, cost-imposing measures could the United States pursue to stress Russia's economy, its military, and the regime's political... ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 5:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/705 "2023-01-06T05:12:37Z")
Swing and a miss! Nope, some theory piece from RAND does not indicate a plan. Keep trying. ---
**Author:** ![Kedikat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed655f/32.png) [@Kedikat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kedikat)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/706 "2023-01-06T05:18:05Z")
If you folks would take a look at fairly recent history. Last couple of decades. The west has very obviously been at odds with Russia. It is one of the big bad guys. We must crush them. Over and over. So why would Russia not think they are under threat? Now it is also China. I don’t like a lot of things about China and Russia. But war? Can we try and find other ways? It isn’t always possible of course. Hitler had to be dealt with finally by war, of course. Some things have to be violently opposed. But this mess could have been avoided. Some people egged it on for their purpose. ---
**Author:** ![Kedikat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed655f/32.png) [@Kedikat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kedikat)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 5:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/707 "2023-01-06T05:19:13Z")
Whatever. ---
**Author:** ![Alessan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alessan/32/465_2.png) [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/708 "2023-01-06T05:25:40Z")
> [@Kedikat](#): > > If you folks would take a look at fairly recent history. Last couple of decades. The west has very obviously been at odds with Russia. It is one of the big bad guys. We must crush them. Over and over. So why would Russia not think they are under threat? That’s just typical Russian hubris. Russia has always needed to think of itself as a big, powerful country with big, powerful enemies, while in fact ever since the Cold War ended, the West didn’t really care all that much about Russia. It was just another country to trade with. Russia is just offended that the West doesn’t consider it an equal in terms of power, and based on Russia’s haplessness in this past year, can you blame them? ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 5:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/709 "2023-01-06T05:27:22Z")
Ok, so no backup for your claim. It’s bullshit all the way down with you, isn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![scabpicker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scabpicker/32/8268_2.png) [@scabpicker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scabpicker)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 5:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/710 "2023-01-06T05:29:19Z")
> [@Kedikat](#): > > Now it is also China. I don’t like a lot of things about China and Russia. But war? Can we try and find other ways? It isn’t always possible of course. Hitler had to be dealt with finally by war, of course. Some things have to be violently opposed. But this mess could have been avoided. Some people egged it on for their purpose. Again, your idiotic questions are directed at the wrong party. The group that is actually starting wars to further their aims is where you should direct it. But at this point, I think you already knew that. ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/711 "2023-01-06T06:02:13Z")
> [@Kedikat](#): > > Whatever. Looking forward to your meltdown and banning, Komrad! > [@Kedikat](#): > > Dissonance posted some detailed points about the legal aspects of the Bosphorus Strait treaty or whatever its technical name is. That is fine and informative. But it was not really negating what I said. The strait is closed to military vessels. See, this is how you make it patently obvious that you are a Putin shill and a troll. It’s the Montreux Convention, it’s really not that hard to see the name being used multiple times by several posters, and clearly none of it was ‘informative’ to you, and you are clearly trolling when you repeat that the Straits are closed to military vessels when it’s been demonstrated to you that there are only two nations that it is closed to: Russia and Ukraine. Turkish military vessels can come and go as they please, and just to remind you Turkey is 1) a part of NATO and 2) arranged the deal to allow grain to be exported from the Ukraine. Turkey has very clearly stated that it has **not** closed the Bosporus to other nations, it only recommends against it. If the US or another NATO nation wanted to send warships into the Black Sea, they would. Something you seem not have noticed - or act like you seem not to have noticed - is that there is no reason for the US or other non-Turkish NATO nations to want or need to send warships into the Black Sea at the current time, which is why they haven’t. NATO held their annual Black Sea naval exercise, [Breeze 2022](https://www.wionews.com/photos/nato-conducts-naval-exercise-in-black-sea-amid-ukraine-war-500170/#helicopter-exercise-500148) in July. NATO ELINT planes have been freely flying over the Black Sea collecting all the electronic data from Russia that they please and passing it on to Ukraine non-stop since the beginning of the war. Why would NATO want to send warships to the Black Sea in the present situation? What purpose would they serve that isn’t already being otherwise covered even better by other assets? As a reminder of just how impotent the Russian Black Sea Fleet actually is nowadays, remember when Ukraine attacked what remains of it at Sevastopol Harbor and [Putin threatened to stop the grain deal](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russia-suspends-participation-deal-ukraine-grain-exports-tass-2022-10-29/) > for an “indefinite term” because it could said it could not “guarantee safety of civilian ships” travelling under the pact after an attack on its Black Sea fleet. only to turn around and do absolutely nothing to stop the flow of grain? There’s nothing that they could realistically do to stop the grain flowing. What remains of the Russian Black Sea Fleet is rightly too scared to venture any closer to the Ukrainian coast than Sevastopol since the loss of the _Moskva_ and the abandonment of Snake Island. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/712 "2023-01-06T07:02:43Z")
Russia started this war, and Russia could easily end it. Your apologism for Putin is bullshit. He wanted to dominate Ukraine and thus he invaded. And he’s ensured Zelenskyy is now seen as a hero to the vast majority of Ukrainians. Putin has done more for NATO unity and Ukrainian nationalism in the last year than anyone could have imagined. ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/713 "2023-01-06T16:36:58Z")
> [@Kedikat](#): > > Ukraine has been jerked around by western countries and Russia for many years. This is the most laughably, transparently off-base example of _tu quoque_ I’ve seen on the SDMB in a long while. That the West is supposedly out to crush Russia is another beaut, on a par with North Korea’s claiming that it’s threatened by an impending U.S. and South Korean invasion. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2023, 7:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/714 "2023-01-06T19:32:47Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > This is the most laughably, transparently off-base example of _tu quoque_ I’ve seen on the SDMB in a long while. In addition, the only possible things I could think of in recent memory would be not doing enough _to protect them against Russia_, or individual bad actors who jerked them around _to help Russia_. So even if it were true, it’s diametrically opposed to the suggestion that this has been a long-awaited and salivated-over proxy war. ---
**Author:** ![Al128](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/al128/32/16541_2.png) [@Al128](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Al128)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2023, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/715 "2023-01-07T18:19:47Z")
> [@Kedikat](#): > > The west has very obviously been at odds with Russia. It is one of the big bad guys. We must crush them. Over and over. **[citation needed]** ---
**Author:** ![Dissonance](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/85f322/32.png) [@Dissonance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dissonance)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2023, 6:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/716 "2023-01-07T18:58:56Z")
I’ll help our Komrad out here and give you his citations since I doubt even he would be so stupid to give them to us directly: Russian state propaganda. The ‘collective west’ is the obvious culprit in the war special military operation, comrade: [Collective West unleashed war in Ukraine, culprit of current events — Putin - Russian Politics & Diplomacy - TASS](https://tass.com/politics/1477149): > # Collective West unleashed war in Ukraine, culprit of current events — Putin > > According to the President of the Russian Federation, the West should have understood that it has already lost from the very beginning of the special operation > > MOSCOW, July 8. /TASS/. The collective West unleashed a war in Ukraine and is responsible for unfolding developments, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday. > > “We are being told that we have unleashed the war in Donbass, in Ukraine. No, it was unleashed by the collective West after it had organized and supported the 2014 anti-constitutional armed takeover and then encouraged and justified genocide with regards to the people of Donbass. This collective West, on the whole, is the direct instigator and the culprit of today’s developments,” he said at a meeting with the leadership of the lower house of parliament and the leaders of parliamentary factions. [Russia at war not so much with Ukrainian army as with ‘collective West:’ Defense minister](https://www.aa.com.tr/en/world/russia-at-war-not-so-much-with-ukrainian-army-as-with-collective-west-defense-minister/2690655) > Russia is at war not so much with the Ukrainian army as it is with the “collective West,” the nation’s defense minister said on Wednesday after a partial military mobilization was announced in Russia. > > The mobilization is being carried out to control “already liberated territories,” Sergei Shoigu said in a live interview with Russia 24 channel. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2023, 8:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/717 "2023-01-07T20:01:42Z")
If the West really wanted to destroy Russia, surely we would have done so when Russia declared war on the US back in 2016. I’m still not entirely sure why we just ignored that declaration of war, but not caring one way or the other about a puny insignificant country like Russia has to be part of it. ---
**Author:** ![velomont](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/8491ac/32.png) [@velomont](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/velomont)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2023, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/718 "2023-01-07T20:13:53Z")
> [@Kedikat](#): > > The west has very obviously been at odds with Russia How so? Please give some examples. And this isn’t some weird specific thing that Russia needs to do - it’s a bloody Putin thing, to the extent that I don’t think that Gorbachev or Yeltsin would have done shit like this. ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2023, 8:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/719 "2023-01-07T20:19:16Z")
> [@Kedikat](#): > > The west has very obviously been at odds with Russia. It is one of the big bad guys. We must crush them. Uh huh. Clearly all the Western businesses and investment that precipitously exited Russia at the onset of hostilities were in reality secretly part of a hostile invasion force. It would be a mistake to regard the presence of so many Western companies and institutions as an indication that the West was perfectly happy to work with Russia and do business and make money together as long as they weren’t overtly being hyperterritorial belligerent assholes. You big fucking dummy. ---
**Author:** ![Monty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/monty/32/47_2.png) [@Monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Monty)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2023, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166/720 "2023-01-08T00:21:40Z")
So here Putin is saying that he, in his own mind, is actually a stooge, a puppet of the “collective West”? Interesting. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166.md?page=35) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/in-defence-of-russia/969166.md?page=37)