Russia could not win a nuclear exchange with China, except in the restricted sense of coming out with fewer dead people. Actually Russia’s thermonuclear weapons superiority over China is most salient in tactical nukes. It is a bluff, and shows Russia wants to keep it a matter of battlefield nukes rather than strategic. The theory goes that after a conventional attack the defender will fire a tactical nuke and the invader will at most fire a tactical nuke back. (But the little nukes like the nuclear bazooka disappeared from Nato because once you go nuclear the other side will up the ante and you will end up at strategic level. Nuclear weapons have no military purpose. Wars cannot be fought with them.)

The Duke Nukem theorem is what the Americans tried to impose on the Nato defending West Europe from a Warsaw pact situation, but it did not really convince even the Americans (When Kissinger was brought in to school new pres Ronald Reagan on thermonuclear reality, Kissinger advised President Ray-gun that he should never use any kind in nuclear weapon first.) When Russia amassed ever more massive conventional forces with what seemed enough materiel for a standing start (ie surprise attack ) arrayed advance into the West, Nato became increasingly worried about a Soviet conventional attack and spent a fortune (conventional weapons are expensive) on conventional defences. I think it was obvious that they were not acting as if they would have actually first use tactically nuked a Soviet conventional attack. But, they knew the Soviets could roll over all those conventional defenses . Nato generals undersood this, see the the Cold war books they wrote.

https://defenceindepth.co/2016/08/01/general-sir-john-hacketts-the-third-world-war-or-how-to-think-about-a-future-war-with-russia-today/Hackett’s earlier attempt at writing a scenario had the Warsaw Pact advancing to the French border in as little as 4 days leading to the occupation of West Germany, a D-day style NATO counterattack two years later, followed by a Soviet collapse. After distributing drafts of this early version, he was told by several retired US and West German generals that if it was published it would undermine public confidence in NATO. A year earlier, in 1976, Belgian Brigadier General Robert Close published a controversial book, Europe Without Defense? 48 hours That Could Change the Face of the World, involving a scenario in which the Warsaw Pact launches a surprise attack and advances to the Rhine in two days. Fearing the prospect of undermining NATO, Hackett developed more optimistic scenarios, including the one that was eventually published.

To the Russian leadership Russia’s seizure of Ukrainian territory made sense from a cost benefit perspective. China is going to try and dominate Russia, and if Russia resists China will will take punitive measures against Russia.

You are no different in requesting

The police don’t “request” I pay my parking tickets, Sport. Maybe they do yours?

I agree Siberia would be too difficult. But if for some reason China wanted to clip Russia’s wings (and John Mearshemer suggests it is inevitable they will) a temptingly easy advance would be to drive across land to the Sea of Okhotsk, and stop after capturing Vladivostok.

Russia has massive strategic nuclear superiority over China, and hence can use tactical nuclear weapons against Chinese forces with impunity. The invading PLA units would quickly become radioactive vapor.

Even if China achieved nuclear parity with Russia, and successfully seized Vladivostok, such a seizure would make no sense from a cost/benefits perspective.

The Brexit supporting Far Right of the UK Conservative Party are Russian supporters to a man, a few ex spooks excepted led by a woman. Surprisingly many of them have Russian wives 30 years younger than they are.

“I’m asking people to voluntarily stop using words that are loaded terms used to smuggle premises into a conversation without debate / analysis.”

Using your logic, we can extend those “loaded terms” to include cuck and race realist, assuming that “college educated” is indeed a loaded term.

“Accusing me of being a “social justice warriorâ€� is embarrassingly off-base if you have read any of my numerous comments here over the past few years.”

You offered the suggestion since you were triggered for people to refrain from employing “college educated” in discourse. If YOU want to stop using that term, go right ahead if it makes you feel better about yourself.

“It is the “thought policeâ€� who are happy with us using a positive term, “college-educatedâ€�…”

You are no different in requesting that people not use this term, which to most people is rather innocuous.

“to describe something that is increasingly personally and socially destructive”

Maybe, or maybe not.

“spending, and usually borrowing, vast sums of money to be indoctrinated and rarely if ever presented with a full range of evidence and viewpoints…”

No, colleges and universities are generally not groupthink mills that chews and spits out radicals who lack the intellectual rigor to carry on in-depth conversations.

Now, I will agree that college is becoming way too expensive and that the trades ought to be emphasized.

I think all of us, including the USA and Russia and China, could use a lot more instruction in, and adherence to, something like the Ten Commandments and Jesus’s teachings in the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew chapters 5, 6, and 7, and yeah I had to look that up 😉 I know I do.

What none of us needs is the unnecessary and often irrational “doctrine”, minutiae, prejudice, and foolishness that also come with Christianity, Islam, Judaism, etc.

Um, yeah Corvinus, obviously it’s voluntary. I’m asking people to voluntarily stop using words that are loaded terms used to smuggle premises into a conversation without debate / analysis.

Accusing me of being a “social justice warrior” is embarrassingly off-base if you have read any of my numerous comments here over the past few years.

It is the “thought police” who are happy with us using a positive term, “college-educated”, to describe something that is increasingly personally and socially destructive: spending, and usually borrowing, vast sums of money to be indoctrinated and rarely if ever presented with a full range of evidence and viewpoints, over the course of four years that could have been spent engaged in true debate and discourse (and the acquisition of actual marketable skills).

I agree Siberia would be too difficult. But if for some reason China wanted to clip Russia’s wings (and John Mearshemer suggests it is inevitable they will) a temptingly easy advance would be to drive across land to the Sea of Okhotsk, and stop after capturing Vladivostok.

Yes China does not want to start a war, but it will inevitably come into conflict with, or Finlandise, all countries on its borders. Russia will not want to fight America’s battles, but that geopolitical fate is one that goes with the territory.

Need or not, they already have two out of the three, and some Chinese seem to be happy with that.

It’s the Jooz and their controlled media trying to keep the last two significant Christian nations, white Christian Russia and nominally Christian but less white America from promoting Christian values and working together to have a good ‘Western’ world order. Europe is a lost cause with boatloads of unwashed, criminally inclined negroes are being sent into Europe with no resistance.
But this will all backfire on the globalist satanic Joo. They must know this but still can’t help themselves, thank God!

Re: African Americans on Russia

Tyrell Starr being a prime example of an affirmative action Russia hater.

The not so Russia friendly Shaun Walker called Starr’s recent WaPo piece one of the dumbest commentaries.

Not that the likes of Malcolm Nance, Barack Obama and Maxine Waters are much better, if at all.

In contrast, the very intelligent and well informed Gerald Horne, gets no airtime from establishment huckster Don Lemon, among others in US mass media.

Regardless of color, those Americans who overwhelmingly rely on US mass media, (as their source of Russia info.), will be extremely ignorant on Russia related matters.

In years and years of being around Chinese irredentism, I have never heard of any interest in Vladivostok.

Well, for one — the Chinese never lived around Vladivostok and never controlled the area.

It was claimed by the Manchu, but the Manchu were mortal enemies of the Han Chinese and are now completely assimilated.

The word “irredentism” here is plain wrong.

China does not need Abrahamic religions.

That’s a good development, hopefully it turns out well for them and yes, they paid a very heavy price to shift from what they were 60 years ago to what they are today.

Peace.

Christianity is on the rapid increase in China. So perhaps the materialism will fade away– very gradually though! Actually, speaking historically, there may very well be a price to pay, but China will probably emerge considerably better off for it. And don’t forget China has paid a pretty stiff price already.

Heck, I sound like Priss. I should get some sleep.

Are you? You’re the one randomly and incorrectly interrupting other peoples’ conversations to tell them what to say.

Naturally, I’m sure as a conservative, you support Alexei “Party of Progress and Pussy Riot” Navalny?

“perhaps we should stop saying “college-educatedâ€�

Are you the SJW thought police? If a person wants to say “college educated”, or “people with college degrees” or “people who graduated from college”, that is what they will say.

Agreed – China has nothing to gain from an aggressive war. She has no imperial reputation to protect either as world’s policeman. If she just keeps doing what she’s doing, she’ll be fine while other nations tire themselves out by jumping up and down.

Something tells me there is going to be a hidden price for all this materialism, but that doesn’t mean she’s jumped the shark yet. So full steam ahead for the time being.

Peace.

It is the same with the left and Brexit, just totally irrational incoherent rage.

No one is going to start a war when the gain from the war, win or lose, is less than the less risky gain from peace. That centrally is the largest flaw of your thesis that China would go adventuring toward Siberia; there’s no point to putting the immense amount of sunk cost in infrastructure at risk and create hostiles. You also seem to firmly believe that China armed North Korea, which is entirely illogical given the sheer amount of hostility that has been elapsed between the governments, including murder.

The best world for China at the moment is a stable and consistent accumulation of power, focused primarily on internal domestic stability and efforts at remediating various problems. None of it could be enhanced by starting a massive war to which China could be seen as the aggressor, and “mistakes” caused by inconsistent policy are far less likely in a single-party government with a planning span of at least five to ten years.

As noted again, pretty much all efforts will be guided at Taiwan. That’s a sore spot, regardless of relative power. And the methods by which China is fighting that “battle” is instructive of how they conduct warfare – political and economical to induce brain drain and foreign isolation, rather than militaristic invasion. The last is too provocative.

Britain was basically given strategic nuke missiles by America so that the Soviets would be less confident about a conventional attack.

Everyone knew America wasn’t going to get into a nuclear exchange with the Soviets to stop a Soviet invasion of Western Europe. Britain would not have either, but it added a little doubt.

Anyway, get it into your head that no one is going to start a nuclear war, but that does not mean they won’t start an ordinary war. Even in the Wild West with everyone carrying a gun hardly any fights ended with shootings.That is why Wyatt Earp could use his fists to keep order.

if Britain suddenly fired off an all-out nuclear attack on Russia, would Russia only hit Britain in return? With 30 million Russians dead and the country devastated, Russia would hit Britain and America.

Knowing some Russians, I’m not sure if their default reaction to every military disaster to end the world. Perhaps Mr. Karlin can help us with more details of a doomsday fetish among the Rus.

Preparations for the next war tend to reflect the last war.
That was one of the mistakes the Soviets made, to many investments into conventional forces that were not really needed.

The Warsaw Pact had nukes and was not conventionally weaker than Nato on the ground in Europe. The Soviets had 10:1 in tube artillery and all those tanks, but Nato had all those nukes so why did Nato need strong conventional forces such as tanks ect in West Germany?

It’s known that Pakistan was given uranium enrichment help by China and actual parts of a Chinese M-II missile. (Prof Jeremy Black’s book War and the New Disorder in the 21st Century: Compact, Page 102. Call me crazy, call me a sick nut , but I think China has given North Korea something similar.

Claims =/= overlordship

To deter conventional attack by a nuclear armed rival you need strong conventional forces and that is why all nuclear powers have to spend lots of money on strong conventional forces.

They spend money on strong conventional forces primarily for the sake of using them against weaker conventional forces without nuclear weapons.

I certainly was not giving a neocon analysis, Mearsheimer is my guide. Anyway, China already has established over-lordship over Taiwan, through their having made a public (it was reported widely at the time) and implacable threat of conventional military attack if Taiwan declared independence. China wasn’t bluffing, the US was. Conventional threats by nuclear powers against other nuclear powers are taken seriously.

Look at the conventional forces Nato felt necessary when it faced Soviet tank and tube artillery (what they were really scared of). And the Soviets had all those tanks because they thought there could not be a conventional war with Nato, eh? They expected their myriad tanks to be nuked by Nato if they rolled into western Europe! No, nuclear weapons are for deterring nuclear weapons because once you go nuclear you end the conventional fighting phase for good (tactical nuke use would be met with tactical nuke use, and so on). To deter conventional attack by a nuclear armed rival you need strong conventional forces and that is why all nuclear powers have to spend lots of money on strong conventional forces.

Well, well, North Korea is publicly threatening to nuke China. I didn’t know that and must admit it is very convincing evidence–that China has been the organ grinder for a dancing North Korean monkey all along. Eamonn Fingleton predicted that North Korea would be used by the mercantile east Asian powers to override Trumps economic nationalism. Now the economic “rape” of America by China is what Trump said he would put an end to, and he is no sooner in a position to do that than North Korea which previously had only a clunky Mongo A-bomb and short range missile it didn’t fit, suddenly made very significant strides in H- bombs (small warhead fitting ones no less) and ICBMs too!

I don’t think for one minute that North Korea will ever be given a rake of ICBMs that could take out the big US cities but for the sake of argument, if Kim devastated the US, do you think America would respond by only nuking North Korea. No, America would hit North Korea and China. If you doubt that consider : if Britain suddenly fired off an all-out nuclear attack on Russia, would Russia only hit Britain in return? With 30 million Russians dead and the country devastated, Russia would hit Britain and America.

It’s even questionable if Pakistan received much help from China. It’s highly unlikely that North Korea received those weapons from it.

The world of the neocon’s mind is truly an interesting place.

But yes, there is no rational reason to self-destruct, and the same risk factor in providing the Kim dynasty with nukes is almost certainly evidence that China did not, especially as NK regularly threatens to nuke Beijing.

Like I said before, before we see any Chinese adventurism, first we have to see Taiwanese reacquisition. Until then, nothing else at all will ever happen.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unequal_treaty
Most revolutions in history were due to national humiliation, China has unfinished business. In 1955 China attacked and took Yijiangshan Island and maybe was deterred by nuclear weapons from invading Taiwan. So China is quite capable of conventional gambits against nuclear-backed powers. Crucially, China did not have any nukes of its own back then. It does now.

In the nineties. China threatened to invade Taiwan if it declared independence and when the US threatened to use nuclear weapons to defend Taiwan, China responded by saying it would nuke mainland America if the US used nukes on China. Taiwan has not been invaded only because it dares not declare independence.
China could take the Russian far east by just driving to the sea. and Vladivostok. A future motive could be to punish Russia for allying with the US (just as Russia punished Ukraine for allying with the West).

China gave Pakistan the nuclear bomb and actual parts for an ICBM, and they also (clandestinely) gave them to North Korea in order to get concessions from Trump on trade, and it worked like a dream. Its risky to give Kims nukes, but China isn’t scared to.

Nuclear weapons are a deterrent to another country’s nuclear attack. If nukes were a deterrent to conventional attack, one would expect nuclear powers to economise on conventional weapons, but they don’t.

Fair reasoning.

Minor semantic quibble: can we stop using the Left’s propaganda words, like “gay”? How about simply writing the neutral, accurate “homosexual”?

Sorta off-topic but not really: perhaps we should stop saying “college-educated”, because that sounds like a positive thing. It’s obviously often NOT something to be proud of (yes, I know, “not something of which one should be proud” 😉

I’d write “people with college degrees” or “people who graduated from college.”

Yeah. I first used this handle on other sites where some people hadn’t realized yet that Russia is no longer communist. At some point, they’ll wise up and I’ll have to find a new name.

I’ve been mulling over “The Great White Gomophobe�.

“Think of the gays! What a terrible loss it would be if they were not allowed to parade!”

Does anyone know what the racial composition of the Democrats are these days? I am assuming they are already majority non white, that being the case this means that the conflict with Russia is increasingly going to take on a racial dimension,

My impression is that non-white Democrats know little and care little about Russia. The anti-Russian stuff from Democrats tends to come from whites.

This implies that opinion towards Russia decreases with age amongst the younger non-Republican population. But that doesn’t seem to tally with other polls I’ve seen. Or common sense.

Why? This group is very pro-gay and Russia is perceived as persecuting gays.

My mother has always adored little Russian school girls in aprons and with braids and big bows, pictures of which she saw in National Geographic decades ago, even before she had her very own half-Russian granddaughter. There are a lot of things in everyday Russian culture that normal Westerners would find quite charming if they encountered them.

Whatever his faults, I can’t help giving Putin some respect every time I hear him speak. Compared to almost all Western politicians, he is extraordinarily thoughtful, articulate, consistent, and knowledgeable. Of course, this might just be a sign of how low political discourse has sunk in the West.

When dealing with anti-Putin rants of various Westerners that I encounter, I usually just ask some simple questions without giving my own opinion unless it is asked for. Have you ever listened to Putin, Medvedev, or Lavrov speak? Do you even know who are Dmitry Medvedev and Sergey Lavrov? Do you speak Russian? Have you ever visited Russia? Do you have friends or family who live in Russia?

Ever since I started reading Mr. Karlin, my view toward Russia has softened a bit… that and the relentless mainstream media obsession with it as the Great Satan.

As for Putin, hey, he is a Judoka. He can’t be all that bad. He can probably hip-toss and strangle just about any other country’s leader… except Mongolia’s.

I can’t wait… these Russia-KGB stories have the huge advantage that anything goes, there are no constraints, the canvas is truly there to spin it, any stereotype or nonsense.

It is mass psychosis. Societies can function fairly well while suffering from a mass psychosis, e.g. some of the religious beliefs, or faith in the lottery economy. The truth is that societies function because they don’t have too many alternatives, the damn thing goes on and on, no matter how much nonsense accumulates. With sufficient resources societies can be quite resilient.

Don’t miss the latest new batch of anti-Russian propaganda in Hollywood.

http://ynuk.tv/2017/11/17/red-sparrow-movie-trailer-march-2-thriller/

This looks like an outbreak of mass psychosis.

Frankly almost everything about life in POZlandia feels like mass psychosis, but amazingly things continue to mostly run. Its amazing, for example, that something between a third or half of the country seems to seriously believe that Russia actually hijacked the election somehow.

China is run by rational actors uninterested in causing pointless nuclear war for Vladivostok. There are literally a dozen other places more worth invading. In years and years of being around Chinese irredentism, I have never heard of any interest in Vladivostok.

Taiwan isn’t even being invaded, let alone starting a war with Russia and destroying OBOR and…its just all so senseless.

It’s the 1950s all over again, but with two things reversed:

1) China is the dominant partner this time vis-à-vis Russia.

2) The USA is the revolutionary power.

And both of these of things have arguably been true for the past decade and a half, at the very least.

I don’t see the two as mutually exclusive. I think a world with multiple great powers in it is more likely to be peaceful than a world with merely one. You’re hedging your bets: if something goes infectious or buggy with one power, the others can check it.

Judging from reading many comments at YouTube and similar places, a lot of socially conservative Americans like the look of Russian women, cute kids, bad-ass troops, religious festivals and various sorts of Kalashnikov weaponry. I think an underground charm offensive has won many over behind the mainstream media’s backs.

University educated Democratic voters tend to be much happier with the “respectable” media and so they likely spend less time looking at this sort of alternative stuff. It’s remarkable how few seem to have never watched a press conference or read a transcript straight from the Russian horse’s mouth. They really seem to prefer having someone else — a trained expert — handle this dangerous stuff for them.

“But how are they ever going to return to sanity after this?”

Most of “them” as individuals are unlikely to ever return, on their own, to sanity in their political worldview and attitudes, which are based on deeply entrenched mental conditioning and brainwashing. The best – and maybe even the only – hope for a return to overall sanity, is for this class of psychopathically hateful, pig-ignorant, arrogantly self-righteous American/Western hypocrites to be neutralized, one way or another.

Does anyone know what the racial composition of the Democrats are these days? I am assuming they are already majority non white, that being the case this means that the conflict with Russia is increasingly going to take on a racial dimension, the new cold war will be more of race war than any kind of ideological struggle between rivals. I can already see the day when the demand is made on Russia is to include black politicians in its cabinet. And I am not joking about this, many will laugh at the notion of a global BLM that will dominate geopolitics, but with Sailers “most important graph in the world” and the radical hysteria that has consumed the USA, this is what I see happening.

Thanks. I checked again and it looks like 41% of Democrats said that ‘always fighting with Russia‘ is preferable. I will not try to extrapolate from Putin’s poll, although that one implies that anti-Putin views are highest among college educated. I am not sure that would translate into ‘wanting to fight with Russia’. I am generally skeptical of the weird meme ‘I like Russia, but hate Putler‘, it seems counter-intuitive, but cognitive dissonance is something liberals do quite well.

Even 41% is pretty scary. This looks like an outbreak of mass psychosis. I think it has been building up for a long time. I also don’t think there is an easy way back – not for this generation. In general, when someone hates you, as the liberals seem to be admitting about their attitude toward Putler’s Russia, any compromise, accommodation or discussion is pointless. They will take any concessions as weakness, celebrate it, and continue hating. So the next few decades will be pretty precarious for all of us…

The US is number one and Russia is not, Russia is far away and hence is not dangerous to America, but what the US did on Russia’s borders has destroyed any chance of Russia dropping their guard again. Still the Russians should keep their clumsy secret service from Polonium and internet campaigns, because they leave a trail like an elephant in six feet of snow,

The US should be worrying about China which is hollowing out America’s productive capacity.Russia should also worry more about China. Chinese can infiltrate and China will inevitably overtake Russia in potential power. Supposing it does and then (maybe while Russia was engaged in the West) grabbed Vladivostok, what could Russia do? If there was only Russia and America they could only be enemies, but China is also a player and multi polar systems are inherently unstable. Russia will have to be overtaken by China before America trusts the Kremlin.

You are right, this is stunning. If I read the poll correctly, over 90% of Democrats with advanced degrees prefer to:

“….always fight with Russia”

Yes, people simply responded based on what they feel emotionally – a deep, intense dislike of Russia and anything Russian – but for educated ‘liberals’ to say that they want to ‘always’ fight with a nuclear power borders on insanity. Presumably they have over 100 IQs and a sense of reality. How does a ‘wasteland within grow’ without some rational boundaries?

Recently, a ‘progressive’ acquaintance of mine went on a hateful rant when I mentioned that earlier this year I saw a performance of a Russian folk ensemble. The words like ‘f..ing Russians’, ‘and worse were uttered.

When I hear about the deep ethnic and openly racist attitudes in the past, or witch trials, I wonder how did the more educated people behave during those times. Now we can see that it is actually the ‘liberal’ elite, people who are full of their own righteous goodness, who are in the forefront stirring up the hatred.

Today they need white, Christian villains, and nobody but the Russians is available in sufficient numbers. I don’t believe this is about geo-politics or military spending, those have a momentum of their own. It is also only marginally about Clinton and the elections, it was a new trigger, but the hatred was already there. But how are they ever going to return to sanity after this?

“I’m ordinarily no fan of Nietzsche…�

Far be from me to challenge you in your right to believe anything you like about anyone you like but if you aren’t yet familiar with The Selected Letters of Nietzsche you may want to give them a look, if only to square accounts with his detractors. Perhaps you will find something in the man to admire and like after all.

from Wiki:

“all the skeptics, in short, about Nietzsche, as well as all his enemies, will be interested to see from these letters that there was another Nietzsche, a Nietzsche who was a good friend, a devoted son, an affectionate brother, and a generous enemy, such as the literary history of the world with its quarrels and jealousies has not had the good luck to encounter for a long time. The friends of Nietzsche—and Nietzsche has many friends in all climes and amongst all races—will be delighted to see their hero in the light of their own wishes and imaginations, while the enemies of Nietzsche—and he still has many and by no means unworthy enemies—will be bound to confess what the Lutheran Pastor Colerus confessed in his Life of the Philosopher Spinoza: “He may have been a man of no strict orthodoxy and an atheist into the bargain, but in the conduct of his life he was wise and good.�

https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Selected_Letters_of_Friedrich_Nietzsche

In the event this is true, you saw it here first:

There are reports now circulating that a special forces group of 2200 marines have landed and invaded the CIA Headquarters. They supposedly have landed in the classic tilt-rotary helicopters. I have been working on this to actually confirm the veracity of this claim but not a single photo has even surfaced. The spin is they are there to prevent a CIA coup against Trump. That seems to be a bit far-fetched. If it is even true, it may be more to secure evidence for the prosecution of the Clintons.

https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/world-news/corruption/report-of-marines-invading-cia-headquarters/

“… having Russia in a friendly posture, as opposed to always fighting with them, is an asset to the world, and an asset to our country, not a liability.�

It is nearly impossible for someone in good faith to consider this proposition and not agree with it. The convolutions of thought necessary to prop up disagreement should properly qualify one as courting insanity. It appears our politics have led many to that precipice. I believe even our newly conjoined war monger class of left and right wing politicians and bureaucrats in Washington would find some way to agree with it, if only to satisfy their appetites for hypocrisy. I’m ordinarily no fan of Nietzsche, himself having wobbled his way to an asylum, but his words “the wasteland within grows” seem apt.

It’s not about realism, young people are just more into the idealistic “world peace” schtick.

As it stands now communism is more likely to erupt in the west than anywhere else, so maybe Marx was right in that regard.

But Bout perpetrated an unforgivable sin. Yes, the weapons to the FARC story had more to do with narcotics consumption in DA offices in the US than Bout’s conduct—he knew the “undercover agents” prior to the “sting,| but if you go back a bit, we see that Bout interfered with a US act of foreign policy (genocide is such an ugly word). To wit, Bout brought French peacekeepers to western Rwanda, thus preventing US geno^H^H^H^H proxy Kagame from massa^H^H^H^H^Hkilling genocidaires. Dallaire did vigorously protest, but by then the damage had been done. Note that Der Spiegel lies—the Rwandan government held to the end to article II of the Arusha accords, going so far as to return a shipment of Eguptian ammunition that was ordered prior to the Ugandan/US/Canadian/British/Burundian invasion, while USA, Canada and Britain continued to arm the Ugandan Tutsi invaders of Rwanda.

For serious people conspiracy theorists, there is Chris Black…

Good riddance.

He also subpoenaed people who made troll comments on the Reason magazine blog.

Bharara’s hazel/green eyes can be found in Indians from every part of the country, including Southern India.

Bharara did a great job of convicting machine pols, both Dems and Republicans in New York State politics and he was in hot pursuit of Andrew Cuomo.

Pity Trump didn’t keep him on.

(1) Prosecuting Viktor Bout, who didn’t do nothing wrong.

Dindu nuffin.

You gotta love AK.

Actually a North-West Indian. His blue-green eye-color is certainly strange, but that part of the region has some people with green eyes, so I’m not surprised.

What a strange post. Preet was the best swamp drainer in the country, and was personally asked by the current clown in power to stay on. Then we was fired.

He was no doubt plotting against him anyway.

Considering he is known for making the highest profile Democrats in New York sweat in inappropriate places, it’s obvious the reactionary author knows nothing of what’s he’s talking about.

My oh my, how low Karlin has fallen. Such fallacious and feeble-minded thinking can only be caused by the right-wing echo-chamber.

Bharara is an East Indian with blue eyes.

Someone on Twitter suggested that now that he’s unemployed, he might challenge DeBlasio for mayor of NYC this November. The same speculation has been made about Hillary.

You’re apparently not aware of it, but
for the wider audience your posts are
reinforcing the standard image of Russians
as drunken and nasty barbarians, people
best kept out of the civilized world. In fact,
the latest survey showed that in the United
States the attitudes toward Russia have become
so negative that you’d have to go back to 1983
to see the same levels of animosity.

drunken schlyachta

Yeah, nice country, but something’s gone terribly wrong with the ruling class there. Was true 150 years ago (see here: https://de.wikisource.org/wiki/Zwei_Ritter ), and still true today. What a fucking disaster. So sad, as the US president would say.

only mathematically challenged people would compare the accomplishments of two countries as disparate in population and size as Poland and Russia

Bravo! While playing hard with abacus to obtain your ‘mathematics degree’ in US, you have eventually evolved to guess that mathematics helps to solve some issues.

Yet you understand it wrong. It is not the land size, but the population density that impacts the societal advance. In Russian Empire, most population density was in Kiev region, and in Polish lands. There is no much creativity in tundra or desert, but in cities – so developed by Poles and other inhabitants of Poland. We still admire Krakow and Gdansk, and praise the Polish brethren. Yes Polish brethren had Copernicus and Chopin and Mariе Curie, whatever ethnicity these really had. Yet Polish brethren had no Lomonosov, Mendeleev, Suvorov and thousands of the Russian great people of Copernicus or Chopin scale, and failed into space.

Polish cities were very developed, and kept their Polish identity under Russian empire – with books, newspapers, clubs, societies etc. In 1800, there were 9.5 mln Poles vs. some 15 mln in European Part of Russia incl non-Russian tribes. Before partions, Poland was even more populous than European Russia. But where is Polish Voltaire? Kant? Lomonosov? Where was Polish fleet? Academie de Science? How Poles used their ‘being part of the West’ bonus? Just for libertum veto, drunken schlyachta, and everyday pogroms.

Moreover, thanks to our wonderful
neighbors (incl. Russia), Poland effectively
ceased to exist for 200 years – from 1772
(First Partition) to 1989 (Overthrow of
Communism), except for a brief 20-year
period of independence between the wars

To finish my thought – only mathematically
challenged people would compare the accomplishments
of two countries as disparate in population and size
as Poland and Russia. Poland has only 38 million people.
And yet, judging by the amount of vitriol and invective in this thread,
some Russians appear very threatened by Poland

Russia has four times the population
of Poland and about a million times the
area of Poland. That’s why Russia for the
last 250 years has been an oppressor to
its neighbors, including Poland. And yet
it claims to be a Christian country

Sophistry, my dear friend, is a currency available to all.

(The answer to your question being: right here.)

I’m not going to accuse you of being an idiot, because I know you’re not, but maybe think before you write. For all you know, for example, I’m a Slavic-speaker still struggling with the concept of definite articles.

the stuff the Russians post?

There are 146 million Russians. Do they all post the same ‘stuff’? Where can I see it?

I don’t know about that. Have you seen the stuff the Russians post?

Here, this is from 2014: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2014-04-29/polish-300-billion-aid-package-hides-eu-expansion-flaws

$317 billion EU aid package for Poland, compared to $150 billion (in current money) for the post-war Marshall Plan.

And still “with 17 percent of families of four living on less than $400 a month”. “Five of the EU’s 20 poorest regions are in Poland”. “Unemployment is 13.5 percent” (2014). “Emigration has become sort of no-brainer for young Poles.”

After the Soviet collapse Poland had become the western darling (alas, not anymore), and was supposed to be the showcase of the eastern/central European post-communist development.

And so, it was flooded with EU cash, to the extend of multiples of the (inflation-adjusted) post-war American Marshall Plan for the restoration/rebuilding of the whole of western Europe.

With these incredible subsidies, obviously Poland isn’t exactly starving, but still some its regions are very poor, young people emigrate en masse, Solidarity, the once powerful and widely glamorized union, has pretty much disappeared off the face of the earth.

EU neoliberalism takes no prisoners.

The definition of the Western civilization is
pretty standard: tradition of democracy, liberty,
order…

Lol. More like the tradition of self-aggrandizing bullshit, it sounds like…

To sum up the Polish incursion to this thread, we may see, when people discuss Russia,
A. few Polacks (deprived Polish emigres in US or EU) break in and say ‘forget Russia, Poland is great’
B. people reply: why and in what exactly Poland is great, it is a failed state
C. Polacks declare Poland having no significant identity or achievement, but part of the West
D. people ask Polacks, if their allegiance to the West has ever brought any benefits to Poles
F. Polacks fail to provide any benefits, but display their obligation to spew lies and hatred towards Russia as they understand their function, or price for branding themselves as part of the West.

The bad news for Poles, that they may imagine themselves part of the West, or even Alpha Centauri. In Western divison of labor, Poles are offered gradient from cannon fodder to plumbing, but never owning any significant asset. The dead rodent may become a part of a larger carnivorous animal too, in some sense.

Spain is not particularly weak on music: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Spanish_composers , and is much stronger on literature. Poland is also much larger than Portugal!

Russian achievement in literature dates from the same nineteenth century, and despite being very well-known is not really that impressive compared to France or England, the real literary powerhouses.

I must agree that Polish accomplishment in music and literature seem to be lightweight in comparison with Russian accomplishments. Still the fact that Poland did not exists for over one century, i.e., the whole 19 century, when other nations could develop and flourish their cultures is an important factor. But when we compare Poland with countries that were independent and more prosperous then Poland in 19 century like Portugal, or even Spain and Scandinavian countries Poland compares favorably.

You know nothing about oligarchs

Says someone who knows nothing about anything.

Putin has done a magnificent job in destroying the Oligarch stucture

That must be why they maintain their position at the top of Russian society and why he never crosses them collectively, merely punishing disruptive renegades on the others’ behalf.

there are no reliable statistics for church attendance in Europe

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_attendance#Attendance_by_country

Weekly church attendance:

Poland, 48%. Second highest in Europe.
Germany, Ukraine 13%

Russia 8%, lowest in the world.

Percentage who never go to church:

Poland under 10%.
Ukraine 10% to 20%
Russia 30% to 40%, same category as Sweden and Germany

Europe are converting their Churches into Restaurants and brothels…Russia are building Churches as places of worship

In Moscow a brothel opened next to a Catholic Church. The prostitutes dress like nuns. Such trolling is a good demonstration of conservatism. This was allowed, in the city that built Europe’s largest mosque.

That just means [Poles] they are more skillful at using contraception you prick….not at “lower abortions�

Abortion is viewed as being much worse than contraception. If you were a Christian you would know that.

Abortion rate Poland, 2014: 2.59
Abortion rate Russia, 2014: 477.6.

Russians have abortions at a rate that is 184 times higher than Poles do.

And while were are here –

HIV rate Poland: .07
HIV rate Russia: .68

Russians are nearly 10 times more likely to have HIV than Poles are.

Percentage of marriages ending in divorce:

Poland: 27%
Russia: 51%

Russians are almost twice as likely to divorce as Poles are.

Poles have 9 times more nationals in prison in the UK, than Indians and Pakistanis.

Maybe. On the other hand:

Homicide rate Poland, 2014: .7
Homicide rate Russia, 2013: 9.5

Russians are about 13 times more likely to commit homicide than Poles are.

As I wrote before – There is a European country that is both conservative and old-fashioned – Poland

It isn’t Russia, which is merely old-fashioned without being conservative, at least in terms of actual behavior.

You seriously are too stupid and poorly informed to be a Russian, gerad. I’m guessing you are from somewhere deep in the Balkans?

You left out the starvation of millions of peasants in the 1930s.

Poles were viewed with suspicion but were not openly discriminated against. Many of them had roots in Ukraine and were officially “Ukrainians” on their passports.

Since you mentioned writers, just a few
recent names in Poland:

– Andrzej Sapkowski. The phenomenally successful
Witcher video games are based on his novels
– 15 years ago two Polish Nobel laureates in literature,
Wisława Szymborska and Czesław Miłosz, were living
in Krakow
– StanisÅ‚aw Lem (science fiction)
– Witold Gombrowicz (novelist)
– Zbigniew Herbert

Polish Film directors:

– Andrzej Wajda (Ashes and Diamonds, etc)
– Krzysztof KieÅ›lowski (Decalogue, Trois Couleurs, etc)
– Krzysztof Zanussi (A year of the quiet sun)
– Roman Polanski (Knife in the water, Chinatown)

Enough vitriol for today! Now I’m gonna hit the highway,
listen to the Polish-American bluegrass singer from Texas,
Sarah Jarosz (“Crazy” etc), and then pull into a Jack-in-the-Box
for a snack. I love America!

The definition of the Western civilization is
pretty standard: tradition of democracy, liberty,
order, rule of law, respect for private property, Western
Christendom, Latin alphabet. By that definition
Russia was never part of the West. In contrast,
the Polish-Lithuanian Res Publica (Republic
or Commonwealth), which for 200 years was the
largest country in Europe, was a republic (representative
democracy) expressly patterned after the Roman Republic,
with 10-12% of the people eligible to vote by the 16th
century. By 15th century, in fact, Poland already had
the equivalent of the British habeas corpus, and by 1791
Poland had Europe’s first written constitution, which,
of course, neither Russia nor Prussia, being despotic
powers, could tolerate.

By 1550 80% of the world’s Jews already lived in Poland.
Google it if you don’t believe me. That implies that
probably 90% of the European Jews lived there. Why?
Because the Jews were expelled from England, France,
Italy, and of course Germany, often repeatedly, and
found refuge in Poland as the land of liberty where they
lived wherever they wanted, and not in ghettoes like in
Western Europe. Russia simply banned Jews from its
territory until 1772 when it got Polish Jews as a result
of annexing Polish-Lithuanian territories in the east.

As part of the West, Poland has extremely low murder rates,
HIV rates, drug use rates, and relatively low levels of corruption.
When Russia reduces its murder and corruption rates to manageable
levels, then we’ll talk.

Why do you think Poland is attracting over a million Ukrainians,
and now increasingly Belarusians and Russians to work in
construction, etc.? Because it has a low unemployment rate and
a severe labor shortage. Because of Poland’s dynamic economy
that has grown since 1990 at South Korean levels, Poland has
become one big construction site that needs a huge labor force

The official figure is that about 10,000 Russians
live in Poland. However, if you include people
of Russian ancestry, that figure would probably rise to
closer to 50,000. People with surnames ending
in -ow, -ew, and -in are not uncommon in Poland.
E.g., one of my favorite Polish writers was Gołubiew.
Another example is Sasha Strunin, a young pop singer
whose Russian father worked at an opera in Poznań.
The number of people of Ukrainian ancestry in Poland
is even larger

I think one reason for the temperamental difference between
Poland and Russia is genetic. Genetically speaking Poland is
about 45% Slavic, 20% Germanic, 10% Celtic, 10% Jewish, 10%
Baltic, and 5% Other (Tatar, etc). Poland is extremely close
genetically to other Western Slavs like the Czechs and Polabian
Slavs, except that they, being farther west, are a bit more Celtic
and Germanic. Poland had its origin in the interaction with the
German Saxons (along the Elbe-Saale rivers – known as Limes
Saxoniae) and the Vikings in the north. In fact, the early Polish
kings and dukes had Vikings in their employ. Hence Poland
emerged as a WESTERN country whose primary neighbors 1000
years ago were the German Saxons, Denmark, and Sweden.
Nietzsche alluded to this cultural and genetic mix when
he talked about his own Polish-German ancestry.

Mindnumbing pseudo-intellectual drivel. Russia has produced far more “western” writers,scientists,engineers, buildings,mathematicians,artists than Poland has over the years. They have a mixed genetic code as that.Russia is a western country…….even the Czechs have produced far more than Poland. Supposed to be western …but Poland can only produce one known classical music composer….and he escaped and eloped in France as soon as he could…..and basically copied an Irishman at the time with many of his works ( and Chopin had, unlike the great Russian and German composers, a minimal amount of orchestral compositions….just very simple Piano works)

Actually, Poland’s unemployment rate is 5.4%

That is simply a lie. Poland’s unemployment rate is closer to double digits than the number you give ( which is more like Russia’s employment rate). Very few Russians live and work. in Poland …or want to work in Poland…and that includes, by proportion, those in Kalliningrad…..but Poland has millions in western Europe that want nothing to do with their former land

I have nothing against Russia (in fact I speak Russian),
as long as the Russians stay on their side of the border.
I (grudgingly acknowledge that in the absence of a large
Slavic state like Russia, the Germans would be even more
arrogant than they are

Remember you ungrateful little cretin…….Russia gave Poland about 1/6th of its current territory. Stalin did. Russia rebuilt Poland and liberated it after 1945.
Remember that Poland is the one stirring up trouble in Ukraine

The Polish may speak a Slavonic language, but they
are a western people, and of course, are part of
Western Christendom

For some reason a major part of my comment
got lost. So here it is again:

A major Russian weakness is the worship of all things
German, like Marxism. I realize, of course, that Marx was
Jewish but his philosophy with its enormous debt to Hegel
could not have originated anywhere else except Germany.
Also, the excessive attitude of trust toward Germany almost
ended in a disaster for Russia.

I think one reason for the temperamental difference between
Poland and Russia is genetic. Genetically speaking Poland is
about 45% Slavic, 20% Germanic, 10% Celtic, 10% Jewish, 10%
Baltic, and 5% Other (Tatar, etc). Poland is extremely close
genetically to other Western Slavs like the Czechs and Polabian
Slavs, except that they, being farther west, are a bit more Celtic
and Germanic. Poland had its origin in the interaction with the
German Saxons (along the Elbe-Saale rivers – known as Limes
Saxoniae) and the Vikings in the north. In fact, the early Polish
kings and dukes had Vikings in their employ. Hence Poland
emerged as a WESTERN country whose primary neighbors 1000
years ago were the German Saxons, Denmark, and Sweden.
Nietzsche alluded to this cultural and genetic mix when
he talked about his own Polish-German ancestry.

I have nothing against Russia (in fact I speak Russian),
as long as the Russians stay on their side of the border.
I (grudgingly acknowledge that in the absence of a large
Slavic state like Russia, the Germans would be even more
arrogant than they are

How was the tolerance in Soviet Union with respect to Poles living there?

I don’t really consider the Soviet Union a form of Russian empire, but we are to take this view, then I think the tolerance of the Soviet/Russian elites (and the population) is clearly demonstrated by the fact that many of their top-level leaders were not ethnic Russians: Stalin, Brezhnev, Chernenko, and many others.

As for Poles (and other foreign groups) in the 1930s, that was, of course, a grotesque and misguided campaign to rid the country of foreign spies. Poland, at the time, wasn’t part of the Soviet empire; it was an unfriendly foreign country. Different story.

You’d have a better point with war-time exile of Chechens, Crimean Tatars, and other ethnic groups. But that was in the middle of the most brutal war in history; they should get some slack for that…

In all your posts you ridicule people who do manual labor.

You wrote:

“Poles have no jobs at home”

Actually, Poland’s unemployment rate is 5.4%, one of the lowest
in the European Union. The labor shortage is so severe,
Poland is now starting to attract construction workers
from Russia.

“Fake humanitarian degree”

Actually my doctorate is in mathematics. Foreigners in the U.S.
typically focus in STEM disciplines, i.e., math, science, and engineering.

I feel like I’m dealing with an alcoholic, and this exchange is
pointless, but decided to give it one more try