Ukraine Invasion: Part 54

[MagicFox]

We're on 54. Slava Ukraini 🇺🇦
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Isn’t the whole point of these threads that we talk about what’s going on in Ukraine?

But turning your logic it on its head @1dayatatime - what are you going to do about it? Criticising us isn’t exactly helping Ukraine.

There is that, isn't there.

I’ve just liked about a hundred posts on Facebook criticising Trump and I’m feeling very satisfied about it ;)

But then we wouldn't know about percentages. 🤣🤣

To be absolutely blunt, @1dayatatime has been on these threads a long time, often quiet, but always coming back. They have always supported Ukraine with a considered assessment, not always uncritical but god help us if we can't identify where a cause we support isn't getting it right.

While the timing of criticising the EU leadership could, right now, be better and honestly letting off steam about Trump is probably a safety mechanism to stop us all exploding given what he's coming out with ... yeah. @1dayatatime -is- a Ukraine supporter.

I think it's vital that we all maintain a cool head, as we have done so far, and allow debate and scrutiny otherwise we will become an echo chamber. Everyone here supports Ukraine, including @1dayatatime, they have just been very blunt at a very sensitive time. We have all felt frustrated with Europe's limitations and have vented here for nearly 3 years about them! I think we are all feeling bewildered and deeply concerned about the last couple of days' events and dealing with it in our own different way. Let us not lose our solidarity at a time when the world seems to be fracturing. We have been a force for good in our own small corner and all forces, big or small, are so important.

Yes, agree strongly about both the need for a cool head... and the difficulty maintaining one when things are so fraught.

Sorry but considered responses or not I don’t appreciate being told who I can and cannot criticise

I think we’re entitled to criticise the petulant little shit as much as we want thanks.

Yes, agree strongly with this.

If all we ever did was criticise Trump, and we ignored all other parties with agency (including Putin), there might be considerable use in refocussing the discussion.

But this is the week it is all going down with Trump.

Today he has nailed his colours to the mast. And not just about Ukraine but about the relationship the US is in with Russia from now on.

It's techtonic plate shifting stuff which is going to determine all our lives for decades.

So any suggestion, today of all days, that we shouldn't be talking about Trump, is not on.

So one thing that's going to shake down to us all...

At the beginning of the week the noises coming out of the US camp were that European countries should put troops in Ukraine to protect it from further Russian invasion.

Today, Trump has thrown in his lot with Putin, lied that Ukraine started the war, and described Zelensky as a dictator.

So with Russia at war with Ukraine, and the US president coming in on Russia's side, wouldn't that cast those same European troops in Ukraine as aggressors to the US? Or to US interests, at the very least?

Trump lives in an Alice Through the Looking-Glass world where he can say six impossible things before breakfast, and there's no attempt to be coherent. In fact he thrives on mutual contradiction to cause all order to break down around him and people to become dependent merely on his personal favour.

The rest of us, however, have to live in the real world. We have to deal with the corrollories of his pronouncements.

JD Vance has warned Zelenskyy against “bad mouthing” Trump in public. Fucking cheek. Zelenskyy has more moral character in his pinky finger than the lot of them have put together.

Meanwhile, given it looks like UK/Europe need to act fast to upgrade their armed forces:

https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/armed-forces-recruits-potentially-face-up-to-one-year-wait/

“”According to the latest data covering the 12 months to 30 September 2024, the average time between application and starting basic training (also known as “Time of Flight”) was:

• Army – 249 days
• Royal Navy/Royal Marines – 279 days
• Royal Air Force – 301 days”

I’m sure current events mean that will all get fixed PDQ…..😕

it wasn't encouraging to read that manufacture of the new tank has been put back to ... 2045.

While Trump is off about the amount of money and Zelenskyy being a dictator, Trump’s very right about the EU and them not stepping up. The Baltics have been pushing for more since day-1. The EU should’ve and need to step up ASAP. If they don’t, I can see this being the beginning of the end for any active EU coordinated military. And they’ve not even started. NATO is already on the deathbed, don’t let the next best thing fail too.

I blame Schloz. May he get voted out ASAP.

Well, Scholz and Spain's done little and it's a huge country.

But Germany has given a LOT to Ukraine, second only after the US iirc. No time to check it.

ROFL Trump calling Zelensky a dictator while cosying up to Putin.

I actually feel so incredibly emotional. The world is so much darker these last few weeks.

Perhaps it would be better to buy them off the lot. I hear that General Dynamics and the South Koreans are offering low finance rates, an extended warranty and 2000 rounds of free machine gun ammo. 😂

In all seriousness, a 20 year development cycle means that you’re doing it wrong.

In all seriousness, a 20 year development cycle means that you’re doing it wrong.

It's insane. It's just insane.

It's like someone has taken every book of standard diplomacy and chucked them on the fire.

diplomacy has its reasons and is a skill. Trump is not a diplomat and I think diplomats from all places will listening a aghast and confused trying to make out where the US actually stands.

the big worry is that as the mid slinging continues any negotiation is going to end up a confused utter mess with a potential US/Russia agreement Ukraine does not agree to with a real threat of a completely destabilized battlefield in the coming months.

could we be looking at the US withdrawing military aid unilaterally with some poor deal to hand to Ukraine which they can't accept so battle on in what could become a very much one sided battle? Is Russia going to use the confusion to go for a big push later in the spring/summer to hammer home an advantage?

one terrifying prospect is Zelensky being somehow removed from office or resigning leading to a power vacuum Putin is so ready to exploit.

humiliation for Ukraine and Europe and I don't think history is going to write this up kindly. We seem to be in a world where might is right and the only value set is that of wealth.

I think it's clear where Trump stands - he blames Ukraine, calls Zelenskyy a dictator, lies about the amount of money that's helped Ukraine and lies that half of it has vanished, and wants to make deals with Russia - oil deals have been mentioned.

Well I’ve just fallen out spectacularly with a close friend of many years who has literally just sent me a tirade of Russian disinformation, knowing I’m very pro-Ukraine. It’s honestly frightening how many otherwise intelligent people are fucking falling for this nonsense. God help us, I pray we’re on the right side of history and that the UK doesn’t bend the knee to Trump.

Medvedev the wank stain tweeting - “A Dictator without Elections, Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left." If you'd told me just three months ago that these were the words of the US president, I would have laughed out loud. @realDonaldTrump is 200 percent right. Bankrupt clown…”

Isn't it tragic that we are having to think in terms of not bending the knee to someone who's the leader of what is meant to be an allied nation?

Macron is joining Starmer on his visit to Washington next week

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/5153506-trump-macron-starmer-meeting/