To feel distressed and heartbroken re Ukraine’s increasingly desperate pleas for help?

[UltraLightfly]

You can hear the desperation in their president’s (and former presidents) voices now. They are BEGGING for physical help. Begging for a no-fly zone to be implemented.

I KNOW we can’t do anything as it’ll cause WW3, but tonight, listening to a former presidents and the current presidents desperate pleas is actually quite distressing. Heartbreaking. Those poor people being left to their fate with the Russians

@Cheesecakeandwineinasuitcase please don’t worry too much about NATO, the Admiral of defence was being interviewed on TV yesterday, watch the interview. Remember these are highly trained military personnel who do not buckle under public opinion . He even stated that emotions must not take over and a calm level headed attitude is required!

Our media has for once not pulled any punches in showing the horrific consequences of bombs and the invasion in general on normal citizens. Horrifying. I do hope they will do the same for all future wars, and conflicts which are in more far off places and do not involve white people. Military intervention should only ever be the very last resort to an existential threat or a genocide that cannot be dealt with my any diplomatic means.

Going back to the surrender point, a similar situation would be if GB suddenly got a mad dictator and decided to annexe Ireland by force. And as if people in the rest of the world said ah well, just surrender Ireland as we don't fancy a world war; that'll be best for everyone. (Obviously the analogy doesn't quite hold true because of the EU and NATO but there are political parallels).

Some people think that putin operates in realms of logic. He does not. He doesn't need a reason to launch a nuke if he wants to. He clearly didn't need a reason to invade Ukraine. All of his excuses are just this - excuses. That's why it's vital that he's stopped now. Feeding the monster helps for a moment, but the beast is growing stronger and more powerful.

@JulesRimetStillGleaming

Going back to the surrender point, a similar situation would be if GB suddenly got a mad dictator and decided to annexe Ireland by force. And as if people in the rest of the world said ah well, just surrender Ireland as we don't fancy a world war; that'll be best for everyone. (Obviously the analogy doesn't quite hold true because of the EU and NATO but there are political parallels).

Well, GB - or England, to be precise - did annexe Ireland by force…

To think the nuclear weapon was supposed to be a deterrent and now it’s being used as the highest form of blackmail!! It should never have been invented, how can we live our lives normally with this constant level of stress looming over us ??? I just can’t imagine how scared the poor people of Ukraine are, so upset seeing that poor family massacred

I am totally against a no-fly zone. I don't think it would stop the atrocities anyway because most of the bombing is not from planes, so it would be pointless.
What I worry a NFZ would do, is give Putin a massive excuse to escalate. I think it would also galvanise the Russian public against the West due to shooting down Russian planes being seen as an act of war. The major thing I then worry is that it would give China a legitimate excuse to step in to help Russia against 'Western aggression'. China have massive resources and it will be a very long and bloody battle if it's Russia and China vs NATO (assuming everyone is too scared to nuke).
Heartbreaking as it might be, we have to let Ukraine fight for herself, use up Russian army resources and hope the people come to realise that they're being lied to by their government. It won't mean that they can overthrow him, but it might stop them wanting to take up arms and fight the West.

What the West, and specifically the UK need to do is impose proper sanctions. The UK are worrying about imposing sanctions legally so are giving notice which allows wealth to be moved out of the country (probably to China?) whereas they just need to seize it and worry about consequences later. Unfortunately, I'd guess there are some politicians so entangled with Russian money that they are holding up the proper imposition of sanctions.

@userxx

So we have to stand by and watch. How can this be happening in 2022.

The same way it happens in places like Syria Afghanistan and Rwanda just the people are white so Europeans care more. None of the people suffer worse and what they have in common is that it's usually middle aged men who start wars young men pay with their lives women and children suffer poverty and often are sexually abused or raped.

@TiddyTidTwo

Everyone on this thread needs to understand that the dead children that we see lying in the street on the news every night are NOT less important than your children. Their parents didn't love them any less, they are no less worthy of protecting than your own children.

Amen

How about the children (especially girls) in Afghanistan?

Blimey, didn’t realise I’d been offensive enough to get a number of posts deleted!

@AppleDoghnuts

A mad man is waging war on a situation that doesn't exist, he knows everyone is walking on egg shells as a result so he'll get what he wants. Catastophically thinking, what is scary in my opinion is we don't know how mad he is and whether he will take us all down with him when he goes...Hopefully economic strangling will see civilian uprising and him ousted out of power, but we can only hope, and this won't be over night.

This is it in the most concise and correct form of words I've seen I think

@Rhannion

The Russian mentality is odd about some things. It’s all about the collective, the individual doesn’t matter, never really has. They have lived under dictatorships for centuries. One of the panel on Question Time said that you only have to look at the way the Russian government mark their war dead soldiers, all dumped in mass graves. The individual means nothing. Friends of my parents were rabid commies, all comrade and Lenin until they visited Russia in the 1960... they came back completely disillusioned and very soon distanced themselves from their past beliefs. What happening now has been coming since that bastard Putin got in power and I don’t know the answers, but hope someone does.

That just doesn't seem to be true, going by the numbers of Russian civilians out marching (under threat of imprisonment) and Russian soldiers and POWs speaking out against Putin's actions.

Agree, on the news the people begging "please close the sky" was horrific.

@Woollystockings which is exactly why I chose Ireland as an example. Ukraine used to be part of the USSR.

[quote Strawberryjellyicecream]@MiniCooper15 I understand that you’re trying to make an example of the Ukrainian people to highlight racism in the U.K., but I think it’s in very poor taste. You’re being a bit ‘all lives matter’ - just because we’re currently focussed on this one issue, it doesn’t mean we don’t care about others.[/quote]
I'm not anyway being all lives matter it's current news that black students usually medical and their families are being treated as second class and being denied exit in favour of Ukrainians

[quote Strawberryjellyicecream]@MiniCooper15 I understand that you’re trying to make an example of the Ukrainian people to highlight racism in the U.K., but I think it’s in very poor taste. You’re being a bit ‘all lives matter’ - just because we’re currently focussed on this one issue, it doesn’t mean we don’t care about others.[/quote]
I'm highlighting the racism in Ukraine that hasn't diminished in a war zone and is impacting African and Indian humans

How about the children (especially girls) in Afghanistan?

I feel the same.

Strawberryjellyicecream

The difference is that while there are a hundred posts and inumerable articles about how awful the Russians and Putin are, nobody really gives a damn about Afghani women. Or Iraqui. Or Yemeni. Or Palestinian.

Women and children have been massacred for years in these countries. But no one really cares. Like no one really cares about women human rights in Saudi Arabia, UAE (Dubbai), Colombia or Mexico to mention a few.

MiniCooper15 just reminded us that there are more women at risk in the world than Ukraine.

"The same way it happens in places like Syria Afghanistan and Rwanda just the people are white so Europeans care more. None of the people suffer worse and what they have in common is that it's usually middle aged men who start wars young men pay with their lives women and children suffer poverty and often are sexually abused or raped"

Middle aged women need to run the world. Can you imagine how different it would be. Wishful thinking I know

This is an awful thing to say but I think it’s the truth. We are used to war in the Middle East the same way we are almost used to starvation in Africa. It’s not that people don't care but a collective immunity to their suffering seems to set in. The war in Ukraine which seems significantly closer and could actually affect us in the west is a reminder of how horrific war actually is. I know I have thought about this is what is must be like for people in Yemen, Syria etc day in day out and I expect I am not the only one. War causes horrendous suffering to innocent victims and it is no less awful in Syria than it is in Ukraine.

@Alondra
I guarantee you that there are people that care about all people suffering from the war. But Ukraine is 'fresh news' and I'm 100% sure that it will go quiet in a couple of weeks due to compassion fatigue. That's a cruel fact. Discussing Ukrainian civilians fleeing from war doesn't mean we don't care about Syria, Palestine or Afghanistan. But the line has to be drawn somewhere, otherwise we won't ever be able to discuss anything without people saying yes, but what about....

Middle aged women need to run the world. Can you imagine how different it would be. Wishful thinking I know

Considering Margaret Thatcher and her policies, I don't think middle aged women are we should be striving for. We need serious young women blood in politics ...but it's never going to happen.

To quote Erich Hartman..

War is a place where the young kill one another without knowing or hating each other, because of the decision of old people who know and hate each other, without killing each other

I would change old people by old men.