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Trump Can Speed Up the Inevitable in Ukraine
The New York Times ^ | Nov. 17, 2024, 1:00 a.m. ET | Megan K. Stack

Posted on 11/17/2024 2:58:53 PM PST by E. Pluribus Unum

President-elect Donald Trump is inheriting a blood-soaked war in Ukraine. He has pledged to put a swift end to the carnage.

Mr. Trump hasn’t explained his plan — if, indeed, he has one — but Vice President-elect JD Vance has called for Ukraine to cede captured land to Russia and drop its pleas to join NATO in exchange for peace. Mr. Trump’s national security adviser nominee, Representative Michael Waltz of Florida, has criticized the flow of U.S. aid to Ukraine and called for prompt negotiations, questioning whether the United States should support the complete liberation of Ukraine.

If Mr. Trump follows their advice and pushes Ukraine into talks that result in lost territory, his political rivals as well as hawks in his own party will accuse him of abandoning Ukraine and rewarding Vladimir Putin’s hunger for expansion.

They would be right; there’s no way to sugarcoat it. Ukrainians would be hung out to dry, and Mr. Putin could end up attacking again or expanding his imperial designs to other neighbors.

Mr. Trump should do it anyway.

Dozens of people, and often hundreds, are dying every day in this grinding war. Mr. Trump should seize the chance to save lives. Nobody is coming to save Ukraine. A settlement will eventually be needed.

Despite flashes of spectacular success by Ukrainian forces, the Russian position has gradually strengthened, and there is no reason to expect Mr. Putin to lose the upper hand now. That may sound like defeatism, but it’s also realism. Nor is it a partisan perception — there have long been reports of Biden administration officials quietly trying to nudge Ukraine toward negotiations.


(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Humor
KEYWORDS: blametrump; killkillkillforpeace; megankstack; mic; newyorkslimes; newyorktimes; smear; trump; ukraine; walterduranty; welfarewar
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To: Locomotive Breath

If “abandoning Czechoslovakia” (which did not belong to the UK or France in the first place) had saved 60 million lives worldwide Chamberlain would have gone down in history as a hero.


61 posted on 11/18/2024 2:51:15 PM PST by Jim Noble (Assez de mensonges et de phrases)
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To: Jim Noble

If “abandoning Czechoslovakia” (which did not belong to the UK or France in the first place) had saved 60 million lives worldwide Chamberlain would have gone down in history as a hero.


After Munich, Hitler was upset. He really wanted war to show off the German military, in order to intimidate Britain and France into signing a Comprehensive Peace Deal, that would have given him “Carte Blanche” in the East.

The other consequence of Munich, is that it pretty much thwarted any chance of the Army overthrowing Hitler in a coup, which was actually in the works at the time.


62 posted on 11/18/2024 2:55:15 PM PST by dfwgator (Endut! Hoch Hech!)
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To: Locomotive Breath
Putin is not Kaiser Wilhelm or Hitler; Russia is not Germany, or the Soviet Union/Warsaw Pact; and we are not living in 1917, or 1941, or even 1991:

The only serious threat is China, not Russia - but the uniparty (including the Biden Crime Family) has been thoroughly compromised by the CCP. As a result, we are wasting our money and resources engaging in an escalating & potentially fatal pissing contest with Russia, over a country that is not a vital US interest...

63 posted on 11/18/2024 3:08:37 PM PST by Who is John Galt? ("...mit Pulver und Blei, Die Gedanken sind frei!")
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To: Locomotive Breath

You must be a foreigner since you use NPR as a source, and you believe Bill Clinton was trustworthy. One more time, a treaty must be submitted to the US Senate and passed with a two-thirds majority before it has any force. It is nothing more than another worthless Bill Clinton promise.


64 posted on 11/18/2024 7:10:54 PM PST by rxh4n1 ( )
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To: rxh4n1

You don’t like NPR? That information is all over the place. Here it is in Wikipedia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_Memorandum

Ukraine gave up its nuclear weapons to Russia in exchange for a promise that Russia would not invade. US involvement in brokering the deal is incidental and the US Senate is irrelevant.


65 posted on 11/19/2024 4:45:24 AM PST by Locomotive Breath
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To: Who is John Galt?

“What’s past is prologue”

Your historical ignorance does not serve you well. Putin is trying to reassemble the Russian empire because whether a Czar, or Stalin or Putin, Russia has always felt a historical entitlement to rule over all the Slavs.

For the moment we might appease Putin by abandoning Ukraine. Are you naive enough to think he’ll stop there? I was just in Slovakia which is a much smaller country just south of Ukraine. They’re nervously looking north imagining the Russian military just on the other side of the border. Where does it stop?

China is also a threat that must be dealt with. US weakness invites aggression whether from China or Russia.


66 posted on 11/19/2024 4:53:13 AM PST by Locomotive Breath
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To: rxh4n1

BTW, born in the US in 1957 and lived through the Cold War including cowering under my school desk during “duck and cover” drills. What’s less expensive? Stopping Putin now or the start of a new nuclear arms race?


67 posted on 11/19/2024 4:55:19 AM PST by Locomotive Breath
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To: Locomotive Breath
Your historical ignorance does not serve you well...Are you naive enough to think he’ll stop there? ...Where does it stop?

I have likely been reading history longer than you have been alive. One aspect that is more than obvious, is that a desire to form an empire does not equal the means to form an empire. You ask how Putin will be stopped, when he has already been stopped by the less-than-mighty Ukrainian military; Russian conventional forces that have not taken Kiev after almost three years are no threat to NATO.

Rather than ask how Putin will be stopped, why not ask how he might accomplish the conquest of Europe that you fear? He is massively out-gunned by the long-term members of NATO; in addition, every Warsaw Pact country that supported the former Soviet Union is now a member of the western alliance. Do you fear that the mighty PootyPoot will appear on the battlefield in person, riding a unicorn and shooting death rays from his eyes, to triumph over NATO (with appropriate victory parades through Piccadilly and the Arc de Triomphe)? The Russian army sure can't do it.

Russia has a military budget comparable to Britain or France (not the US, and not even China); and Russian conventional forces are far less competent (not more competent) than western forces. Your willingness to ignore simple facts does not serve you well...

68 posted on 11/19/2024 6:01:38 AM PST by Who is John Galt? ("...mit Pulver und Blei, Die Gedanken sind frei!")
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To: Locomotive Breath

***You don’t like NPR? That information is all over the place. Here it is in Wikipedia.***

Wikipedia is another untrustworthy site, especially for politically charged current events. I’ll use it to find info on sphagnum moss or baseball stats, but that’s about it. I’m not denying the Budapest Memorandum wasn’t signed, I’m trying to get it through your thick Ukrainian nationalist skull that it is worth, as we say in the US, a warm bucket of piss.


69 posted on 11/19/2024 7:03:51 AM PST by rxh4n1 ( )
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To: rxh4n1

Now you’re being intentionally obtuse by attacking the messenger and ignoring the message. As I said, that info is all over the place. There’s this thing called a search engine. ANY source YOU find will agree. Feel free to find your own.

Two things are irrefutable and beyond dispute.

1. Ukraine gave up the nuclear weapons.
2. Russia promised to respect Ukraine’s borders.

Your misdirection to the US Senate or anything else about the US doesn’t enter into it.

What’s really sad is that NYT = NPR and, while dissing NPR as a biased source, you’re agreeing with an NYT opinion urging appeasement of a dictator.

“An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last.”

After a bunch or irrelevant obfuscation, you’ve just confirmed my original point.

Any agreement with Russia is worthless. Ukraine already had one and Putin didn’t respect it. Why should Ukraine surrender and make another worthless agreement leaving Ukraine only a smaller part of their own country? When Obama was in office Putin already took a first bite. (Go look up Sudetenland and Czechoslovakia to see the end game.)

In the future, Putin will just violate a new agreement whenever he feels like and finish gobbling up Ukraine in convenient bite-sized chunks. And then move on to Ukraine’s neighbors.

So what’s the point of a surrender to Russia when Russia won’t respect the terms of the surrender anyway?


70 posted on 11/19/2024 10:51:54 AM PST by Locomotive Breath
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To: rxh4n1

Further, if Ukraine does surrender territory there will be immediately a Stalinist purge of anyone who opposes Putin. If a Ukrainian wants to die on his feet facing an enemy instead on his knees shot in the back of the head, who are you to say otherwise? Maybe you’re just a Putin-bot in favor of a totalitarian regime.

BTW, I’m currently working my way through The Gulag Archipelago by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. Read it and you’ll find out how it ends for Ukraine if it surrenders. Because it’s happened before.


71 posted on 11/19/2024 10:59:23 AM PST by Locomotive Breath
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To: Locomotive Breath

One more time, I didn’t deny the Budapest thing exists. I deny the validity of the thing. You certainly are a foreigner when you say the US Senate ratification is misdirection. Senate ratification is the only time representatives of the US voters have a say and gives the treaty legal authority. An agreement with Putin is worthless, you say. That’s the only realistic chance for Ukraine to escape from this since no one is going
to war with Russia to save them. Then you resort to the stale old Uke talking points and insults, that anyone against the war is a Putin stooge or an appeaser.


72 posted on 11/19/2024 2:38:47 PM PST by rxh4n1 ( )
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To: rxh4n1

I was born in the US in 1957. In Norfolk VA to a military family. So buzz off.

A month ago I was in Austria, Slovakia and Hungary including Budapest. When was the last time you were out of the country?

Now read up...
https://hal.science/hal-04025270/document

At this point there is no reason for Ukraine to attempt an agreement of any kind with Russia because Putin will just violate it when he feels like.

You must be ignorant of the long history of the abuse of Ukraine starting with Czarist Russia, through Leninist/Stalinist Soviet Union and now Putin’s Russia or you’d know why Ukraine won’t surrender.

The people of Ukraine know their own history even if you don’t. Even if Putin manages eventual “victory”, the Ukrainians are going to make sure that Putin has made a huge expenditure and all Putin will get is a smoking ruin.

BTW, you’ve been insulting me all along so you finally had it coming. You’re agreeing with the NYT that Putin’s naked aggression should be rewarded. That make you a supporter of Putin. You ought to be ashamed of yourself and so should the NYT.


73 posted on 11/19/2024 5:49:20 PM PST by Locomotive Breath
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To: Locomotive Breath

***I was born in the US in 1957. In Norfolk VA to a military family. So buzz off.***

Then you should know better and look out for the USA first, not some foreign shitehole.

***A month ago I was in Austria, Slovakia and Hungary including Budapest. When was the last time you were out of the country?***

Well good for you, I guess you stayed in a Holiday Inn Express so you’re an expert now.

***You must be ignorant of the long history of the abuse of Ukraine***

It’s a dirty blood feud, a family quarrel between Slavic brothers and we should never have been involved in it. Our ancestors left Europe to get away from those ethnic and religious feuds. People like you are trying to bring them here and involve us in them.

***Putin’s naked aggression should be rewarded.***

Unfortunately for the Ukraine, they don’t have the strength to defeat Russia, and no other nation is willing to pay the price to do that. Some kind of peace settlement will happen, and Russia is likely to get something from it whether you call it a reward or not.


74 posted on 11/20/2024 12:25:12 AM PST by rxh4n1 ( )
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To: rxh4n1

“Then you should know better and look out for the USA first, not some foreign shitehole.”

That’s how ignorant you are. Stopping Russian aggression now is a lot cheaper than stopping it later. Check your calendar. It’s not 1900. The US is no longer in a position to be isolationist. You’re making again all the failed arguments that were made before WW I and WW II. But, hey, this time it will work. Right?

Again, skip the abuse. When was the last time you were out of the country? You’ve been claiming I’m not an American. My family has been in this country for since about 1800. You’re living in butt-fuck nowheresville with your head up your ass and only probably just got here.

You’re supporting the totalitarian dictator of a large country as he tries to subdue a smaller weaker neighbor. I’ll bet you’re a big fan of all like him - Stalin, Hitler and Mao.

But Putin-bot gonna Putin-bot.


75 posted on 11/20/2024 2:44:11 AM PST by Locomotive Breath
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