Free Republic

My first post on this thread was #16. That post was about how much bigger we are.

I take it you concede that we are enormously bigger than Russia. (That’s why you have to threaten nuclear war, isn’t it?) Our side can lose a regional war or two, and survive and, even, continue to grow. But not Russia. Russia fell apart after its war in Afghanistan. Good bye Warsaw Pact and good bye Soviet Union. Not only that, the population of Russia has been falling since 1993. Who knows whether Russia will survive or will again collapse after what was supposed to be a special military operation in Ukraine, that has turned into a war attrition.

My recurrent theme is that we are a democratic society. In spite of the problems we have, we tend to resolve or overcome these problems and to grow. The future is always our friend.

Post #144 was about the policy of Mutual Assured Destruction. Why BOTH sides had nuclear weapons and neither side used them during the cold war. And, why we can’t be so sure nowadays about Russia. Obviously. It is your side that again and again threatens nuclear war.

No, Ivan, I brought up nuclear aircraft carriers. I said we had eleven of them plus a bunch of lesser aircraft carriers described as amphibious assault ships. I said this to illustrate that our side is so much bigger, multiple times bigger than your side. The NATO countries have a combined GDP of $50 trillion, whereas Russia has a GDP of $5 trillion.

https://www.worldeconomics.com/Thoughts/NATOs-Combined-GDP-is-far-larger-than-Russias.aspx

You, in typical Russian fashion, ignored this unpleasant fact and went off on your own tangent; and, after a while, forget your point of departure.

After dead people and illegal aliens, felons are the next most consistent constituency of the Democratic Party.

We used two atomic bombs on Japan.

The proper lesson to draw is: Do not attack us. You don’t know what crazy weapons we have in skunk works.

Then after WWII we helped Japan become a prosperous, democratic state. Ditto Germany and Italy after WWII. Also Taiwan and South Korea, although it took them a but longer to get with the program. Now we are helping to turn the countries of eastern Europe in prosperous and democratic states.

Do you think this is lost on the people of Ukraine. They can see the pessimism of Russia and the optimism of Poland.

As to corruption, no, I do not like what the Democrats are doing to Trump. But, they’re didn’t throw him off a skyscraper, or kill him with polonium 220, or imprison him and then beat him to death.

Nor did we starve 4 million people to death during the 1930s because they were Ukrainian, kill a total of 60 million of our people during the 20th Century, join with Hitler in dividing up eastern Europe, or send the tanks into Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Poland and Romania during the Cold War when those countries tried to be independent, nor did we send 10 million people into slave labor camps collectively known as the Gulag.

Your boy says the fall of communism was the worst tragedy of the 20th Century. In Great Falls, Montana, where I was when the American ICBMs were taken off alert, we had a victory parade. We had lived through the Cold War, and we were neither red nor dead. We were alive and free. We celebrated our country’s greatest victory. A victory secured not by war, but by remaining vigilant over three generations. My father, myself and my son all took our turns on the ramparts.

A free country will grow in all manner of ways, including in military power and the economy needed to sustain that military power. We can deal with inevitable losses, and individuals who succumb to corruption and even to evil. Countries based on subjugation cannot keep up with us and, if they try, they will collapse.

You collapsed recently. You are about to collapse again. Your boy believed he could conquer Ukraine in three days. Instead he wound up in a war of attrition that, over time, is depleting his stockpiles of weapons and military-age men.

Hillary needs to crawl back into her bottle.

Biden couldn’t pronounce the word “libertarian.”

I notice that you believe the law of conquest was a good thing until the U.S. started conquering. Let’s look at the case of Mexico, which you treat as legitimate until it was defeated by the United States.

A few dozen conquistadors conquered Mexico because the conquistadors allied themselves with the subjugated tribes to overthrow their ruthless rulers.

The consequent territory was ruled by Spain as New Spain. During the Spanish period, there were incessant uprisings and intrigues. Finally, Mexico gained its independence from Spain in a long war of independence.

The consequent Mexican period was also one of incessant uprisings and intrigues. The central government of Mexico was constantly suppressing or trying but failing to suppress independence movements. Among these independence movements was one in the Mexican state of Texas.

The Texians (as they called themselves) flew the Mexican flag over the Alamo, with the number 1824 on it. They were demanding their rights under the Mexican Constitution of that year. But, not having their rights respected, they declared independence and won their independence in a short but decisive war.

When the consequent Republic of Texas joined the U.S. as a state, we thought there was some uncertainty about its border with Mexico. Was it the Rio Grande or the Rio Nueces? President Polk sent an envoy to Mexico to try to resolve the matter, with an offer of $5 million to put the border at the Rio Grande.

But, no, the flamboyant general and sometimes dictator of Mexico, Santa Ana, was going to defend every inch of Mexican territory to the Sabine River (the border of Texas with Louisiana). And, so, we got into a war with Mexico.

At what point did the right of conquest turn bad? When the U.S. defeated Mexico? Or, was it always bad? Isn’t the sorry history of mankind one of one war after another? The question shouldn’t be who has the right to be anybody’s master, because nobody has that right. Rather, the question should be when will everybody be free?

We’ve been trying for about a hundred years now to end war as a means of national policy. Obviously, we’ve not been successful. Our failure to end war doesn’t justify Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. It means we must be vigilant in our own defense, and it means that small and medium-sized nations should consider joining into mutual defense with others to secure their independence.

Given that each side is rational, the doctrine of mutual assured destruction says neither side will start a nuclear war. During the cold war, the US and the USSR opposed each other with nuclear arsenals, and even engaged in flare-ups here and there. But, there was no nuclear war because each side was rational.

Each side was confident in its ultimate victory. The democrats believed in democracy, and the communists believed in communism. Khrushchev famously said, we will bury you (meaning with kitchen appliances, family homes, health clinics, etc.) Nixon engaged him in “the kitchen debate.” Why would either side gamble a sure victory with peace by getting into a nuclear war?

Well, when the Berlin Wall fell, it was your side that collapsed. Democracy won, not communism.

For a time it looked as though Russia would join with the west as a democratic country. But, no. I’m sorry. Yeltsin was weak and the Chechens were (and still are) crazy. Russia needed a strong leader, and that person turned out to be Putin. Putin and his party were actually the best at the time for Russia. But, the corruption was too ingrained. And, instead of evolving into a multi-party democracy, Russia evolved into a dictatorship. Eventually Putin and his party succumbed to corruption.

Nowadays, Russia is a kleptocracy with nuclear weapons. It has become a big version of North Korea. It is not clear that Russia is rational.

Certainly Iran isn’t rational. They have the idea they can usher in the battle of Armageddon and the coming of the 12th Imam. They are religious fanatics and there’s no telling what they will do.

China, on the other hand, appears to be confident in their system. They say the west is corrupt by materialism. That we are lazy, stupid and fat. That crime and sexual perversion is growing. They think their system, in which the state controls the media and education, is better, because it maintains the ethics of hard work and saving.

Xi is therefore like Khrushchev. He believes his system will win with peace. Why would he risk victory by getting into a war with us? As long as we are reasonable, we can work with that guy. Let’s wait until the next time something like the Berlin Wall falls, and one of the two sides collapses. Then, we will find out whether Chinese communism or western democracy prevails.

To paraphrase Groucho Marx, Libertarians wouldn’t join any club that would have them as members.

Usually it’s Dmitry Medvedev with the idiotic statements. What are we to make of Putin making idiotic statements? Maybe his syphilis can no longer be controlled.

right from Putin

We Americans believe that government comes from the consent of the governed; not as a legacy of some long dead monarch. When my fellow Americans figure how eff’ed up Russians are, they’ll figure out that the only thing Russians understand is power.

When they opened the archives of the Kremlin (which they have since re-closed), we found out that many orthodox priests were killed resisting the communists. I repented not having faith in my eastern brothers. Today the Russian orthodox church sells itself to Putin for a few lousy pieces of silver. Cathedrals with stained glass windows featuring Lenin, Stalin and Putin.

God will not be mocked.

You must be ignorant, or think I am, about Russia. Ethnic Russians share the vast Russian Federation with many other people. For a time, some federal subjects were allowed self-rule including in language. But, no more, Putin has taken away the rights of the Republics.

The Russians are Europeans but not western. They are eastern Europeans. (This is basic knowledge. You must know this.) Russia traces its cultural lineage to Kiev and prior to that to Constantinople. In the west, the cultural lineage goes something like this, from Rome to the Holy Roman Empire, to Protestantism, liberal government and capitalism. The Poles easily align with the west, even though subjugated by Imperial Russia and by the Soviet Union for many centuries. Other eastern Europeans, such as the Hungarians, Bulgarians, and Romanians, have their own national stories; and, being sovereign nations, they are able to reconcile their national histories with their present.

Over here, in America, we were “conceived in Liberty,” as Lincoln put it, and don’t have a shared national history.

There are effectively no opportunities for alternative leadership in Russia. Hence, there is no meaningful opposition party or opposition leaders. Your man is a dictator who has consolidated power even more completely than any Party Secretary during the Soviet era. Russia, therefore, will have to collapse because it cannot change. Of course, collapse is what Russian has been doing the past century. You collapsed during WWI and you collapsed after Afghanistan.

You will collapse because of your stupid war in Ukraine. Well, unless Putin blames his generals for misinforming him, and seeks some kind of a deal from the west.

We, in America, appreciate that Czar Alexander II freed the serfs. At about the same time, we were involved in a civil war to end slavery in this country. Abraham Lincoln said it doesn’t matter what you call it, it is the same tyranny, that some work and others live off their work. The real struggle isn’t who will be the master, but whether we will be free.

Russia made yet other attempts to liberalize during the 19th Century; but, these attempts proved insufficient. While Russia made some progress, this progress was by no means sufficient. The masses of people remained rural peasants or urban poor. And, after defeat at the borders of Germany and Austria in WWI, the allure of communism was compelling.

Under communism, new forms of subjugation were brought to Russia. As many as 10 million people were sent to the Gulag, basically to be worked to death or nearly so, in slave labor camps. Everybody else lived in fear.

To show the difference between Russian thinking and American thinking, Russians think if the Poles are their slaves, they must be our slaves. No. By reason of NATO and their own resolve, the Poles aren’t anybody’s slaves. Just like Poland saved Europe from the Ottomans at Vienna in 1683, they saved Europe from the Communists in 1921. Today, with mutual defense, many people can be free.

We, in America, have flaws. But anybody who says the U.S. is similar to Russia is a Putinbot, an anti-American leftist, or simply confused. Regarding Putinbots, I can respect that it’s a paying job. Ditto those who are paid by Soros.

Reverend Wright should wright the QDR.

The U.S. Dept. of Defense is charged with a wide range of responsibilities. These responsibilities range from dealing with existential threats to dealing with all kinds of lesser contingencies. No doubt that many of the technologies pursued by the DOD suffer from a desire that these technologies can be applied to a range of contingencies. Consider the disasters of the Littoral Combat Ship and the Zumult-class “destroyer.” The F-35, the most expensive purchase in DOD history, is a very expensive platform, and lacks important attributes of the platforms it is supposed to replace.

Aircraft carriers have capabilities that cannot be duplicated. To sustain the deployment of three or four carriers around the world, we need a multiple of them. Each takes years to design and build and, once built, they have service lives of fifty years. Another aspect of having eleven or so, is to be able to deal with loses whether due to a near peer in a war, or to any other cause.

Only a country like the U.S. can sustain a defense posture like we do. We spend 3.5 percent of GDP on defense, which is less than half the percent we spent fifty years ago. And, this 3.5 percent of GDP is roughly equal to what the rest of the world spends on defense. We would greatly appreciate that our NATO allies met the expectation that they spend 2 percent of GDP on defense. We’ll take care of the things only we can, and they can focus on conventional arms.

It is naive to compare aircraft carriers with artillery shells. Conventional artillery shells can be produced on an assembly line. Production can be ramped up as necessary. We’re supposed to maintain production capacity in reserve so as to be able to increase production to met surges in demand. Besides, we have largely moved away from dumb bombs, and to smart munitions.

Guided munitions are more complicated and production of them can’t be easily ramped up. With more complicated munitions, we manage stockpiles. Having dipped into these stockpiles, we should consider placing new orders.

Compare the west’s ability to defend against air attacks to Russia’s. We see in Israel and in Ukraine tremendous ability to defeat rocket, missile and drone attacks. In Ukraine, air defense deters Russia from deploying warplanes and helicopters near the front (and motivated them to develop glide bomb technologies). In contrast, Ukraine can fly inexpensive drones far into Russia territory to target its undefended energy infrastructure.

The topic of this thread, Ivan, is Russia’s military and you criticized the U.S. for having aircraft carriers.

Hey, let’s think like a Russian. If Putin’s media says “recent research indicates that bread causes cancer,” what can you conclude? You can conclude that the wheat crop has failed.

Using your “logic” in boasting that Russia having no aircraft carriers is in better shape than the US having 11 super-carriers and another 9 amphibious assault ships (”small” aircraft carriers).

Russia simply doesn’t have the economic base to sustain much of a military.

US + other NATO countries have 1 billion people and a combined GDP of $50 trillion.

Russia has 150 million people and a GDP of $2 trillion.

Things are WAY different from the days I was in the army. Back then the Soviet Union + Warsaw Pact had rough parity with the US + NATO.

Good thinking, Ivan. Now that you are down to zero aircraft carriers, you have become invincible. I see you are applying this strategy of invincibility to tanks and other armored vehicles, to air defense systems, to the Black fleet, and to military-age men.

We have two ships passing in the night.

One side says that Russia was invaded during WWII, and distinguishes wars in which Russia was the country being invaded from wars in which Russia is the country that is the invader. The other side says, and I quote a particular freeper, “Regardless of how Russia got into WW2, Russia did win (with help from the rest of the world).” As written, the “other side,” which disregards whether Russia is being invaded or is the invader, is correct.

I will repeat that the “other side” doesn’t disagree that since 1904, Russia has lost one after another border war (Japan, Poland, etc.), and has several times after these defeats subsequently had an internal revolution.

I would agree with you that it is wrong to say Russia never won a war outside its borders, if Russia hadn’t been invaded by Hitler during WWII. But, on June 22, 1941, Germany invaded Russia in Operation Barbarossa. Hence, I distinguished Russia’s victories when being invaded from its loses in border wars beginning in 1904.

The other part of what you said is correct. If you go back far enough, you find that Russia and its predecessor, the Duchy of Moscovy, were variously defeated when invaded, and were successful when invading others.

For a time, Moscovy was a vassal state of the Mongols. Upon the withdrawal of the Mongols from the region, Moscovy, and later Imperial Russia expanded to the east, the south and the west.

To the south and the west, this expansion involved conflicts with the Persians, the Ottomans, and others. To the west, expansion involved conflicts with Sweden, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and others. (The countries I just mentioned were, at the time, quite powerful.)

You are also correct to notice the conflict involved Great Britain in Afghanistan, and also in Crimea. While Imperial Russia was in the process of creating a great, contiguous land-empire; Great Britain was in the process of creating an even greater, non-contiguous maritime-empire, which brought it into conflict with Russia and many other countries at various times. We (the U.S.) are the successor of Great Britain. We are the size of a continent, but - having one face on the Atlantic and another face on the Pacific - we are like a big island. Our interests were at the start, and still are today, peace and free trade with all countries. We have no “natural” enemies. Every country is, at least potentially, our partner in trade, if not our friend and ally.

We need a great President for us to realize our great destiny. With patience and persistence, we can be instrumental in securing peace and human rights for the whole world. Not through empire. Just the opposite. By securing the sovereignty of all nations. This can and should include Russia.