Who is the real tough guy?

Author: Greyparrot

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#121
Lemming
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@Best.Korea
I get the sense, that you're being contrary just to be contrary,
Mentioning Iran or North Korea's 'strength compared to America, to me, comes off a bit absurd.

I think I'll pass on conversation with you for now.
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#122
Greyparrot
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@Lemming
More broadly, Ukraine is practicing self defense, I'd say.
Ukraine started a civil war in 2014, that is the opposite of "self-defense"
#123
Best.Korea
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@Lemming
Here is a CNN claim:

Russia is producing 3 times more artillery shells than USA and Europe combined:

"Russia is producing about 250,000 artillery munitions per month, or about 3 million a year, according to NATO intelligence estimates of Russian defense production shared with CNN, as well as sources familiar with Western efforts to arm Ukraine. Collectively, the US and Europe have the capacity to generate only about 1.2 million munitions annually to send to Kyiv, a senior European intelligence official told CNN.
The US military set a goal to produce 100,000 rounds of artillery a month by the end of 2025 — less than half of the Russian monthly output — and even that number is now out of reach with $60 billion in Ukraine funding stalled in Congress, a senior Army official told reporters last week."
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#124
Greyparrot
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@Best.Korea
More than half of all the deaths in Ukraine are from artillery.
#125
Lemming
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@Greyparrot
The war in Donbas?

"The war in Donbas,[c] also known as the Donbas war, was a phase of the Russo-Ukrainian War in the Donbas region of Ukraine. The war began in April 2014, when a commando unit headed by Russian citizen Igor Girkin seized Sloviansk in Donetsk oblast.[20][21][6][22] The Ukrainian military launched an operation against them.[23][5] The war continued until subsumed by the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022.[24]"

"Russia covertly directly sent troops, tanks and artillery into the Donbas."

"Following the invasion, Russia held illegitimate referendums on the Ukrainian territory it occupied, annexing the LPR and DPR as well as Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts, despite not controlling all of the area of any of these territories nor defining borders for them. Russia now thus views the LPR and DPR as a Republics of Russia, but the international community still overwhelmingly views them as part of Ukraine."


#126
Best.Korea
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@Lemming
"China has the largest navy with 730 military vessels, followed by Russia with 598 and North Korea with 519. The United States comes in fourth with 484 naval vessels."

"Satellite images reveal the scale. China has been investing so much in shipbuilding over the past 18 years that it can now build more ships in a month than the United States can in a year — and Beijing aims to keep widening its advantage."

Yeah, good luck.
#127
Best.Korea
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@Greyparrot
More than half of all the deaths in Ukraine are from artillery
Artillery makes it possible to attack the frontline easily from a distance. And Ukrainians must stay on the front and keep dying from artillery to defend territory. Suicide war.
#128
FLRW
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 do not think Trump will be able to invade Canada or Greenland, he is not Dictator.
Well, Stormy did say his dick was a tater tot.
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#129
Greyparrot
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@Lemming

That Civil War. It was never about "Self-Defense"
#130
Lemming
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@Greyparrot
"Protesters opposed what they saw as widespread government corruption and abuse of power, the influence of Russia and oligarchs, police brutality, human rights violations,[33][34] and repressive anti-protest laws.[33]"

"Pro-Russian, counter-revolutionary protests erupted in southern and eastern Ukraine. Russia occupied and then annexed Crimea,[45][46] while armed pro-Russian separatists seized government buildings and proclaimed the independent states of Donetsk and Luhansk, sparking the Donbas war."

Sounds to me like self later on when Russia invaded, all with Russia claiming Nazis, Nazis everywhere.
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#131
Greyparrot
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@Lemming
Yeah...much much later on after they had already been fighting for almost a decade in a bloody civil war, mainly targeting ethnic cleansing of Russians.

Timeline: From Maidan Revolution to Russia’s 2022 Invasion of Ukraine:

2013–2014: The Maidan Revolution & Fall of Yanukovych
  • November 21, 2013 – Protests begin in Kyiv after President Viktor Yanukovych rejects an EU trade deal in favor of closer ties with Russia.
  • February 18–20, 2014 – The Euromaidan protests turn violent, with police cracking down on demonstrators. Over 100 people are killed.
  • February 22, 2014 – Yanukovych is undemocratically ousted and flees to Russia, and a new pro-Western government takes power. Russia calls this a Western-backed coup.
2014: Donbas War Begins
  • April 6–12, 2014 – Pro-Russian separatists in Donetsk and Luhansk seize government buildings, declaring the creation of the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LPR).
  • April 15, 2014 – The new Ukrainian government launches an “Anti-Terrorist Operation” (ATO) and wages a cleansing war against ethnic Russian separatists in Donbas.
  • May 11, 2014 – DPR and LPR hold referendums, claiming independence from Ukraine in an effort to stop the mass scale slaughter of ethnic Russians in the Donbas. Kyiv and the West call the referendums "illegal democracy."
  • July–August 2014 – Ukrainian forces push deep into Donbas but suffer heavy defeats at Ilovaisk from the ethnic Russian separatists.
2015–2021: Stalemate in Donbas
  • February 12, 2015 – The Minsk II agreement is signed, calling for a ceasefire and autonomy for Donbas. Fighting slows but never fully stops.
  • 2016–2021 – Kiev takes time during the ceasefire to gather support from the west and then violates the cease fire by continuing low-level warfare along the front line, with thousands of casualties.
  • April 2019 – Volodymyr Zelenskyy is elected President of Ukraine, pledging peace but taking a firm stance against ethnic Russians in the Donbas.
  • 2021 – Ukraine moves to increase ties with NATO, threatening the security of Russia and the ethnic Russians in the Donbas.
2022: Russia Invades Ukraine
  • February 21, 2022 – Russia formally recognizes the DPR and LPR as independent states.
  • February 24, 2022 – Russia launches a full-scale invasion, under the justification of rescuing ethnic Russians in the Donbas from Ukrainian aggression.
This marks the transition from the civil war phase (2014–2021) to an outright interstate war between Russia and Ukraine.


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#132
Greyparrot
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@Lemming
Ethnically cleansing Russians from the Donbas was never about "self-defense" any more than it was self-defense for Hitler to cleanse the Jews.

The more you actually study and learn what is really going on there past the war propaganda, the more sickening it is to see who the real monsters were.

I am sure there were many Hitler fans before the mass graves were uncovered.
#133
Lemming
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@Greyparrot
"Yanukovych fled the city that evening.[36] The next day, 22 February, the Ukrainian parliament voted to remove Yanukovych from office by 328 to 0 (about 73% of the parliament's 450 members).[37][38][39][40] Yanukovych claimed this vote was illegal and asked Russia for help."

What made this illegal?
. . .

Many of the separatist attempters happened to be ethnically Russian,
Ukraine fighting them does not make it ethnic cleansing.
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#134
Greyparrot
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@Lemming
The Ukrainian Parliament (Rada) voted 328–0 to remove him, but the constitutional requirement for impeachment (three-fourths majority, or 338 votes) was not fully met. Hence, it was an illegal removal of an elected president. The entire world describes it as a coup.

Many of the separatist attempters happened to be ethnically Russian,
Ukraine fighting them does not make it ethnic cleansing.
Oh!... just like the majority of people Hitler killed just happened to be ethnic Jews, and the people Trump excluded just happened to be ethnic Muslims. That's some badass mental gymnastics my friend.
#135
Lemming
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@Greyparrot
"Russian propaganda described the events as a "coup".[42][43][44]"

Maybe the guy shouldn't have fled the country.

Still, 'sounds a  fair point in #134 in what you say constitutional requirement for impeachment were.

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#136
Greyparrot
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@Lemming
Maybe the guy shouldn't have fled the country.
Umm...when there's an armed mob outside your door staging a coup, there's not many sane choices. Saying it's Russian "propaganda" doesn't actually make them less violent.

By mid-February 2014, the situation in Kyiv had escalated into outright street warfare between protesters and security forces. On February 18–20, violent clashes erupted as protesters, armed with Molotov cocktails, bats, and even some firearms, fought against the Berkut riot police, who responded with live ammunition and sniper fire. Over 100 protesters and 13 police officers were killed in the chaos. Demonstrators seized government buildings, torched police headquarters, and fortified their occupation of Independence Square (Maidan Nezalezhnosti).

On February 21, under extreme pressure, President Viktor Yanukovych signed an EU-brokered deal to hold early elections and restore the 2004 constitution, which would limit presidential power. However, the protesters rejected the agreement, demanding his immediate resignation. The following day, February 22, radical factions and paramilitary groups, including the nationalist Right Sector, stormed government buildings and occupied the presidential palace. Yanukovych fled overnight after his security detail warned him they could no longer protect him. In his absence, the Ukrainian parliament (Rada) voted to remove him from office, though they lacked the required three-fourths majority for formal impeachment.

By February 23–24, the new government had issued arrest warrants for Yanukovych and his ministers, accusing them of mass murder. Meanwhile, pro-Russian demonstrations erupted in Crimea and Donbas, setting the stage for the coming conflict. While the new Ukrainian government maintained that Yanukovych’s removal followed legal procedures, the reality was that an armed insurrection in the streets had driven him from power. Parliament did not follow the proper impeachment process, and the president fled under duress, not by choice. With radical groups seizing control of key institutions, the events of February 2014 clearly amounted to a violent regime change.

Whether one supports it or not, calling it a purely peaceful democratic uprising and not a coup is historically inaccurate.
#137
Lemming
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@Greyparrot
Well, I wouldn't call it a 'purely 'peaceful democratic uprising.
#138
Lemming
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@Greyparrot
Whoops, gotta take my like away from #134 after I noticed that edit of yours.
Not that editing one's comments is bad, I do so myself now and then sometimes.

But I don't agree with your comment,
"Oh!... just like the majority of people Hitler killed just happened to be ethnic Jews, and the people Trump excluded just happened to be ethnic Muslims. That's some badass mental gymnastics my friend." - Greyparrot

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#139
Greyparrot
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@Lemming
I get you don't like it, but to claim the conflict in Donbas has nothing to do about the forcible removal of ethnic Russians in the Donbas misses the very core of the conflict over there. It's not at all "good guy vs bad guy"

To ignore the concerns of ethnic Russians and Russian-speaking Ukrainians in Donbas, or to frame them all as “Russian puppets,” is to overlook the very heart of the conflict. It wasn’t just about geopolitics, it was about identity, survival, and the fear of being forcibly assimilated or displaced by a government they did not recognize as legitimate. They literally outlawed their language and killed thousands of them.
#140
Lemming
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@Greyparrot
Just because X is fought in war, doesn't make said war a genocide against X.

"During the build-up to its invasion of Ukraine, Russia falsely accused Ukraine of genocide against Russian speakers in the Donbas region. Ukraine fought a war against Russian proxy forces in the Donbas War from 2014 to 2022. Russia's president Vladimir Putin used this claim of genocide to justify the invasion of Ukraine. There is no evidence to support the allegation and it has been widely rejected.[1]"
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#141
Greyparrot
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@Lemming
Well Putin was wrong. It was definitely an ethnic cleansing and not strictly a "genocide"
He most likely exaggerated for political purposes, but the intent to forcibly remove or suppress a population based on their ethnicity, language, or cultural identity fits the very definition of ethnic cleansing. The world saw it in the Balkans in the 1990s, and something similar played out in Donbas, even if Western media refused to frame it that way with their war propaganda. It's wrong to do it in Gaza and it is wrong to do it in the Donbas.

In any case, I will never be on the side of ethnic cleansing, and I don't care how cute the blue and yellow flag looks. I really do not.
#142
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@Best.Korea
Here is a CNN claim:

Russia is producing 3 times more artillery shells than USA and Europe combined:

"Russia is producing about 250,000 artillery munitions per month, or about 3 million a year, according to NATO intelligence estimates of Russian defense production shared with CNN, as well as sources familiar with Western efforts to arm Ukraine. Collectively, the US and Europe have the capacity to generate only about 1.2 million munitions annually to send to Kyiv, a senior European intelligence official told CNN.
The US military set a goal to produce 100,000 rounds of artillery a month by the end of 2025 — less than half of the Russian monthly output — and even that number is now out of reach with $60 billion in Ukraine funding stalled in Congress, a senior Army official told reporters last week."
There is a chance America will lose Ukraine and the rare earth minerals Trump was after.
#143
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@Best.Korea
Ships are easily sunk, even with rudimentary ordinance.

As the Ukrainians proved.

A direct hit on a munitions and fuel laden ship is likely to end in total disaster.
#144
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@Greyparrot
Hey, the ongoing Russo-Soviet autocratic record for mass ethnic extermination, beats Hitler hands down.

So does it's total disregard for it's own cannon fodder and any internal dissent.

And you love these people...So perhaps you should buy a one way ticket and go sign up.
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#145
Greyparrot
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@zedvictor4
Wrong again. I don't like either of them, and you can shove your pretty yellow and blue flag where it fits.
#146
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@Greyparrot
A man of ideological mystery, who describes himself as libertarian.

Save for Cats and Star Trek.


Nope, I'm not a flag man or enamoured of any divisive symbolism.


So China is keen to redraw maps. ..Not much Putin can do about that.

And with a 14000 mile border to defend and not many true friends, save for a few Orthodox Slavs and perhaps a current  North Korean boyfriend.


(Not even sure that Lukashenko's love is as undying as it once was).


How do you predict Russia's future, moving on from it's current boggy position in Eastern Ukraine?

Indeed, moving on when?

#147
Dr.Franklin
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I'll feel happy about it if he showed the same attitude towards Israel
#148
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@Greyparrot
We held up this Zelensky guy to be some folk hero
"We," who?" What'shisname, the pic of the guy who is your current avatar? He made this mess, but someone else is cleaning it up. And don'r give me some telephone transcript, and an explanation from a keystone cop who couldn't keep his willy out of a Chinese spy, and an aborted Impeachment for his momma, Madam Pelostomy.