dimitrig said:

---

Putin has proven that he is a relic. It looked like he might get somewhere with his threats and saber rattling but attacking another nation unprovoked is a bad look in an age when appearance is everything.

---

Putin clearly doesnt care about appearance.
See Georgia in 2008 and Crimea in 2014.

MinotStateBeav said:

---

I'm seeing comments on twatter about enlisting the unvaxxed to fight, which is hilarious because they just kicked them out for being unvaxxed.

---

Send kyrie Irving

Ccajon2 said:

---

I've read quite a bit about the Ukraine and as you well know, though I'm no expert, I do read a lot. 90 % of the population in the Ukraine east of the 38 latitude are fully Russian, and are loyal to Moscow/Putin. They are treated poorly by the Ukraine athorities. The two regions that don't want to be under Kiev's control basically invited the Russian in for there protection. That Russian Mechanized army will cross the border and I'm 99% certain they will proceed no further west of the 38. Lat. Mr. tRump agreed with Vlads Putin's plans, calling them genius.?! Now there are about 12,000-15,000 Ukraine troops dug in between the border and line 38 so there might be some Ukrainian hair mussed. (Apologize for the in joke.). I hope we don't get too involved. It would cost the US thousands of casualties for almost no reward. At best the US could get maybe 6,000 troops there from the 82nd airborne ready brigade within the next 48 hours. Russia had about 140,000 troops ready to cross the border. The math isn't encouraging.

---

1) thx
2) they crossed that 38 line. So what say you now?
3) 100 years ago there were very few Russian speakers in Ukraine.

dajo9 said:

---

Eastern Oregon Bear said:

---

sycasey said:

---

Ccajon2 said:

---

I've read quite a bit about the Ukraine and as you well know, though I'm no expert, I do read a lot. 90 % of the population in the Ukraine east of the 38 latitude are fully Russian, and are loyal to Moscow/Putin. They are treated poorly by the Ukraine athorities. The two regions that don't want to be under Kiev's control basically invited the Russian in for there protection.

---

That 90% is a very much disputed number. The problem is that in these regions there has been a lot of Russian propaganda and destabilization going on, and the polling is not reliable. Without a doubt there are a lot of ethnic Russians in that area, but loyal to Putin? Not necessarily.

---

Good point. I knew quite a few people of Chinese ancestry when I was growing up. I don't recall any of them being loyal to Mao.

---

We're the Japanese Americans in California during WWII loyal to the emperor?

---

I worked with a friend whose family was at manzinar. His dad was pissed. They had been in USA since 1880. They were all asked two questions
1) do you renounce your Japanese ancestry?
2) would you fight for USA against Japan?

He and brothers answered No and No.





After the war, my friend's dad moved to Japan, a place he had never lived. He married a Japanese woman and Larry was born there. But shortly after moved back to LA because he didn't like the quality of life. Sure, he was an outsider, foreigner.

The map that shows why Russ feels surrounded
(5 years ago)

Lol

Some really insightful thoughts by Samuel Green.
A professor of Russian politics and director of the Russia Institute at King's College London.
Green had been on record that Putin wouldnt go all the way, and was game to reassess.


"Yes. Or even in terms of security, frankly. Because nobody's threatening Russia. So I and a lot of my colleagues came to this conclusion that it just didn't make sense. Now, of course it still doesn't make sense. But he's doing it, so clearly it makes sense to him. So part of me goes back to the drawing board and tries to think, OK, what did I misunderstand about Russian politics? I don't have the answer to that question yet.

But another part of me actually sticks to my guns and says, well, the fact that he's decided he can accept these risks doesn't mean the risks aren't there. There's still going to be pain for the Russian economy. There are sanctions on the table that would turn the Russian economy into the Iranian economy eventually. Public opinion is a risk. The economy is a risk. And the war itself is a risk. So we now get to see how they deal with it. And we'll learn a lot about the system of power that Putin has built.

The gradual expansion of the EU as a project and EU economic influence in Russia's direction makes the Russian elite poorer because it makes it harder for them to continue doing business. The business model that the Russian political economy is built on is a rent-based model, a model that has these massively bloated value chains so that money can be siphoned off in politically convenient directions.

If you have to compete in a liberalized market, inefficient corporate management and corporate ownership falls by the wayside eventually, at least in theory. That puts a lot of pressure on your margins, on your structure, and on what you're doing with your money. That's pressure that is both economic and political at least in its ramifications for Putin and the people on whose behalf he rules. Keeping Ukraine out of that EU integration project is important. Keeping that project at bay so it doesn't begin to exert too much influence on Russia itself is important.

However, having reasonable access to European financial markets is also important. Being able to transact in global currencies is important. Being able to enjoy some of this wealth that you have built is important.

I have to begin to question whether something is shifting in how Putin understands his own power. Because he's either making a massive mistake and hurting the interest of the people who he serves. Or he's not as beholden to them or doesn't want to be as beholden to them as we've thought.

If the West imposes the kind of sanctions it's been saying it will, it will tremendously limit their room for maneuver, limit their independence and autonomy, which is already pretty limited, but limit it even further and tie them much more closely to Putin. Now, they may have an opportunity to decide they don't like that. And if there's a real political risk that Putin faces, that's probably it."

Does Jerome Randle, and do other American basketball players remain in the Ukraine?

cbbass1 said:

---

sycasey said:

---

I admit, even I didn't think the Putin appeasers would be proven wrong THIS quickly.

---

Me either!

I'll take my lumps & eat some well-deserved crow; I didn't think that Putin would be stupid enough to go on his rant about restoring the old USSR. In proving his NeoCon critics correct, he's crossed a dangerous line.

It remains to be seen if he'll attack a NATO Member country. I doubt that he will, as that would invite a direct U.S. military response. Personally, I don't think he's likely to take that step.


If he does, then this might be the first phase of The Great Realignment. Then China will soon be annexing Taiwan, and U.S. defense pacts with many nations will be put to the test. China would be Putin's partner in a massive realignment of the world economy, with the U.S. defaulting on its Treasuries held by China, the end of the USD as the world's reserve currency, and the collapse of the U.S. import-based economy.

All existing relationships between U.S. corporations and China will need to be reconsidered, since the U.S. is almost completely dependent on China and its neighbors for manufactured goods. The U.S. economy remains extremely vulnerable, and China is holding all the cards. The political alignment of Japan, S. Korea, Philippines, and all of Southeast Asia are at stake. Current U.S. satellites will be faced with a choice of alignment with the U.S. military empire, or China's Belt & Roads.

Even with all the Covid-related supply disruptions, U.S. corporations have done little to invest in U.S. domestic manufacturing. That will be disastrous for the U.S. -- IF this keeps going on its current course.

---

Looks like it's going to be USA+Europe vs China+Russia.
We need to get some super poor nations to do our manufacturing for us, then cut China out. USA+Europe are the consumers.
India has a lot of people, let's align with them and shift all manufacturing there, or to African or Latin American populations who will work for cheap (and need development).

Quote:

---

U.S. Officials Repeatedly Urged China to Help Avert War in Ukraine

Edward Wong - NYTimes
Fri, February 25, 2022, 5:29 AM

WASHINGTON Over three months, senior Biden administration officials held half a dozen urgent meetings with top Chinese officials in which the Americans presented intelligence showing Russia's troop buildup around Ukraine and beseeched the Chinese to tell Russia not to invade, according to U.S. officials.

Each time, the Chinese officials, including the foreign minister and the ambassador to the United States, rebuffed the Americans, saying they did not think an invasion was in the works. After one diplomatic exchange in December, U.S. officials got intelligence showing Beijing had shared the information with Moscow, telling the Russians that the United States was trying to sow discord and that China would not try to impede Russian plans and actions, the officials said.

The previously unreported talks between U.S. and Chinese officials show how the Biden administration tried to use intelligence findings and diplomacy to persuade a superpower it views as a growing adversary to stop the invasion of Ukraine, and how that nation, led by President Xi Jinping, persistently sided with Russia even as the evidence of Moscow's plans for a military offensive grew over the winter.

This account is based on interviews with senior administration officials with knowledge of the conversations who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the diplomacy. The Chinese Embassy did not return requests for comment.

China is Russia's most powerful partner, and the two nations have been strengthening their bond for many years across diplomatic, economic and military realms. Xi and President Vladimir Putin of Russia, two autocrats with some shared ideas about global power, had met 37 times as national leaders before this year. If any world leader could make Putin think twice about invading Ukraine, it was Xi, went the thinking of some U.S. officials.

But the diplomatic efforts failed, and Putin began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Thursday morning after recognizing two Russia-backed insurgent enclaves in the country's east as independent states.
Some U.S. officials say the ties between China and Russia appear stronger than at any time since the Cold War. The two now present themselves as an ideological front against the United States and its European and Asian allies, even as Putin carries out the invasion of Ukraine, whose sovereignty China has recognized for decades.

The growing alarm among U.S. and European officials at the alignment between China and Russia has reached a new peak with the Ukraine crisis, exactly 50 years to the week after President Richard Nixon made a historic trip to China to restart diplomatic relations to make common cause in counterbalancing the Soviet Union. For 40 years after that, the relationship between the United States and China grew stronger, especially as lucrative trade ties developed, but then frayed due to mutual suspicions, intensifying strategic competition and antithetical ideas about power and governance.

In the recent private talks on Ukraine, U.S. officials heard language from their Chinese counterparts that was consistent with harder lines the Chinese had been voicing in public, which showed that a more hostile attitude had become entrenched, according to the American accounts.

On Wednesday, after Putin ordered troops into eastern Ukraine but before its full invasion, Hua Chunying, a Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, said at a news conference in Beijing that the United States was "the culprit of current tensions surrounding Ukraine."

"On the Ukraine issue, lately the U.S. has been sending weapons to Ukraine, heightening tensions, creating panic and even hyping up the possibility of warfare," she said. "If someone keeps pouring oil on the flame while accusing others of not doing their best to put out the fire, such kind of behavior is clearly irresponsible and immoral."

She added: "When the U.S. drove five waves of NATO expansion eastward all the way to Russia's doorstep and deployed advanced offensive strategic weapons in breach of its assurances to Russia, did it ever think about the consequences of pushing a big country to the wall?" She has refused to call Russia's assault an "invasion" when pressed by foreign journalists.

Hua's fiery anti-American remarks as Russia was moving to attack its neighbor stunned some current and former U.S. officials and China analysts in the United States. But the verbal grenades echo major points in the 5,000-word joint statement that China and Russia issued on Feb. 4 when Xi and Putin met at the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games in Beijing. In that document, the two countries declared their partnership had "no limits" and that they intended to stand together against U.S.-led democratic nations. China also explicitly sided with Russia in the text to denounce enlargement of the NATO alliance.

Last Saturday, Wang Yi, the Chinese foreign minister, criticized NATO in a video talk at the Munich Security Conference. European leaders in turn accused China of working with Russia to overturn what they and the Americans say is a "rules-based international order." Wang did say that Ukraine's sovereignty should be "respected and safeguarded" a reference to a foreign policy principle that Beijing often cites but no Chinese officials have mentioned Ukraine in those terms since Russia's full invasion began.

"They claim neutrality, they claim they stand on principle, but everything they say about the causes is anti-U.S., blaming NATO and adopting the Russian line," said Evan Medeiros, a Georgetown University professor who was senior Asia director at the White House National Security Council in the Obama administration. "The question is: How sustainable is that as a posture? How much damage does it do to their ties with the U.S. and their ties with Europe?"

The Biden administration's diplomatic outreach to China to try to avert war began after President Joe Biden and Xi held a video summit on Nov. 15. In the talk, the two leaders acknowledged challenges in the relationship between their nations, which is at its lowest point in decades, but agreed to try to cooperate on issues of common interest, including health security, climate change and nuclear weapons proliferation, White House officials said at the time.

After the meeting, U.S. officials decided that the Russian troop buildup around Ukraine presented the most immediate problem that China and the United States could try to defuse together. Some officials thought the outcome of the video summit indicated there was potential for an improvement in U.S.-China relations. Others were more skeptical, but thought it was important to leave no stone unturned in efforts to prevent Russia from attacking, one official said.

Days later, White House officials met with the ambassador, Qin Gang, at the Chinese Embassy. They told the ambassador what U.S. intelligence agencies had detected: a gradual encirclement of Ukraine by Russian forces, including armored units. William J. Burns, the CIA director, had flown to Moscow on Nov. 2 to confront the Russians with the same information, and on Nov. 17, U.S. intelligence officials shared their findings with NATO.

At the Chinese Embassy, Russia's aggression was the first topic in a discussion that ran more than 1 1/2 hours. In addition to laying out the intelligence, the White House officials told the ambassador that the United States would impose tough sanctions on Russian companies, officials and businesspeople in the event of an invasion, going far beyond those announced by the Obama administration after Russia seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014.

The U.S. officials said the sanctions would also hurt China over time because of its commercial ties.
They also pointed out they knew how China had helped Russia evade some of the 2014 sanctions, and warned Beijing against any such future aid. And they argued that because China was widely seen as a partner of Russia, its global image could suffer if Putin invaded.

The message was clear: It would be in China's interests to persuade Putin to stand down. But their entreaties went nowhere. Qin was skeptical and suspicious, a U.S. official said.

U.S. officials spoke with the ambassador about Russia at least three more times, both in the embassy and on the phone. Wendy R. Sherman, the deputy secretary of state, had a call with him. Qin continued to express skepticism and said Russia had legitimate security concerns in Europe.

The Americans also went higher on the diplomatic ladder: Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke to Wang about the problem in late January and again on Monday, the same day Putin ordered the new troops into Russia-backed enclaves of Ukraine.

"The secretary underscored the need to preserve Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity," said a State Department summary of the call that used the phrase that Chinese diplomats like to employ in signaling to other nations not to get involved in matters involving Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang and Hong Kong, all considered separatist problems by Beijing.

U.S. officials met with Qin in Washington again on Wednesday and heard the same rebuttals. Hours later, Putin declared war on Ukraine on television, and his military began pummeling the country with ballistic missiles as tanks rolled across the border.

2022 The New York Times Company

---

JUST LOOK AT THE URL - ARTICLE TITLES IF NOTHING ELSE

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/559975-russia-china-alignment-strengthens-dangerously-while-us-alliances

https://www.russiamatters.org/analysis/non-aggressors-benefits-russia-china-alignment-wont-be-game-changed-ukraine-or-much-else

https://www.axios.com/washington-wakes-up-to-beijing-moscow-alignment-838d107a-728c-48bb-95f4-f7e8a612fd18.html

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/11/25/why-are-russia-and-china-strengthening-ties

https://www.npr.org/2022/02/23/1082495257/examining-the-strategic-alignment-between-china-and-russia

DiabloWags said:

---

However, having reasonable access to European financial markets is also important. Being able to transact in global currencies is important. Being able to enjoy some of this wealth that you have built is important.

I have to begin to question whether something is shifting in how Putin understands his own power. Because he's either making a massive mistake and hurting the interest of the people who he serves. Or he's not as beholden to them or doesn't want to be as beholden to them as we've thought.

If the West imposes the kind of sanctions it's been saying it will, it will tremendously limit their room for maneuver, limit their independence and autonomy, which is already pretty limited, but limit it even further and tie them much more closely to Putin. Now, they may have an opportunity to decide they don't like that. And if there's a real political risk that Putin faces, that's probably it."

---

THIS ^^^

concordtom said:

---

cbbass1 said:

---

sycasey said:

---

I admit, even I didn't think the Putin appeasers would be proven wrong THIS quickly.

---

Me either!

I'll take my lumps & eat some well-deserved crow; I didn't think that Putin would be stupid enough to go on his rant about restoring the old USSR. In proving his NeoCon critics correct, he's crossed a dangerous line.

It remains to be seen if he'll attack a NATO Member country. I doubt that he will, as that would invite a direct U.S. military response. Personally, I don't think he's likely to take that step.


If he does, then this might be the first phase of The Great Realignment. Then China will soon be annexing Taiwan, and U.S. defense pacts with many nations will be put to the test. China would be Putin's partner in a massive realignment of the world economy, with the U.S. defaulting on its Treasuries held by China, the end of the USD as the world's reserve currency, and the collapse of the U.S. import-based economy.

All existing relationships between U.S. corporations and China will need to be reconsidered, since the U.S. is almost completely dependent on China and its neighbors for manufactured goods. The U.S. economy remains extremely vulnerable, and China is holding all the cards. The political alignment of Japan, S. Korea, Philippines, and all of Southeast Asia are at stake. Current U.S. satellites will be faced with a choice of alignment with the U.S. military empire, or China's Belt & Roads.

Even with all the Covid-related supply disruptions, U.S. corporations have done little to invest in U.S. domestic manufacturing. That will be disastrous for the U.S. -- IF this keeps going on its current course.

---

Looks like it's going to be USA+Europe vs China+Russia.
We need to get some super poor nations to do our manufacturing for us, then cut China out. USA+Europe are the consumers.
India has a lot of people, let's align with them and shift all manufacturing there, or to African or Latin American populations who will work for cheap (and need development).

Quote:

---

U.S. Officials Repeatedly Urged China to Help Avert War in Ukraine

Edward Wong - NYTimes
Fri, February 25, 2022, 5:29 AM

WASHINGTON Over three months, senior Biden administration officials held half a dozen urgent meetings with top Chinese officials in which the Americans presented intelligence showing Russia's troop buildup around Ukraine and beseeched the Chinese to tell Russia not to invade, according to U.S. officials.

Each time, the Chinese officials, including the foreign minister and the ambassador to the United States, rebuffed the Americans, saying they did not think an invasion was in the works. After one diplomatic exchange in December, U.S. officials got intelligence showing Beijing had shared the information with Moscow, telling the Russians that the United States was trying to sow discord and that China would not try to impede Russian plans and actions, the officials said.

The previously unreported talks between U.S. and Chinese officials show how the Biden administration tried to use intelligence findings and diplomacy to persuade a superpower it views as a growing adversary to stop the invasion of Ukraine, and how that nation, led by President Xi Jinping, persistently sided with Russia even as the evidence of Moscow's plans for a military offensive grew over the winter.

This account is based on interviews with senior administration officials with knowledge of the conversations who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the diplomacy. The Chinese Embassy did not return requests for comment.

China is Russia's most powerful partner, and the two nations have been strengthening their bond for many years across diplomatic, economic and military realms. Xi and President Vladimir Putin of Russia, two autocrats with some shared ideas about global power, had met 37 times as national leaders before this year. If any world leader could make Putin think twice about invading Ukraine, it was Xi, went the thinking of some U.S. officials.

But the diplomatic efforts failed, and Putin began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Thursday morning after recognizing two Russia-backed insurgent enclaves in the country's east as independent states.
Some U.S. officials say the ties between China and Russia appear stronger than at any time since the Cold War. The two now present themselves as an ideological front against the United States and its European and Asian allies, even as Putin carries out the invasion of Ukraine, whose sovereignty China has recognized for decades.

The growing alarm among U.S. and European officials at the alignment between China and Russia has reached a new peak with the Ukraine crisis, exactly 50 years to the week after President Richard Nixon made a historic trip to China to restart diplomatic relations to make common cause in counterbalancing the Soviet Union. For 40 years after that, the relationship between the United States and China grew stronger, especially as lucrative trade ties developed, but then frayed due to mutual suspicions, intensifying strategic competition and antithetical ideas about power and governance.

In the recent private talks on Ukraine, U.S. officials heard language from their Chinese counterparts that was consistent with harder lines the Chinese had been voicing in public, which showed that a more hostile attitude had become entrenched, according to the American accounts.

On Wednesday, after Putin ordered troops into eastern Ukraine but before its full invasion, Hua Chunying, a Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, said at a news conference in Beijing that the United States was "the culprit of current tensions surrounding Ukraine."

"On the Ukraine issue, lately the U.S. has been sending weapons to Ukraine, heightening tensions, creating panic and even hyping up the possibility of warfare," she said. "If someone keeps pouring oil on the flame while accusing others of not doing their best to put out the fire, such kind of behavior is clearly irresponsible and immoral."

She added: "When the U.S. drove five waves of NATO expansion eastward all the way to Russia's doorstep and deployed advanced offensive strategic weapons in breach of its assurances to Russia, did it ever think about the consequences of pushing a big country to the wall?" She has refused to call Russia's assault an "invasion" when pressed by foreign journalists.

Hua's fiery anti-American remarks as Russia was moving to attack its neighbor stunned some current and former U.S. officials and China analysts in the United States. But the verbal grenades echo major points in the 5,000-word joint statement that China and Russia issued on Feb. 4 when Xi and Putin met at the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games in Beijing. In that document, the two countries declared their partnership had "no limits" and that they intended to stand together against U.S.-led democratic nations. China also explicitly sided with Russia in the text to denounce enlargement of the NATO alliance.

Last Saturday, Wang Yi, the Chinese foreign minister, criticized NATO in a video talk at the Munich Security Conference. European leaders in turn accused China of working with Russia to overturn what they and the Americans say is a "rules-based international order." Wang did say that Ukraine's sovereignty should be "respected and safeguarded" a reference to a foreign policy principle that Beijing often cites but no Chinese officials have mentioned Ukraine in those terms since Russia's full invasion began.

"They claim neutrality, they claim they stand on principle, but everything they say about the causes is anti-U.S., blaming NATO and adopting the Russian line," said Evan Medeiros, a Georgetown University professor who was senior Asia director at the White House National Security Council in the Obama administration. "The question is: How sustainable is that as a posture? How much damage does it do to their ties with the U.S. and their ties with Europe?"

The Biden administration's diplomatic outreach to China to try to avert war began after President Joe Biden and Xi held a video summit on Nov. 15. In the talk, the two leaders acknowledged challenges in the relationship between their nations, which is at its lowest point in decades, but agreed to try to cooperate on issues of common interest, including health security, climate change and nuclear weapons proliferation, White House officials said at the time.

After the meeting, U.S. officials decided that the Russian troop buildup around Ukraine presented the most immediate problem that China and the United States could try to defuse together. Some officials thought the outcome of the video summit indicated there was potential for an improvement in U.S.-China relations. Others were more skeptical, but thought it was important to leave no stone unturned in efforts to prevent Russia from attacking, one official said.

Days later, White House officials met with the ambassador, Qin Gang, at the Chinese Embassy. They told the ambassador what U.S. intelligence agencies had detected: a gradual encirclement of Ukraine by Russian forces, including armored units. William J. Burns, the CIA director, had flown to Moscow on Nov. 2 to confront the Russians with the same information, and on Nov. 17, U.S. intelligence officials shared their findings with NATO.

At the Chinese Embassy, Russia's aggression was the first topic in a discussion that ran more than 1 1/2 hours. In addition to laying out the intelligence, the White House officials told the ambassador that the United States would impose tough sanctions on Russian companies, officials and businesspeople in the event of an invasion, going far beyond those announced by the Obama administration after Russia seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014.

The U.S. officials said the sanctions would also hurt China over time because of its commercial ties.
They also pointed out they knew how China had helped Russia evade some of the 2014 sanctions, and warned Beijing against any such future aid. And they argued that because China was widely seen as a partner of Russia, its global image could suffer if Putin invaded.

The message was clear: It would be in China's interests to persuade Putin to stand down. But their entreaties went nowhere. Qin was skeptical and suspicious, a U.S. official said.

U.S. officials spoke with the ambassador about Russia at least three more times, both in the embassy and on the phone. Wendy R. Sherman, the deputy secretary of state, had a call with him. Qin continued to express skepticism and said Russia had legitimate security concerns in Europe.

The Americans also went higher on the diplomatic ladder: Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke to Wang about the problem in late January and again on Monday, the same day Putin ordered the new troops into Russia-backed enclaves of Ukraine.

"The secretary underscored the need to preserve Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity," said a State Department summary of the call that used the phrase that Chinese diplomats like to employ in signaling to other nations not to get involved in matters involving Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang and Hong Kong, all considered separatist problems by Beijing.

U.S. officials met with Qin in Washington again on Wednesday and heard the same rebuttals. Hours later, Putin declared war on Ukraine on television, and his military began pummeling the country with ballistic missiles as tanks rolled across the border.

2022 The New York Times Company

---

---

Trump's Tariffs did successfully move some manufacturing from China to Mexico, India, and Malaysia. Not everything he did was bad although he got a lot of heat here for these tariffs for a "tax on poor Americans and subsidizing large farms." Unfortunately, I have to declare that I am not saying his tariffs were perfect, and I am not whole-heartedly defending Trump either. He sucks. I don't want to be attacked just because I am defending a major aspect of his tariffs.

grab from archived funny pages..
https://www.thefarside.com/2022/02/25/2

concordtom said:

---

DiabloWags said:

---

DiabloWags said:

---

However, having reasonable access to European financial markets is also important. Being able to transact in global currencies is important. Being able to enjoy some of this wealth that you have built is important.

I have to begin to question whether something is shifting in how Putin understands his own power. Because he's either making a massive mistake and hurting the interest of the people who he serves. Or he's not as beholden to them or doesn't want to be as beholden to them as we've thought.

If the West imposes the kind of sanctions it's been saying it will, it will tremendously limit their room for maneuver, limit their independence and autonomy, which is already pretty limited, but limit it even further and tie them much more closely to Putin. Now, they may have an opportunity to decide they don't like that. And if there's a real political risk that Putin faces, that's probably it."

---

THIS ^^^

---

He shares a massive border with China, two authoritarian communist-capitalist countries with Presidents for Life.
I'm beginning to smell something stinky.

(and Trump wanted to join their club.)

---

Meanwhile, the people that are closely tied to Putin (Russian billionaires) lost $39 Billion in 24 hours.

The EU has now agreed to freeze the assets of PUTIN and his foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov.

oski003 said:

---

concordtom said:

---

cbbass1 said:

---

sycasey said:

---

I admit, even I didn't think the Putin appeasers would be proven wrong THIS quickly.

---

Me either!

I'll take my lumps & eat some well-deserved crow; I didn't think that Putin would be stupid enough to go on his rant about restoring the old USSR. In proving his NeoCon critics correct, he's crossed a dangerous line.

It remains to be seen if he'll attack a NATO Member country. I doubt that he will, as that would invite a direct U.S. military response. Personally, I don't think he's likely to take that step.


If he does, then this might be the first phase of The Great Realignment. Then China will soon be annexing Taiwan, and U.S. defense pacts with many nations will be put to the test. China would be Putin's partner in a massive realignment of the world economy, with the U.S. defaulting on its Treasuries held by China, the end of the USD as the world's reserve currency, and the collapse of the U.S. import-based economy.

All existing relationships between U.S. corporations and China will need to be reconsidered, since the U.S. is almost completely dependent on China and its neighbors for manufactured goods. The U.S. economy remains extremely vulnerable, and China is holding all the cards. The political alignment of Japan, S. Korea, Philippines, and all of Southeast Asia are at stake. Current U.S. satellites will be faced with a choice of alignment with the U.S. military empire, or China's Belt & Roads.

Even with all the Covid-related supply disruptions, U.S. corporations have done little to invest in U.S. domestic manufacturing. That will be disastrous for the U.S. -- IF this keeps going on its current course.

---

Looks like it's going to be USA+Europe vs China+Russia.
We need to get some super poor nations to do our manufacturing for us, then cut China out. USA+Europe are the consumers.
India has a lot of people, let's align with them and shift all manufacturing there, or to African or Latin American populations who will work for cheap (and need development).

Quote:

---

U.S. Officials Repeatedly Urged China to Help Avert War in Ukraine

Edward Wong - NYTimes
Fri, February 25, 2022, 5:29 AM

WASHINGTON Over three months, senior Biden administration officials held half a dozen urgent meetings with top Chinese officials in which the Americans presented intelligence showing Russia's troop buildup around Ukraine and beseeched the Chinese to tell Russia not to invade, according to U.S. officials.

Each time, the Chinese officials, including the foreign minister and the ambassador to the United States, rebuffed the Americans, saying they did not think an invasion was in the works. After one diplomatic exchange in December, U.S. officials got intelligence showing Beijing had shared the information with Moscow, telling the Russians that the United States was trying to sow discord and that China would not try to impede Russian plans and actions, the officials said.

The previously unreported talks between U.S. and Chinese officials show how the Biden administration tried to use intelligence findings and diplomacy to persuade a superpower it views as a growing adversary to stop the invasion of Ukraine, and how that nation, led by President Xi Jinping, persistently sided with Russia even as the evidence of Moscow's plans for a military offensive grew over the winter.

This account is based on interviews with senior administration officials with knowledge of the conversations who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the diplomacy. The Chinese Embassy did not return requests for comment.

China is Russia's most powerful partner, and the two nations have been strengthening their bond for many years across diplomatic, economic and military realms. Xi and President Vladimir Putin of Russia, two autocrats with some shared ideas about global power, had met 37 times as national leaders before this year. If any world leader could make Putin think twice about invading Ukraine, it was Xi, went the thinking of some U.S. officials.

But the diplomatic efforts failed, and Putin began a full-scale invasion of Ukraine on Thursday morning after recognizing two Russia-backed insurgent enclaves in the country's east as independent states.
Some U.S. officials say the ties between China and Russia appear stronger than at any time since the Cold War. The two now present themselves as an ideological front against the United States and its European and Asian allies, even as Putin carries out the invasion of Ukraine, whose sovereignty China has recognized for decades.

The growing alarm among U.S. and European officials at the alignment between China and Russia has reached a new peak with the Ukraine crisis, exactly 50 years to the week after President Richard Nixon made a historic trip to China to restart diplomatic relations to make common cause in counterbalancing the Soviet Union. For 40 years after that, the relationship between the United States and China grew stronger, especially as lucrative trade ties developed, but then frayed due to mutual suspicions, intensifying strategic competition and antithetical ideas about power and governance.

In the recent private talks on Ukraine, U.S. officials heard language from their Chinese counterparts that was consistent with harder lines the Chinese had been voicing in public, which showed that a more hostile attitude had become entrenched, according to the American accounts.

On Wednesday, after Putin ordered troops into eastern Ukraine but before its full invasion, Hua Chunying, a Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, said at a news conference in Beijing that the United States was "the culprit of current tensions surrounding Ukraine."

"On the Ukraine issue, lately the U.S. has been sending weapons to Ukraine, heightening tensions, creating panic and even hyping up the possibility of warfare," she said. "If someone keeps pouring oil on the flame while accusing others of not doing their best to put out the fire, such kind of behavior is clearly irresponsible and immoral."

She added: "When the U.S. drove five waves of NATO expansion eastward all the way to Russia's doorstep and deployed advanced offensive strategic weapons in breach of its assurances to Russia, did it ever think about the consequences of pushing a big country to the wall?" She has refused to call Russia's assault an "invasion" when pressed by foreign journalists.

Hua's fiery anti-American remarks as Russia was moving to attack its neighbor stunned some current and former U.S. officials and China analysts in the United States. But the verbal grenades echo major points in the 5,000-word joint statement that China and Russia issued on Feb. 4 when Xi and Putin met at the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games in Beijing. In that document, the two countries declared their partnership had "no limits" and that they intended to stand together against U.S.-led democratic nations. China also explicitly sided with Russia in the text to denounce enlargement of the NATO alliance.

Last Saturday, Wang Yi, the Chinese foreign minister, criticized NATO in a video talk at the Munich Security Conference. European leaders in turn accused China of working with Russia to overturn what they and the Americans say is a "rules-based international order." Wang did say that Ukraine's sovereignty should be "respected and safeguarded" a reference to a foreign policy principle that Beijing often cites but no Chinese officials have mentioned Ukraine in those terms since Russia's full invasion began.

"They claim neutrality, they claim they stand on principle, but everything they say about the causes is anti-U.S., blaming NATO and adopting the Russian line," said Evan Medeiros, a Georgetown University professor who was senior Asia director at the White House National Security Council in the Obama administration. "The question is: How sustainable is that as a posture? How much damage does it do to their ties with the U.S. and their ties with Europe?"

The Biden administration's diplomatic outreach to China to try to avert war began after President Joe Biden and Xi held a video summit on Nov. 15. In the talk, the two leaders acknowledged challenges in the relationship between their nations, which is at its lowest point in decades, but agreed to try to cooperate on issues of common interest, including health security, climate change and nuclear weapons proliferation, White House officials said at the time.

After the meeting, U.S. officials decided that the Russian troop buildup around Ukraine presented the most immediate problem that China and the United States could try to defuse together. Some officials thought the outcome of the video summit indicated there was potential for an improvement in U.S.-China relations. Others were more skeptical, but thought it was important to leave no stone unturned in efforts to prevent Russia from attacking, one official said.

Days later, White House officials met with the ambassador, Qin Gang, at the Chinese Embassy. They told the ambassador what U.S. intelligence agencies had detected: a gradual encirclement of Ukraine by Russian forces, including armored units. William J. Burns, the CIA director, had flown to Moscow on Nov. 2 to confront the Russians with the same information, and on Nov. 17, U.S. intelligence officials shared their findings with NATO.

At the Chinese Embassy, Russia's aggression was the first topic in a discussion that ran more than 1 1/2 hours. In addition to laying out the intelligence, the White House officials told the ambassador that the United States would impose tough sanctions on Russian companies, officials and businesspeople in the event of an invasion, going far beyond those announced by the Obama administration after Russia seized Ukraine's Crimean Peninsula in 2014.

The U.S. officials said the sanctions would also hurt China over time because of its commercial ties.
They also pointed out they knew how China had helped Russia evade some of the 2014 sanctions, and warned Beijing against any such future aid. And they argued that because China was widely seen as a partner of Russia, its global image could suffer if Putin invaded.

The message was clear: It would be in China's interests to persuade Putin to stand down. But their entreaties went nowhere. Qin was skeptical and suspicious, a U.S. official said.

U.S. officials spoke with the ambassador about Russia at least three more times, both in the embassy and on the phone. Wendy R. Sherman, the deputy secretary of state, had a call with him. Qin continued to express skepticism and said Russia had legitimate security concerns in Europe.

The Americans also went higher on the diplomatic ladder: Secretary of State Antony Blinken spoke to Wang about the problem in late January and again on Monday, the same day Putin ordered the new troops into Russia-backed enclaves of Ukraine.

"The secretary underscored the need to preserve Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity," said a State Department summary of the call that used the phrase that Chinese diplomats like to employ in signaling to other nations not to get involved in matters involving Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang and Hong Kong, all considered separatist problems by Beijing.

U.S. officials met with Qin in Washington again on Wednesday and heard the same rebuttals. Hours later, Putin declared war on Ukraine on television, and his military began pummeling the country with ballistic missiles as tanks rolled across the border.

2022 The New York Times Company

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Trump's Tariffs did successfully move some manufacturing from China to Mexico, India, and Malaysia. Not everything he did was bad although he got a lot of heat here for these tariffs for a "tax on poor Americans and subsidizing large farms." Unfortunately, I have to declare that I am not saying his tariffs were perfect, and I am not whole-heartedly defending Trump either. He sucks. I don't want to be attacked just because I am defending a major aspect of his tariffs.

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Starting with Trump and particularly with the rise of Covid, the US dependence on international supply chains has been waning. In fact, of all the advanced economies, the US is less dependent on foreign supply chains for GDP than all the others, and of the foreign reliance it does have, most is Canada and Mexico. The manufacturing we used to rely on China for has been shifting mostly to Mexico, with some shifting to the sun belt. Also, with the increase in automation, cheap labor is not the deciding factor it once was.

China on the other hand needs to be able to have someone buy their goods. That said, China has known the economic boom years are gone, as the population is rapidly aging, cheaper manufacturing can be found elsewhere, automation is making labor less important, and the uncertainty of Chinese leadership and debt is leading to a dearth of new foreign investment. As such the leadership has started to change from an economic promise to a cult of personality. This makes the potential for war far more likely.

That said, China is also surrounded by angry and afraid neighbors, and I don't imagine them have much success in a war. However, with Russia supplying China with the raw materials they need, no one would defeat China and China won't defeat anyone, thus a bloody stalemate would ensue.

Overall, the US economy is only dependent upon the rest of the world for ~11% of its GDP. Nearly half of that is locked up in NAFTA trade.
Curious about your state? Czech this out:
SC: FDI
WA: Boeing
LA: refining
TX: NAFTA pic.twitter.com/dMm8Kl1OL2

— Peter Zeihan (@PeterZeihan) June 29, 2018

Dear Mister President Vladimir Putin… pic.twitter.com/LbDFBHVWJf

— AnnaLynne McCord (@IAMannalynnemcc) February 24, 2022

wdh is going on

Former Cal basketball star Jerome Randle was lucky to be out of the country when the invasion started (he was contracted to play for a team in Ukraine).

“At least 50 people must have hit me up. They were all saying, ‘You need to get out of there.’”

For Jerome Randle and other Americans playing basketball in Ukraine this season, fleeing was rarely a simple decision.@JeffEisenberg shares a few of their stories ⤵️

— Yahoo Sports (@YahooSports) February 25, 2022

concordtom said:

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JUST LOOK AT THE URL - ARTICLE TITLES IF NOTHING ELSE

https://thehill.com/opinion/international/559975-russia-china-alignment-strengthens-dangerously-while-us-alliances

https://www.russiamatters.org/analysis/non-aggressors-benefits-russia-china-alignment-wont-be-game-changed-ukraine-or-much-else

https://www.axios.com/washington-wakes-up-to-beijing-moscow-alignment-838d107a-728c-48bb-95f4-f7e8a612fd18.html

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/11/25/why-are-russia-and-china-strengthening-ties

https://www.npr.org/2022/02/23/1082495257/examining-the-strategic-alignment-between-china-and-russia

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Yep. Putin wasn't going to make a move this important without making sure that his relationship with China was solid.

DiabloWags said:

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oski003 said:

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Trump's Tariffs did successfully move some manufacturing from China to Mexico, India, and Malaysia. Not everything he did was bad although he got a lot of heat here for these tariffs for a "tax on poor Americans and subsidizing large farms." Unfortunately, I have to declare that I am not saying his tariffs were perfect, and I am not whole-heartedly defending Trump either. He sucks. I don't want to be attacked just because I am defending a major aspect of his tariffs.

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I would also suggest that many manufacturing CEO's found Trump to be so volatile when it came to the Trade War against China, that they were fearful of relocating manufacturing to "other" countries (like Vietnam) for fear of Trump levying tariffs on them too.

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Trump's tariffs on imports from China were purely for show, obviously. No corporation is going to make investment decisions based on Executive Orders from one President.

It's true that American importers and American consumers paid those tariffs.

Trade policy is a long-term decision, and it requires legislation & international agreements.

One big factor in Trump's 2016 victory was his opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and that even though Hillary publicly opposed it to get Bernie's endorsement, Obama was actively campaigning FOR TPP, just weeks before the election. The presumption among DC insiders was that if Hillary won, TPP would become law. This was a campaign/policy blunder that Dems and the Clinton campaign still refuse to acknowledge.

cbbass1 said:

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DiabloWags said:

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oski003 said:

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Trump's Tariffs did successfully move some manufacturing from China to Mexico, India, and Malaysia. Not everything he did was bad although he got a lot of heat here for these tariffs for a "tax on poor Americans and subsidizing large farms." Unfortunately, I have to declare that I am not saying his tariffs were perfect, and I am not whole-heartedly defending Trump either. He sucks. I don't want to be attacked just because I am defending a major aspect of his tariffs.

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I would also suggest that many manufacturing CEO's found Trump to be so volatile when it came to the Trade War against China, that they were fearful of relocating manufacturing to "other" countries (like Vietnam) for fear of Trump levying tariffs on them too.

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Trump's tariffs on imports from China were purely for show, obviously. No corporation is going to make investment decisions based on Executive Orders from one President.

It's true that American importers and American consumers paid those tariffs.

Trade policy is a long-term decision, and it requires legislation & international agreements.

One big factor in Trump's 2016 victory was his opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and that even though Hillary publicly opposed it to get Bernie's endorsement, Obama was actively campaigning FOR TPP, just weeks before the election. The presumption among DC insiders was that if Hillary won, TPP would become law. This was a campaign/policy blunder that Dems and the Clinton campaign still refuse to acknowledge.

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I know several manufacturers who moved a large portion of their manufacturing out of China and into Mexico, India, and other places because of the tariffs on China. They did this by creating a premium line and then phasing out their Chinese line. My company also moved to many companies that did not manufacturer in China, based on the cost differences between Chinese imports and others.

Live streaming

https://vm.tiktok.com/TTPdSaRk9U/

It appears WHNT in Huntsville was the only Alabama TV station to report its U.S. senator's bizarre belief that Russia is a communist nation that needed to invade Ukraine because its people are starving. pic.twitter.com/qGzl7K1KuL

— Timothy Burke (@bubbaprog) February 25, 2022

I never tweet anything about politics, but today is an exception. As I watch Russia continue their invasion of Ukraine this morning, I ask if Americans that want socialism are watching? Do you want to be a part of something like this?

— Charlie Weis (@charlieweissr) February 25, 2022

DiabloWags said:

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Some really insightful thoughts by Samuel Green.
A professor of Russian politics and director of the Russia Institute at King's College London.
Green had been on record that Putin wouldnt go all the way, and was game to reassess.


"Yes. Or even in terms of security, frankly. Because nobody's threatening Russia. So I and a lot of my colleagues came to this conclusion that it just didn't make sense. Now, of course it still doesn't make sense. But he's doing it, so clearly it makes sense to him. So part of me goes back to the drawing board and tries to think, OK, what did I misunderstand about Russian politics? I don't have the answer to that question yet.

But another part of me actually sticks to my guns and says, well, the fact that he's decided he can accept these risks doesn't mean the risks aren't there. There's still going to be pain for the Russian economy. There are sanctions on the table that would turn the Russian economy into the Iranian economy eventually. Public opinion is a risk. The economy is a risk. And the war itself is a risk. So we now get to see how they deal with it. And we'll learn a lot about the system of power that Putin has built.

The gradual expansion of the EU as a project and EU economic influence in Russia's direction makes the Russian elite poorer because it makes it harder for them to continue doing business. The business model that the Russian political economy is built on is a rent-based model, a model that has these massively bloated value chains so that money can be siphoned off in politically convenient directions.

If you have to compete in a liberalized market, inefficient corporate management and corporate ownership falls by the wayside eventually, at least in theory. That puts a lot of pressure on your margins, on your structure, and on what you're doing with your money. That's pressure that is both economic and political at least in its ramifications for Putin and the people on whose behalf he rules. Keeping Ukraine out of that EU integration project is important. Keeping that project at bay so it doesn't begin to exert too much influence on Russia itself is important.

However, having reasonable access to European financial markets is also important. Being able to transact in global currencies is important. Being able to enjoy some of this wealth that you have built is important.

I have to begin to question whether something is shifting in how Putin understands his own power. Because he's either making a massive mistake and hurting the interest of the people who he serves. Or he's not as beholden to them or doesn't want to be as beholden to them as we've thought.

If the West imposes the kind of sanctions it's been saying it will, it will tremendously limit their room for maneuver, limit their independence and autonomy, which is already pretty limited, but limit it even further and tie them much more closely to Putin. Now, they may have an opportunity to decide they don't like that. And if there's a real political risk that Putin faces, that's probably it."

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> If the West imposes the kind of sanctions it's been saying it will....

If Putin stays within Ukraine's borders (plus the Trans-Dneister region of Moldova), then I doubt the next level of sanctions will kick in.

There are simply too many people in the EU who depend on natural gas from Russia (40% of EU gas). They're OK with NATO & the U.S. taking an L, but keep the heat on!

Same with the SWIFT cutoff. Too many people in the U.S. & EU making too much $$$ (or Euros) to support any SWIFT-based sanctions.

The EU freezing Putin's assets, & Sergei Lavrov's is laughable. How much do you think they have stashed there? Only enough to supply Europe with gas. And they're still buying. They can freeze all the assets they want in Europe. All that will get is a good laugh from Putin. Their big $$$ is stashed safely in the U.S., and won't be touched unless Putin overplays his hand & goes outside Ukraine.

If you want to understand what Putin will or won't do, start by listening to what he's been saying for the last 20 years. When he talks about the de-Nazification of Ukraine, he's referring directly to the U.S.-funded neo-Nazi militias that have been attacking & killing Russian-speaking people in Eastern Ukraine since 2014.

oski003 said:

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cbbass1 said:

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DiabloWags said:

---

oski003 said:

---

Trump's Tariffs did successfully move some manufacturing from China to Mexico, India, and Malaysia. Not everything he did was bad although he got a lot of heat here for these tariffs for a "tax on poor Americans and subsidizing large farms." Unfortunately, I have to declare that I am not saying his tariffs were perfect, and I am not whole-heartedly defending Trump either. He sucks. I don't want to be attacked just because I am defending a major aspect of his tariffs.

---

I would also suggest that many manufacturing CEO's found Trump to be so volatile when it came to the Trade War against China, that they were fearful of relocating manufacturing to "other" countries (like Vietnam) for fear of Trump levying tariffs on them too.

---

Trump's tariffs on imports from China were purely for show, obviously. No corporation is going to make investment decisions based on Executive Orders from one President.

It's true that American importers and American consumers paid those tariffs.

Trade policy is a long-term decision, and it requires legislation & international agreements.

One big factor in Trump's 2016 victory was his opposition to the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), and that even though Hillary publicly opposed it to get Bernie's endorsement, Obama was actively campaigning FOR TPP, just weeks before the election. The presumption among DC insiders was that if Hillary won, TPP would become law. This was a campaign/policy blunder that Dems and the Clinton campaign still refuse to acknowledge.

---

I know several manufacturers who moved a large portion of their manufacturing out of China and into Mexico, India, and other places because of the tariffs on China. They did this by creating a premium line and then phasing out their Chinese line. My company also moved to many companies that did not manufacturer in China, based on the cost differences between Chinese imports and others.

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OK, I acknowledge that those manufacturers made decisions based on Trump's Executive Order-based tariffs, and I stand corrected. I'm guessing that Trump's EO's weren't the only reason for their actions, and there were other strategic reasons involved.

The point that I failed to include was that Trump talked at length about bringing manufacturing back to the U.S., and his tariffs were a signal to his followers that he was at least doing something. But like I said, it was all for show. He clearly wasn't serious about it, because the corporate owner-donors wouldn't tolerate it.