So now the US are officially running a protection racket! You really do have mob bosses running the place.
It's like that crude joke
"Would you have sex with me for 1 million? Yes. How about for 20 instead? No, I'm not a whore! We already established that, we're now negotiating the price"
First it was the rare earth worth X amount, now it's half. What's next?
They have been doing it with Arab countries for decades. Pay up or get sanctioned, bombed, invaded and couped. What some in the West wrongly perceive as bribes are actually tributes to avoid becoming the next Iraq, Syria or Libya, or worse: Palestine.
What good is being saved from being enslaved by one dictator only to be enslaved by your "saviour" instead?
Theoretically maybe the "savior" won't shoot, maybe.
Look, it's not a good deal, but hey, I'm trying this optimism thing out. Don't think it's working.
That said, anyone who makes a deal with Trump hasn't paid attention to any of the deals he made in his last administration that he'll drop them when they're inconvenient.
I think that, if Trump hadn't decided to just sow chaos for the last three weeks, all of these deals he's trying to make might actually end up with more favorable outcomes.
How is anyone supposed to trust the US in good faith when they're watching us destroy ourselves on purpose?
I would have just pulled a Trump and agreed then reneged afterwards.
That works if you're in a position of power and don't need to rely on the people you're reneging on.
It's a bold strategy, Cotton.
Good. Fuck em (us) the USA shouldn't shake down Ukraine for minerals with the empty promise of security.
Ukraine should join NATO and they all should rally to support Ukraine. USA isnt dependable currently. And should be treated as hostile.
Take it from me.. an american, the US government is absolutely hostile towards folks. :(
NATO isnt an option anymore. Trump being president means the US will reject their NATO application.
Unless, of course, the US exits NATO. At this point, everybody would be better of without them.
I believe that the us passed a law saying that a president can't remove the USA from NATO... But gestures broadly we can see how much rule of law matters to a R government trifecta.
Idk.. either way... Ukraine needs support and if they don't get it.. the Russians will be at doorsteps to the major European countries. IMHO.
It doesn’t really matter what happens with nato, trump is technically commander in chief of the armed forces and just the chaos alone of the first few hours and days is where it makes all the difference. Jan 6 for example would have looked a whole lot different under a different sitting president where the national guard and military were sent in when they should have been, because as it was, disaster was minutes and tens of feet away that day.
So kick US out of NATO. They can re-apply once they're done with fascism.
Meh as long as it's not in a treaty they can start the process and wait for trump to hit the burger king in the ground
(I was going to say sky but we all know he ain't going up)
Nato isn't an option for anyone anymore. Europe needs to re-group and handle their own security. This includes weapon production. US is not a stable partner, and it’s finally starting to dawn on the Europeans
As a US citizen, it's never been hostile towards me. In fact, I would imagine most people have had little to no engagement with the federal government (outside of the routine items: taxes, etc...) Now, their state government may be a different story.
The offer might have gone over slightly better if the US Secretary of Defense hadn't already ruled out NATO membership and a return to Ukraine's 2014 borders.
I'd like to see Ukraine get Crimea back but it's never going to happen. not without russias complete collapse at least
a worthy goal
not without russias complete collapse at least
Your terms are acceptable.
not without russias complete collapse at least
How far can that be anyway?
too far, i fear
Sorry Ukraine, that we elected a small handed baby, who is a terrible leader. Hopefully, things work out for you. Sincerely, U.S.A.
Hopefully Europe steps up
Good on you, Zelensky. Do not cave.
Lol. The US is a fucking failed state that couldn't even defeat Vietnamese, Afghan, or Iraqi peasants at the peak of their empire, with trillions of dollars in capital... Literally 1000x more capital than their enemy.
Every country needs to grow balls, forge alliances, and tell the US to collectively get fucked. They're swinging their dick around like they hold the cards, when they're grossly incompetent, and without the rest of the world playing ball the US is fucking dead in the water. All of their wealth is worthless without the global supply chain. They will collapse in months without us.
Even if Ukraine's gov fell, it's likely Russia would be locked in a guerrilla warfare quagmire (like Afghanistan in the 80's). If the USSR couldn't defeat a bunch of peasants, why would a state with 1/10th the power be able to defeat Ukraine?
If the EU is smart — and not a bunch of capitalist oligarchies masquerading as "democracies" — they'll offer asylum and jobs to US scientists, and brain drain the US of what little remaining leverage they have.
Don’t know about the other countries,but Afghanistan is a bit special. Many invaders have tried, and failed. I guess the mountainous terrain doesn’t make it any easier. Seems to me that nobody is capable of conquering Afghanistan. When you hear about another empire trying their luck, you know it’s going to drain their power.
Vietnam has historically been pretty brutal for invaders too. Between the end of the third Chinese domination and the start of the French colonial period, they went almost a thousand years rarely ever losing a war. They even fended the Mongols off
Let me guess, it was the jungle. I recall from history class, that China is protected by a massive jungle on one side, which has kept potential invaders from trying that direction. Maybe the same is true for Vietnam as well.
I assume it must have played a role. The Chinese border with Vietnam, Laos, and Myanmar has some pretty damn big mountains too, which is one of the other classic "invading through this sucks" features
Yeah - the US was just unlucky. They lost these ones + the korean war. But anywhere else they would win. Maybe except in Russia. Or china. Or a few others. But except for that they would win
The US was lucky that Afghanistan didn’t drain all of their money and power. It was already a total disaster, but it could have been even worse.
Well... the US could have won any of those wars, but only by completely wiping them off the map. And even the worst of the presidents wouldn't have done that (the current one TBD).
I love going to the SanDiego area swap meets. There are at least 3 big ones.. National city, El Cajon and Oceanside. There, many people come haggle and barter to get used or grade B products. Maybe Trump should start there?
Anyone who has ever gone there knows that you don't go for the jugular of your cash cow. If you're a buyer, you wanna be a nice mosquito... Look around a few times to see what you wanna get, go elsewhere, and then come back. If you are selling, you don't kill the mosquito, buy you know how much blood to give. As a buyer you find a thing you don't want, which is similar to the thing you do want so you can trade down or somehow not show interest in the actual thing you want.
Now the entire world knows that Trump is an idiot and wants 50% of all natural resources. It could have been 90% of all uranium for example. Bug nah, look, here are all my cards! Take a good look see!
That's Trump's are of the deal and it's ass. It doesn't mater if he actually gets anything from it. Its ass. We lose, they lose, ruzzia wins. Maybe we should have a well trained Lego dealing kid to negotiate a better deal.
Did the world already not know that Trump is an idiot?
Since he showed his face probably.
US support was never out of the goodness of their hearts, there was always going to be a price to pay, but of course trump goes about it in the most hamfisted way possible.
The US has always got the dollar-as-global-reserve-currency out of its military spending, which is a large part of how post second world war America accrued a huge portion of unearned global wealth. Trump, those that voted for him, and those that spent decades creating this situation for personal enrichment are rapidly hastening the end of this situation.
Good. Crazy that people were cheering on this straight up extortion. Europe and America promised support to win the war. Now that Ukraine is deep in the sunk cost fallacy they start extorting them.
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