The 2.2 million men that are currently on the run amounts to 6.8% of the Ukrainian population and is slightly larger than the percentage of Asians in the US.
This proxy war which the USA initiated and financed has resulted to Russia looking to /Asia as Allies. This is not good for America. Time for the USA to help bring this war to an end and get Russia back into Europe. What better then to see the USA & Russians as friends. Those who see otherwise need to be questioned and ignored or shipped to Israel. Thanks again Andrew for another excellent newsletter.
Thank You for formulating the proper narrative here for this rather obvious case. There was a very open and free intellectual debate in the 1990s about Russia’s future geopolitical orientation inside that country. The pro-Western fraction won, hands down. This was the greatest historical opportunity to unify the Western World in modern times. Instead of doing the right thing the American public was played by the supposed masters of this universe and the possibility was lost. Had the West taken the right path thirty years ago we would not be suffering from China Syndrome today.
All Putin had to do was not invade and he would proved the neocons wrong!! Instead Putin made John McCain and Lindsey Graham look prescient by invading Ukraine!?! For me personally any world leader that makes the vile McCain look prescient is my enemy!! 😉
Sure, had we asked Putin not to engage in diplomacy with China I’m sure he would have obliged! 😝
The reality is Putin will always do what is in Russia’s and his best interests and Xi will always do what is in China’s and his best interests. The notion we can manipulate Putin and Xi to enact policies that help America is a fool’s errand. Bush literally believed making China great again would benefit America and so he didn’t believe losing manufacturing jobs to China would harm America…at no point did Hu ever do anything with the goal of helping America.
Putin even addressed the relationship with China in his interview with Tucker Carlson and the Republican false narrative didn’t even compute with Putin because it’s so absurd. Tucker implied we were pushing Russia closer to China which is literally an insult to Putin because the implication is Putin isn’t in charge of his country and Russia is merely a victim of great power machinations.
"The notion we can manipulate Putin and Xi to enact policies that help America is a fool’s errand."
True. But despite being neighbors (they share the world's 4th longest border I think?!) and essentially having to have decent relationship with China for pragmatic reasons...
China still benefits from Russia being bogged down in Ukraine for as long as possible. China will say nice things about Russia publicly but sell boatloads of drones to Ukraine. Worse, it seems to me that most of the China-leaning influences in the US are pretty much pro-Ukraine across the board. The longer Russia, the EU and the US are bogged down in Ukraine, the better a bid at Taiwan starts to look.
I think China is very much aware that a weakened/split up Russia would be to their advantage long term, just as Brussels and the Neo-cons all think. And of course Russia knows this too. So Russia is best to think in terms of who's the enemies of my enemies going forward...
Russia has the most nukes of any country!?! Nobody wants a “split up” Russia! “Nonproliferation” is agnostic about what type of individual runs a country so long as they are somewhat rational. But if Russia splits up that is literally proliferation which everyone believes is bad…very bad. What’s crazy is Trump supporters think that Trump being more likely to use a nuke makes him a stronger leader when in reality it got us closer to nuclear war with China when he refused to concede the 2020 election.
I think Russia splitting up would be a very bad deal, if that wasn't clear.
But you can't infer that everyone feels that way, including neo-cons and Brussels.
There's a huge blind spot in your argument -- the end of the Cold War. The USSR broke up and somehow that worked out with the nukes. I don't want to try it again, but there's considerable evidence that some players would risk it.
'The 2.2 million men that are currently on the run amounts to 6.8% of the Ukrainian population and is slightly larger than the percentage of Asians in the US.'
Under the circumstances they are trying to save their lives in a war that has close to zero chance for a positive outcome for Ukraine. They need to get organized and force the election of a better 'Servant of the People'.
This surely puts a big question mark over Europe’s claim to be prolonging this war for the sake of the Ukrainian people. If that many men don’t want to fight for their country, why are European populations being forced to sacrifice their own economies for them?
I keep hearing the line from western media sources that Ukraine’s ultimate problem is that they “don’t have enough men”… but clearly that’s not true. Why make it sound like the problem is ultimately demographic? I think they’re setting up their excuse for when NATO’s defeat must finally be recognized: “it’s not that NATO weapons and tactics failed; it’s not that the west’s deindustrialize economies and profit-driven military industrial complex failed; it was just a case of Goliath beating brave David.”
But what puzzles me are the draft dodgers who are totally ok with letting other men die in their place, while still wanting the war to continue. I have met many of them here in Europe, and I know a few pretty well (as in, I chat with them a few times every week). Yet this is a question I have not been able to pose. It is just too sensitive.
I do not assume I am any better than them, and that I would not fall into the same contradiction, if I were in their shoes.
It was rather obvious from day one of this war that there were two possible final outcomes: A Russian victory or a nuclear war. The 220,000 Ukrainian men who are away from the frontlines are likely those who realize the hopelessness of the military situation and there are as many on the frontlines who must feel the same way. Today’s Russia and Putin are not equals of Stalin’s Soviet system of the 1930s. If they managed to avoid killing extensive numbers of civilians in the last four years they are not going to do it if the Ukraine Army walks from the fight. If the hardware and cash deliveries dry up from EU/NATO that will spell the end of the conflict very soon. I would call that a happy ending for this bitter, self-destructive and dangerous war.
Putin has already lost this war. The territory Russia now controls is not only worthless but it comes with elderly mouths to feed and bodies to heat. The only value the territory holds is that it increases Russia’s military strength if Russia can negotiate a ceasefire so that it can regroup and rebuild its military and begin an invasion in Ukrainian territory.
Biden informed Zelensky that Putin was definitely invading in February 2022. If Biden wanted a war he would have lied to Zelensky and told him Putin was bluffing which would have made it more likely for Zelensky to not prepare for war while also not engaging in diplomacy with Russia because it was a just bluster.
As we saw in Iraq and Ukraine the invader’s most leverage comes right before the invasion…and once the invasion happens the invader loses leverage because the invaded country starts fighting and doesn’t believe diplomacy is an option. So Rubio in Venezuela is maxing out his leverage by orchestrating a successful military operation without invading. So don’t do what Bush did in Iraq or what Putin did in Ukraine…do what Rubio did in Venezuela!
Zelensky spent the whole of 2021 telling absolutely everyone that he was going to invade Donbas and Crimean in 2022. He even changed the constituion to commit all future governments to do the same (one reason a final peace deal is impossible before a new president and Parliament gets elected and change that constitution back).
the whole pre-war scenario was a massed raising of troops by Ukraine and the previous 7 years were spent building fortresses from which to shell Donbas with Nato advisers.
But given this was a US war there had to be a false flag attack by Rebel Donbas to permit Ukraine to attack Donbas. That was what the CIA was predicting in Feb 2022. For Historians of the 21st century this will be one of the great ironies - that Russia called the US bluff with a real SMO instead of the planned fake false flag.
You didn't know Zelensky was preparing the attack all along? Or notice that all the propaganda from 2023 onwards till very recently was all about Ukraine defeating Russia?
You even missed the obvious joke - idiot Biden turned into a substack comments poster.
False flag…so Zelensky attacked first?? So why hasn’t Trump ended the war?? Trump could have ended the war on day 1 by ending support for Ukraine and telling Putin he would never provide Ukraine with security guarantees which would force Zelensky to surrender. The only thing keeping Ukraine going is the prospect of security guarantees from America that prevent Putin from restarting the war after a ceasefire.
Their wives and children obviously support their decision to evade the draft. I also support their decision. I know several of these guys personally, and I pray they remain beyond the reach of the thugs who forcibly conscript Ukrainian men.
But here is my point: if they do not want to fight, they should not want others to fight in their place. The same goes for European leaders who want to prolong Ukraine’s agony but prolonging this unwinbabls war. They want to force others to fight and die, but they are not willing to risk their own life.
In America they these types of politicians “chicken hawks.” Hopefully you can understand what that means.
and yes we should talk about this a lot more - failing to discuss it makes western media complicit in Ukrainian deaths.
I really doubt Ukraine still has 900k men active - they would be still throwing men at lost causes if they did. More like 300k.
The interesting thing is how many have been called up - which I'd guess at around 2.5m to add t the initial 700k (not including those who simply failed to turn up).
So 3.2 million have been whittled away to 300k by Death, serious wounds and gone AWOL
This proxy war which the USA initiated and financed has resulted to Russia looking to /Asia as Allies. This is not good for America. Time for the USA to help bring this war to an end and get Russia back into Europe. What better then to see the USA & Russians as friends. Those who see otherwise need to be questioned and ignored or shipped to Israel. Thanks again Andrew for another excellent newsletter.
Thank you, Walt!
Thank You for formulating the proper narrative here for this rather obvious case. There was a very open and free intellectual debate in the 1990s about Russia’s future geopolitical orientation inside that country. The pro-Western fraction won, hands down. This was the greatest historical opportunity to unify the Western World in modern times. Instead of doing the right thing the American public was played by the supposed masters of this universe and the possibility was lost. Had the West taken the right path thirty years ago we would not be suffering from China Syndrome today.
the west as people with an opinion, or a chance to have a saying in things political
just does not exixt. the hegemon is run by deepstate neocons out of a basement
and the big money out of wallstreet and disengoff st.
All Putin had to do was not invade and he would proved the neocons wrong!! Instead Putin made John McCain and Lindsey Graham look prescient by invading Ukraine!?! For me personally any world leader that makes the vile McCain look prescient is my enemy!! 😉
Sure, had we asked Putin not to engage in diplomacy with China I’m sure he would have obliged! 😝
The reality is Putin will always do what is in Russia’s and his best interests and Xi will always do what is in China’s and his best interests. The notion we can manipulate Putin and Xi to enact policies that help America is a fool’s errand. Bush literally believed making China great again would benefit America and so he didn’t believe losing manufacturing jobs to China would harm America…at no point did Hu ever do anything with the goal of helping America.
Putin even addressed the relationship with China in his interview with Tucker Carlson and the Republican false narrative didn’t even compute with Putin because it’s so absurd. Tucker implied we were pushing Russia closer to China which is literally an insult to Putin because the implication is Putin isn’t in charge of his country and Russia is merely a victim of great power machinations.
"The notion we can manipulate Putin and Xi to enact policies that help America is a fool’s errand."
True. But despite being neighbors (they share the world's 4th longest border I think?!) and essentially having to have decent relationship with China for pragmatic reasons...
China still benefits from Russia being bogged down in Ukraine for as long as possible. China will say nice things about Russia publicly but sell boatloads of drones to Ukraine. Worse, it seems to me that most of the China-leaning influences in the US are pretty much pro-Ukraine across the board. The longer Russia, the EU and the US are bogged down in Ukraine, the better a bid at Taiwan starts to look.
I think China is very much aware that a weakened/split up Russia would be to their advantage long term, just as Brussels and the Neo-cons all think. And of course Russia knows this too. So Russia is best to think in terms of who's the enemies of my enemies going forward...
Russia has the most nukes of any country!?! Nobody wants a “split up” Russia! “Nonproliferation” is agnostic about what type of individual runs a country so long as they are somewhat rational. But if Russia splits up that is literally proliferation which everyone believes is bad…very bad. What’s crazy is Trump supporters think that Trump being more likely to use a nuke makes him a stronger leader when in reality it got us closer to nuclear war with China when he refused to concede the 2020 election.
I think Russia splitting up would be a very bad deal, if that wasn't clear.
But you can't infer that everyone feels that way, including neo-cons and Brussels.
There's a huge blind spot in your argument -- the end of the Cold War. The USSR broke up and somehow that worked out with the nukes. I don't want to try it again, but there's considerable evidence that some players would risk it.
Hear hear!
'The 2.2 million men that are currently on the run amounts to 6.8% of the Ukrainian population and is slightly larger than the percentage of Asians in the US.'
Under the circumstances they are trying to save their lives in a war that has close to zero chance for a positive outcome for Ukraine. They need to get organized and force the election of a better 'Servant of the People'.
its just not their war, and as long they are not higher up in the gvt. the make no money off it.
I don't think anyone is criticising them.
This surely puts a big question mark over Europe’s claim to be prolonging this war for the sake of the Ukrainian people. If that many men don’t want to fight for their country, why are European populations being forced to sacrifice their own economies for them?
I keep hearing the line from western media sources that Ukraine’s ultimate problem is that they “don’t have enough men”… but clearly that’s not true. Why make it sound like the problem is ultimately demographic? I think they’re setting up their excuse for when NATO’s defeat must finally be recognized: “it’s not that NATO weapons and tactics failed; it’s not that the west’s deindustrialize economies and profit-driven military industrial complex failed; it was just a case of Goliath beating brave David.”
But what puzzles me are the draft dodgers who are totally ok with letting other men die in their place, while still wanting the war to continue. I have met many of them here in Europe, and I know a few pretty well (as in, I chat with them a few times every week). Yet this is a question I have not been able to pose. It is just too sensitive.
I do not assume I am any better than them, and that I would not fall into the same contradiction, if I were in their shoes.
It was rather obvious from day one of this war that there were two possible final outcomes: A Russian victory or a nuclear war. The 220,000 Ukrainian men who are away from the frontlines are likely those who realize the hopelessness of the military situation and there are as many on the frontlines who must feel the same way. Today’s Russia and Putin are not equals of Stalin’s Soviet system of the 1930s. If they managed to avoid killing extensive numbers of civilians in the last four years they are not going to do it if the Ukraine Army walks from the fight. If the hardware and cash deliveries dry up from EU/NATO that will spell the end of the conflict very soon. I would call that a happy ending for this bitter, self-destructive and dangerous war.
Putin has already lost this war. The territory Russia now controls is not only worthless but it comes with elderly mouths to feed and bodies to heat. The only value the territory holds is that it increases Russia’s military strength if Russia can negotiate a ceasefire so that it can regroup and rebuild its military and begin an invasion in Ukrainian territory.
So this is what happened to Joe Biden
Biden informed Zelensky that Putin was definitely invading in February 2022. If Biden wanted a war he would have lied to Zelensky and told him Putin was bluffing which would have made it more likely for Zelensky to not prepare for war while also not engaging in diplomacy with Russia because it was a just bluster.
As we saw in Iraq and Ukraine the invader’s most leverage comes right before the invasion…and once the invasion happens the invader loses leverage because the invaded country starts fighting and doesn’t believe diplomacy is an option. So Rubio in Venezuela is maxing out his leverage by orchestrating a successful military operation without invading. So don’t do what Bush did in Iraq or what Putin did in Ukraine…do what Rubio did in Venezuela!
doh - you really do believe all that BS.
Zelensky spent the whole of 2021 telling absolutely everyone that he was going to invade Donbas and Crimean in 2022. He even changed the constituion to commit all future governments to do the same (one reason a final peace deal is impossible before a new president and Parliament gets elected and change that constitution back).
the whole pre-war scenario was a massed raising of troops by Ukraine and the previous 7 years were spent building fortresses from which to shell Donbas with Nato advisers.
But given this was a US war there had to be a false flag attack by Rebel Donbas to permit Ukraine to attack Donbas. That was what the CIA was predicting in Feb 2022. For Historians of the 21st century this will be one of the great ironies - that Russia called the US bluff with a real SMO instead of the planned fake false flag.
You didn't know Zelensky was preparing the attack all along? Or notice that all the propaganda from 2023 onwards till very recently was all about Ukraine defeating Russia?
You even missed the obvious joke - idiot Biden turned into a substack comments poster.
False flag…so Zelensky attacked first?? So why hasn’t Trump ended the war?? Trump could have ended the war on day 1 by ending support for Ukraine and telling Putin he would never provide Ukraine with security guarantees which would force Zelensky to surrender. The only thing keeping Ukraine going is the prospect of security guarantees from America that prevent Putin from restarting the war after a ceasefire.
would you fight for a crooked political gamble of the the usa big capital?
another lost war added to their other lost and destructive ones.
Maybe you should ask their wives and children first. Or you family what they would expect.
Their wives and children obviously support their decision to evade the draft. I also support their decision. I know several of these guys personally, and I pray they remain beyond the reach of the thugs who forcibly conscript Ukrainian men.
But here is my point: if they do not want to fight, they should not want others to fight in their place. The same goes for European leaders who want to prolong Ukraine’s agony but prolonging this unwinbabls war. They want to force others to fight and die, but they are not willing to risk their own life.
In America they these types of politicians “chicken hawks.” Hopefully you can understand what that means.
Yes exactly. First I re-read my comment and it clumsily looks like you might not have thought that, but that wasn't in my thoughts.
I'll forgive the thoughts of most Ukrainians either way (except the out and out nazis). They have all been subject to a lot of propaganda.
It is the western media and politicians that have been complicit in sending the last Ukrainian - complicit in their deaths - that anger me.
Thanks for your great work Andrew!
We've restacked and shared this link on 'The Stacks'
https://askeptic.substack.com/p/the-stacks
Clearly they STOPPED enjoying the BARBECUE! And to think it all started with simple COOKIES...
https://voza0db.substack.com/p/morons-just-dont-get-it-b0e
Why are the regular modern moron slaves so easy to FOOL?!
From "wars" to m[iracle]RNA toxic spew COVIDIUS jabs to LOCKDOWNS to 6 FEET to MUZZLES...
It's just interesting to see how easy the HERDS of Modern Moron Slaves are so perfectly steered across MILLENNIA.
https://busification.org for 5500 videos of "conscription".
and yes we should talk about this a lot more - failing to discuss it makes western media complicit in Ukrainian deaths.
I really doubt Ukraine still has 900k men active - they would be still throwing men at lost causes if they did. More like 300k.
The interesting thing is how many have been called up - which I'd guess at around 2.5m to add t the initial 700k (not including those who simply failed to turn up).
So 3.2 million have been whittled away to 300k by Death, serious wounds and gone AWOL
More dead than wounded should be expected.
WESTERN REGIME MEDIA is part of the PROFIT MACHINE... AKA a good tool of the Secular Ruling Families!
Western Elites WET DREAMS of conquering RUSSIA never stopped.
https://voza0db.substack.com/p/morons-just-dont-get-it-1c2
Sorry, but for Ukrainians, it's not a colonial war like US in Vietnam or France and England in Africa in the 60's.
No, it's a invasion of their country.
Either you are against your government and you go directly to Russia , either you fight for your country.
When your country is invaded only the traitors and the cowards flee away.
I think that every country where Ukrainian guys in age of fighting are fleeing should send those trash back to Ukraine.
I have no respect for those lowlife who shout "Slavia Ukraine" in handing Champaign in Courchevel or Miami.
Shame on them.
Shame to the hundreds thousands young Russians who flew abroad too.
i would! no land is worth death
no rights are worth dying for
life is precious
i'm not sure
i don't know
Was that reply for me?!
What "rights"?!?