Ukraine LC Debates, Arguments and Terrible Memes

Exactly this. A peaceful, safe, prosperous Europe is manifestly a US interest.

Yeah US policy is usually based around how does this help our extremely rich citizens.

Does the US have an interest in protecting Taiwan from China? Is there value in protecting Ukraine from Russia if doing so discourages China from doing something similar in Taiwan?

My point is that the US doesn’t actually consider the well being of non-US citizens when formulating foreign policy. Or its own citizens. US foreign policy is remarkably violent and has caused immense suffering over the decades. So this isn’t different from what I was saying, I was just pointing out that it’s rather funny to think that the US’s Ukraine policy has anything to do with the well being of Ukrainians.

So I don’t have an opinion about if the US involvement is good for Ukrainians. I do think that US foreign policy should be less violent and militaristic in general, it would benefit both the entire world and the US.

But back to the question of US involvement. If the US had never shown any interest in Ukraine and never trained its army or sent it weapons, and just left it alone, would this war have happened? Maybe. But you’d imagine that the chance for a negotiated settlement between Ukraine and Russia before the conflict would be a lot higher if Ukraine didn’t know its big brother USA#1 would back it to the tune of Russia’s entire defense budget.

The reason for coming to the aid off Ukraine is if you don’t then you give Russia a free pass on all non NATO countries, China all of Asia and a United Korea under Kim Jung-un. You also start a full nuclear arms race in the middle east and Africa as you make it clear nuke threats is all it takes for the USA to back down. I don’t think that is a safer world with less chance of armageddon.

Right, it doesn’t.

This is such a simplistic world view. This isn’t the 19th century where Napoleon wreaking havoc doesn’t affect the USA in any significant capacity. Russia dictating energy prices and deciding each year which country will suffer famine and unrest is obviously detrimental to US interests.

Anything that helps Ukraine win increases the chance of nuclear war, including Ukrainian defending itself.

I agree. What Ukraine does is up to Ukraine. Can’t do anything about that. The US supplying massive amounts of weapons and intelligence? That’s in US control.

I mean. This is off topic in the off topic thread. But the USA was significantly impacted by the napoleonic wars and the various trade embargoes.

Of course we help force Ukraine’s hand by supporting Russia. In reality we should be helping each nuclear armed imperialist power maximize their control in their sphere of influence in order to minimize the threat of nuclear war.

No, we should clearly telegraph our red lines and carefully choose what those red lines are. Including Ukraine or other former soviet republics inside of our red line umbrella seems to me of very questionable benefit and very high risk.

UN’s red lines include annexation and invasion with military personnel. it’s why those don’t happen very often

Is this really a more intense proxy war than Vietnam or the Soviet Afghanistan conflict, those are both events that happened since the Cuban Missile Crisis? Why were those events not pushing the aggressor to the brink of nuclear war against the power supplying the defenders with arms?

It seems to me that USA and Russia actually have a long history of these proxy wars and they have always resulted in the aggressor losing (both US and Russia) and never resulted in nuclear escalation.

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If this war helps the US (and NATO allies) reassert itself as global hegemon this may help the USA with regard on future conflicts with China (not necessarily military, maybe diplomatic).

From a propaganda standpoint it also helps the US in that they can hold this up and claim the whole defender of the free world and pretend Iraq never happened and some people will believe it.

In the long term, increasing the size, influence, and stability of the EU is also a benefit to the US as EU is essentially the most reliable trading partner (more than double the exports that we have to China), and also a reliable partner in international politics both within the UN and with defense treaties.

Plus, weaking a geopolitical adversary and sending a message to other potential adversaries has it’s own geopolitical reward. Maybe there is not a direct link to Joe SixPack but in general the average American does enjoy a lot of benefits from living in a country that is a dominant superpower.

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What if USA gave all their nuclear weapons to Russia? Then Russia would truly have nothing to fear and would probably get rid of their own weapons in response and never invade another county again.

hasn’t been posted here, a burial ground with 500+ civilian graves discovered in Kharkiv region. russians have denied holodomor for so long, now they are going to have to eat extensive evidence of war crimes for the rest of their lives.

practically speaking, giving up nukes is a very high bar for any leader to pull off. but they could make nuclear codes system be shared with an international/independent body.

The horseshoe theory here is very real. If it were me, I’d be very concerned if I had the same ideas as the American Virtue Organization or Josh Hammer I’d have some serious questions for myself

I hope you understood I was being sarcastic, maybe it wasn’t directed at me