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If Ukraine Wins, Who Loses?
There’s the obvious answers – Putin, the image of Russian might, the Duginist dream of solidifying Russian control over its insolent children.
Who else? The Russian Orthodox Church, for declaring this a holy war? Xi, for his association with a loser whose actions renewed Taiwanese determination to stave off an invasion? The countries that have been buying Russian military gear and now have a rep, however justified, for buying junk? US pundits who backed Russia’s invasion? Renewable energy advocates, suddenly on the back foot because nuclear is a better option than Russian gas? US intelligence agencies that failed to figure out how the Russian forces are ancient and hollowed out by corruption?
You could also note who else wins: the West, for one. Superior armaments and tech, better logistics, the products of a more energetic and innovative culture. I suspect there’s a non-insubstantial intersection between those who are comfy with Russian control of Ukraine and those who would be irritated by a Western win, because the West is decadent and subject to rule from our Davos overlords, and ought not to prevail until it is overhauled and remade.
This is not a thread about whether Ukraine will win, or what victory looks like. Just a question about what shakes out when it is apparent to all that Russia could not prevail.
Published in General
Well they have had a pretty authoritarian response to CoVID. Maybe this is the backlash against that?
That is fair it is very hard to judge where countries are on the scale of democracy. As I said both Canada and the US have adopted some pretty authoritarian policies lately. Those use to be among the gold standard on democratic norms.
My broader point was a truly democratic Turkey or Egypt could easily get to a point where they felt it necessary to go to war with a democratic Israel. Thus undermining the whole democracies don’t go to war with each other narrative.
Fair points. Except I think the average Arab Sunni is probably distrustful of the Iranians. The Sunni Shia divide is pretty ancient and bitter as is the Persian Arab divide. I don’t think the average citizen of Saudi Arabia, Jordan, or Egypt is down with the Iranian cause. The Palestinians are a different matter because Iran is an ally against Israel. I agree though the average citizen of a gulf state probably isn’t completely sanguine with an alliance with Israel, although maybe they are. Quite frankly I think a citizen of the UAE would feel pretty comfortable in Tel Aviv. Probably more comfortable than in Gaza.
Erdogan certainly fought corruption early on in his administration. He also managed to preside over a fairly decent economy. It has gone on too long though I think for most Turks. Secularism is an interesting thing. I can see more conservative Turks thinking that some return to traditional religious norms would be a good thing, but being uncomfortable when it went to far. It turns out I think most democracies want a pretty Goldilocks balance between secularism and religious traditions. I am not sure how easy that balance is to achieve.
The AKP has been in power since 2002. It’s been corrupted by power, imho, as has Erdogan.
But more fundamentally, it’s a victim of its own success. It is without question that the AKP opened public space to more traditional Turks (especially women) – spaces like Universities – and that this resulted in more participation by those Turks in education and the economy.
It’s in a similar position to Iran. It empowered all those women, and now there’s a generation of empowered women that it has to please. It changed the people, but the party didn’t change alongside them.
I forgot about Lebanon, but those other two are definitely not. Not even close.
They are right of center? Could have fooled me.
Probably fooled a lot of Australians, too.
If the argument is that democracies never go to war with each other, I think you are correct. If the argument is that democracies rarely go to war with each other, then the argument seems to have validity.
I also think that if a democracy is very young, as in the case when the Muslim Brotherhood won the election in Egypt in 2012, the chances of a democracy going to war with another democracy is much higher than would be the case where a country has been democratic for over a generation.
A slightly different topic:
Even though many Americans now view the Iraq war as a mistake, the democracy that the United States help set up in Iraq following the US led invasion of that country has not, so far, engaged in anything like the Iran vs Iraq war or the Iraq war against Kuwait.
Senator Ted Cruz Delivers Floor Speech Explaining American National Security Reasons for Supporting Ukraine
The Senate voted 86 to 11 to approve aid to Ukraine on Thursday.
A lot of people are not aware that Iraq is still a democracy. Even many conservatives on this site will use them as the example that “you can’t force democracy on other people.” They only remained in the news so long as there was an insurgency or terrorism attacks. Democracy gets a big “Ho Hum” from the news media. Though from what I read anecdotally it is a very corrupt democracy.
So they ARE just like us! :-)
Dated but interesting:
https://www.businessinsider.com/heres-what-life-in-iraq-was-like-under-saddam-hussein-2014-7?amp
Yes, the spitting image.
This guy’s story is very interesting and maybe he was better off individually during Saddam’s reign. However, my 1st cousin went into Iraq on the first day of the War in 2003 with the 101st Airborne Division, and did three tours of duty over the next ten years, one of them in Mosul. I used to talk to him over the phone in Iraq and the most surprising thing he told me is that the Iraqi people just love Americans and especially George Bush, for liberating them. This is in direct contradiction to what the news media were trying to tell us 24/7. My cousin said Iraqis did not like the British nor Tony Blair because of historical reasons (Britain occupied and administered Iraq after world War I).
I once saw a documentary on Iraq done by a low-budget outfit that took a few cameras into the country shortly after the second Gulf War was over. Its subject was not political but there was one scene where an Iraqi man invited the cameraman into his home. The cameraman videoed the guys living room and was struck by a framed photograph of George Bush hanging over his mantle place (or whatever you call it. It was in a prominent position). When asked “What is this?” the Iraqi man grew reverential and said “I love this man like my own father. I respect him every bit as much.” And the guy was practically tearing up with sentiment. The stunned cameraman just said “Oh” or something like that.
Apparently many Polish families have similar displays of a Reagan photo.
Also he’s Sunni. I imagine opinions vary by Sunni/Shia/Kurd/Christian sect/Yazidis as well as by individual.
That is certainly surprising. Do you think, given the insurgencies, that some Iraqis at least didn’t feel that way? I’m not discounting your cousin’s experiences at all – but just saying that people who come up and speak to American soldiers (in English?) without asking for something are a self selecting sample that may not be typical?
That is also surprising. Especially as it was probably dangerous to have a picture of Bush up like that before Saddam was overthrown.
A girl I was with in High School married and Iraqi that she met while in college in Delhi, and moved to Baghdad. In 1993 she went to the Indian Embassy and asked for advice about staying or returning to India – and they said that if she left it would be very hard to return, so she stayed on. Unfortunately the sanctions got her – she got cancer and it wasn’t possible to get the meds she needed for treatment – a sad story.
My cousin was working in Kuwait in 1993, like a lot of Indians – eventually the Indian Govt sent ships to evacuate them, and conditions on the docks where they were waiting were bad – running out of water etc. But my cousin, who is an enterprising type, loaded his family and electrical goods into a car and drove up to Baghdad – selling TVs for petrol and food along the way – and was able to fly home from there.
Yes, certainly not all Iraqis felt that way, The Insurgency proves it. But I think that is what happens when any dictatorship is overthrown. There are many people who were invested in the dictatorship ruling class, not just the dictator himself. Germany had an insurgency going against American troops during the occupation after world War II. I think they even had a name for the insurgents, “Wolf Hounds” or something like that. No country is monolithic in their allegiances or beliefs of individuals. From what I hear there are still supporters in Russia of Joseph Stalin, the 3rd greatest mass murderer in history (of his own people). When he died in the 1950’s there were many people genuinely crying over his demise.
This was after Saddam was overthrown. If it had been found out under Saddam, the guy would have been fed into a paper shredder.
I dated a woman from Kuwait for a year who fled after the first Gulf war. I learned all sorts of stuff about the Arab world from her. I even speak and read a little Arabic. Interesting fact that your cousin probably knows – unlike America and most Western countries that have a “minimum wage,” Kuwait has a “maximum wage.” It is aimed at all the imported workers from other countries so they can keep the flow of menial labor on the cheap.
Is it sceptical of me to suspect he had a Saddam photo up there before?
Ahlain, ya Steven!
I had no idea about that. My cousin lives in Dubai, which would probably have the same motivation – but they seem to rely on a strict work permit system (kafala) and general desperation in the Global South to keep wages as low as they can over there.
Sounds like Imamoglu and Trump have some similarities.
Corrupt democracy is not democracy.
Well then there must not be such a thing as democracy at all if it has to be perfect.
To some people it isn’t democracy unless it is socialist.
To some people it isn’t democracy unless equality of outcomes is enforced by a totalitarian dictatorship.
I have been saying that we have our own problems we need to address.
On the plus side, most of our problems don’t require spending a lot of money to fix them.
In fact, most of our problems would benefit from spending LESS money on them.
Most of them require less spending in order to fix them.
ETA already, before I saw this.
1) we can fix our problems and assist Ukraine- it isn’t an either/or situation.
2)of course we have corruption- any sizable human enterprise will. But using the Cesar’s wife criteria before helping any nation will only cause more problems- perfect is the enemy of the good.
3) Our situation is mirrored by that of the late 70s- we are faced by a rival who is vastly expanding their military while we argue over trivial expenses ($40B is a rounding error for our government- last year we spent almost $7T). At that time, many who decried defense waste caused severe problems in our armed forces b/c they used arguments for money saving as a cudgel to drive down defense spending- but were more than willing to increase non defense spending . Of course we need to monitor for mismanagement and corruption- but we also need to increase our military and aide our allies. A well known book from the early 80s- “Why we need more waste, fraud and mismanagement in the Pentagon” by Luttwak pointed out the folly of trying to totally eliminate waste and “cut out the fat” – b/c typically we mostly cut out the muscle.
4) Russia is a Chinese ally and preventing them from swallowing Ukraine and significantly degrading their military is a worthwhile national security objective. If the present tends continue, it is very unlikely the Russian military will be of much assistance to China for years after this war. Allowing Putin to achieve even a partial success in Ukraine will just mean he will be back in a few years to try to take the rest.
It has not been demonstrated we are capable of walking, let alone walking and chewing gum at the same time. Perhaps we should work on walking before we try chewing gum AND walking?