It is not a petty tantrum though it might look like one. You have to consider that the incumbents have won the US elections, that's not a small feat. What many people are missing is that if the US main challenger is China and beating Russia is a far thing, then it makes sense for the US to ally with Russia against China. For that, the US might need to give Russia something (some EU countries?) for this hustle and also refund it for the earlier war (yep). But if the administration believes this is worth it to contain China then it's the right call.
This is why European countries are freaking out. They might be seeing the change as being more fundamental than a two guys liking/hating each other and that a trade might involve their territory in an unfortunate moment (though a part of this is their own negligence).
The US took Ukraine’s nukes in exchange for safety guarantees.
The true extent of US commitment to european security has been clear to everyone for at least ten years.
Hell, the French nuclear programme was premised on the fact that Paris didn’t trust the US to defend France. Do you think the easternmost NATO states have built their military doctrine on blind trust in Uncle Sam?
> The US took Ukraine’s nukes in exchange for safety guarantees.
Please read the actual text of the memorandum, so you don't spread any more baseless accusations. It's only 1 page, it'll just take you a minute and the language it is written in is very accessible.
The only point that even touches on any kind of guarantees is essentially a promise to "seek immediate United Nations Security Council action" in the case of an attack or a threat of attack IN WHICH NUCLEAR WEAPONS ARE USED. That last part is always conveniently left out whenever anyone tries to throw out the soundbite of "They gave up their nukes for security guarantees". And even if you assume that the nuclear weapon part only covers the "threat" part of the sentence and not the "attack", then you're still left with the only solid guarantee being the seeking of United Nations Security Council action.
The Budapest Memorandum on its own is not the only document that you should consult. We may debate the degree to which 'assurances' differ from 'guarantees', but considering the vagueness of international law I would leave interpretation of primary sources to scholars and statesmen.
In the eyes of the people in Europe, the US response to the war has been been lacklustre from the very beginning, only marginally improving after Russia's 2/2022 escalation.
There is not a single country in the world that has given more money and weapons to Ukraine than the United States.
If the people in Europe find that to be a lackluster response, then it is not surprising that Trump sent Vance over to humiliate them, because they need a wake-up call and they needed it yesterday.
How would Russia help “contain” China? China’s actual territorial ambitions have never been especially wide ranging, and I really doubt that Russia would make a credible deal to help keep China’s military out of Taiwan.
To the contrary, China’s increasing power is economic. They out-manufacture everyone. They appear to be beating the US at its own recent games (BYD seems to be ahead of Tesla!). They have plenty of software expertise these days. They are approximately caught up in AI. They also happen to lead in non-petroleum-dependent energy, and Russia’s main strength is in its oil and gas resources.
If the US wants to remain a dominant economic power, how is Russia going to help?
They have a giant land border. An adversarial Russia-China relationship is expensive for both powers, and is a major reason for the USSR going bankrupt in the cold war (also the USSR propping up Vietnam after China invaded in 79).
It seems more and more that if war between US and China starts it will be US-initiated. You just can’t stand not being the top dog anymore.
For context, EU+UK is over 500M people, Russia is 143M.
I think two weeks back many Europeans took for granted (at least I did) we would get involved in the Pacific theatre if needed on US side, but after what is happenning now… I am for not getting involved in any coflict in Pacific if US treats us this way.
Russia would never trust US. Russia would never ally itself with US against China. What makes you think they will suddenly turn on their ally China, to side with US (their always-enemy)?
Economically, allying with Russia is stupid, they're poor. The only way they are making it through this war economy is the fact that Russian people are patient and are used to bad economy. The average anual salary in Russia is below $10K.
$10K/year is not that bad, you won't die from hunger and can buy all necessary things. Also, it is more than in previous years (cannot believe, but it was somewhere around $1K/year in 2000 when Putin came into power).
This seems quite reasonable on the surface but it neglects the evidence of sheer incompetence from the first Trump term.
There's no 5d chess here. There's no scenario where ceding Poland and Ukraine to Russian authoritarians leads to a more free world and a victory over Chinese aithoritarianism. There's just rampant and opportunitistic corruption.
The US is being carved up from the inside and nothing about this process will help the impending conflict against China.
The sooner we all recognize this like the Europeans seem to be doing is the sooner we can coordinate to destroy authoritarians wherever they may call home.
> it makes sense for the US to ally with Russia against China
Economically and population wise Russia is tiny compared to the West (Canada, EU, etc) It makes no sense to trade our alliance with the West for alliance with much weaker and poorer Russia.
I think Russia has compromising info on Trump. That's the simplest explanation.
Russia advantage is its large border with China. The US is not allying because of their (non) existent economy. But they'll be a formidable ally in case of a war against China.
> But it looks much more like Russia dividing and conquering the USA from the rest of the democratic, human rights supporting West.
Yes, the famous human rights where people get visited by the cops for a Facebook post or an offensive tweet like in the UK.
Also, regarding the UK who just recently forced Apple to remove it's EtoE encryption because it wants access to all the data of it's citizens violating the fundamental right of privacy?
What about the UK terror law where they can detain you at the border without telling you why and for as long as they want, where you can't have a lawyer present with you in the room while they interrogate you and while they go through all your electronics + email + phone and you don't have the right to refuse giving them your passwords otherwise you will be jailed?
Russia is bad, terrible even but let's not pretend that some of the western countries haven't been sliding in proto-fascism either.
Lets also not forget that the UK took part in the illegal invasion of Afghanistan and Irak, which led to the disastrous consequences that we know today.
I think it would be best for the West to stop lecturing the world about democracy and human rights and the rule of law for a while and start by cleaning it's own house first because it doesn't have much credibility left on these matters.
No those are facts. Simple as that. What is your contention exactly with what I said?
> what the fuck is your point?
Why the aggressiveness? We are all here to have a peaceful conversation. You may disagree with me and that is fine but we don't have to get at each other's throat.
> Do you really think the UK is as bad or worse then Russia?
You must have missed part of my comment if you are asking this question.
> Russia is bad, terrible even
That's from my comment.
> Of course we can and should criticize other countries
Exactly my point. I am criticizing all the countries that infringe on human rights and that includes Russia and the UK an whoever else engages in these sorts of things.
My point was that simply asserting that the West respects human rights when we know that that is not always the case is the like the pot calling the kettle black.
You can go and give lessons of democracy and human rights when you stop detaining your own citizens for arbitrary reasons and without cause and without having the right to be represented by a lawyer.
Now, if you think that this is perfectly acceptable in a democracy, then I guess we don't have the same concept of human rights then.
I didn't say they weren't facts. I said it's whatoboutism:
> Whataboutism or whataboutery (as in "what about ...?") is a pejorative for the strategy of responding to an accusation with a counter-accusation instead of a defense against the original accusation.
>
> The communication intent is often to distract from the content of a topic (red herring). The goal may also be to question the justification for criticism and the legitimacy, integrity, and fairness of the critic, which can take on the character of discrediting the criticism, which may or may not be justified
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whataboutism
The topic is Russia dividing and conquering the USA from Europe and other nations. Not: are Europe perfectly living up to its stated humanist goals.
> Why the aggressiveness?
I guess it comes from this being a very common tactic to shut down any criticism and debate. Maybe you didn't mean to do that, in that case I'm sorry for assigning malignant intentions.
That border is either mountain ranges (Altai), or empty steppes (Zabaikalsk), or boreal forests (Amur and Vladivostok). Either way -- the area lacks infrastructure and even roads, for the most part. It doesn't provide any military advantage, especially given that the Chinese side of the border is much better developed.
If anything, the area is not defensible against even a half-ass incursion effort from the south (either economical or military-driven), which they're actually in the middle of (the economical one for now) without realizing that.
Russian lost hundreds of thousand men, I'm not sure they'll be willing to ally themselves with the US to contain China anytime soon, they'll pursue what's in their best interest and play every side.
It could be an advantage for the US, but it looks to me like a liability for Russia, since they don't have enough manpower to guard it.
In case of war between China and Russia I could easily see Chinese invading large swaths of lands without any meaningful opposition. Populations in eastern Russia are treated more like than colonial subjects than regular citizen, so I don't think they will mind too much a new overlord.
Assuming they had the troops to get there, they cannot move all of them to the border with China and leave the western front unguarded
a) be willing to join a US-led coalition against China, given that the US foreign policy stopped being consistent and the next administration may well make a sharp turn again;
b) be capable of joining a US-led coalition against China when they now spent 3 years slowly restructuring their infrastructure and industry from Western products to Chinese products and any break in the relations with China would mean a full stop for support, spare parts etc., which US alone, with its depleted industrial platform, is unable to compensate for.
Not to mention that Russian nationalists HATE the idea of Russia being a junior partner to anyone and especially to the Anglo-Saxons. That would be hard sell even from Putin.
> Not to mention that Russian nationalists HATE the idea of Russia being a junior partner to anyone and especially to the Anglo-Saxons. That would be hard sell even from Putin.
America would be the junior partner. I do not see Russia doing anything for America, it is just America giving Russia what they want.
Politically maybe, but as far as raw force goes, Russians have been reduced to deploying donkeys in battlefield logistics. That is a big capability gap, and won't be easily bridged.
The next POTUS may not be as prostrate to Russia as Trump is, even if a Republican.
So the plan is to burn all of our current allies who joined us under a framework we devised largely for our own benefit so that we could maybe gain the favor of someone who is even less trustworthy and reliable than we are at this point against China? You really think this is smart? Trump is delivering the Russians their number 1 strategic goal since World War 2 by destroying NATO and trading this for seemingly nothing, which at this point again raises serious questions about what his actual motivations are with regard to his otherwise unexplainable deference to Putin and Russia in all things.
This is why European countries are freaking out. They might be seeing the change as being more fundamental than a two guys liking/hating each other and that a trade might involve their territory in an unfortunate moment (though a part of this is their own negligence).