MoreAmphibians

Sometimes he buys books he likes a lot out of loyalty to the author

Your friend is pretty damn cool. I personally pirate whatever I feel like and then buy the stuff I like and want to support. I used to avoid pirating indie games then I realized I bought more indie games when I pirated them first to see if I enjoyed them.

"To the last Ukrainian" is no longer enough, now future Ukrainians have to die too.

Tungsten penetrators perform better than DU ones. They're just more expensive and Ukrainian lives aren't worth that much.

Hell Yes brother, we'll finally drown those Azov bastards in the Dnieper. We fought them for eight long years and we'll do it again if we have to.

Depleted Uranium is definitely radioactive. It's depleted but there are still radioactive isotopes in it. It's relatively same to handle until it's fired and some of it turns to dust. The dust is both poisonous and radioactive. The toxicity of it is probably worse than the radiation but they're both still bad.

Most of the people I'm talking about were either born there or have lived there for longer than Ukraine has existed as a state. Those people should be the ones in charge of the fate of Crimea, regardless of their ethnicity. I don't believe in blood and soil nationalism where only certain ethnicities get to be full citizens.

By "the Uighers" I assume you're talking about Xinjiang? The most serious separatist movement there is the Eastern Turkistan Islamic Movement, the US recognized these guys as a terrorist group in 2002. The US continued to recognize them as a terrorist group until 2020, when the US decided that it would be more politically convenient for them to not be terrorists anymore. The overall populace supports the central government. It's 90+% approval for China overall, I can't find a breakdown by region. If the people of Xinjiang were to lose faith in the central government and decided to go their own way then I would support them. The important part is that is has to be the people, not terror groups, not US-backed NGOs, and not US-backed protest movements, that support the separatism movement.

Shouldn't the people of Crimea get to decide whether they want to live under Kyiv's rule?

The troubles were not an inter-state conflict.

Only because the Irish didn't manage to win.

Cyprus is a vastly complicated situation as Turkish Cypriots were in favour of British rule and Greek Cypriots wanted unification with Greece while it was a dictatorship.

Now this definitely was an inter-state conflict, because Cyprus managed to break free from the British empire. And if we excluded complicated situation then we would have to exclude all wars, including the Ukraine war.

I mentioned Yugoslavia. Do you read comments before replying.

You mentioned it and then said it didn't count because of reasons. I'm saying it does count because it was a war and it was in Europe. Although under your criteria this should also be excluded because it wasn't an inter-state conflict. One of the ways that NATO justified its bombing was by saying it wasn't a state but a supranational organization and thus wasn't beholden to the UN charter.

Georgia is basically the same shit as Ukraine just in a bit less worse

It was another situation where a western-backed revanchist government attacks a separatist area and then Russia moves in to stop the shelling.

Transnistria

"The first fatalities in the emerging conflict took place on 2 November 1990, two months after the PMR's 2 September 1990 declaration of independence. Moldovan forces entered Dubăsari in order to separate Transnistria into two halves, but were stopped by the city's inhabitants, who had blocked the bridge over the Dniester, at Lunga. In an attempt to break through the roadblock, Moldovan forces then opened fire.[47] In the course of the confrontation, three Dubăsari locals, Oleg Geletiuk, Vladimir Gotkas and Valerie Mitsuls, were killed by the Moldovan forces and sixteen people wounded.[30]"

According to a Human Rights Center “Memorial” report, local Bender eyewitnesses on 19 June 1992 saw Moldovan troops in armored vehicles deliberately firing at houses, courtyards and cars with heavy machine guns.[39] The next day, Moldovan troops allegedly shot at civilians that were hiding in houses, trying to escape the city, or helping wounded PMR guardsmen. Other local eyewitnesses testified that in the same day, unarmed men that gathered in the Bender downtown square in request of the PMR Executive Committee, were fired at from machine guns.[39] HRC observers were told by doctors in Bender that as a result of heavy fire from Moldovan positions between 19 and 20 June, they were unable to attend the wounded.[39] -Wikipedia

Hmm

The economic situation in Moldova was not bright. The Agrarian Democratic Party of Moldova was having, along with the Unity-Edinstvo formation – belonging to the people with nostalgia for the former Soviet Union, a comfortable majority; yet, deep concepts and programmes on reforms and the country’s development were absent.

Nevertheless, the western countries were helping Moldova make progress on the way of liberalization of the political and economic spheres. In particular, a substantial assistance was coming on behalf of the USA. The Americans repeatedly declared their unconditional support for Moldova’s territorial integrity, acting to this end in diverse international institutions. And the economic agenda of the Moldovan-American relations was rich at that time. In 1993, 35 Moldovan-U.S. enterprises were working and the trade between the two countries was in a continuous growth. In 1992, this commerce stood at 11.5 million dollars, in 1993 - 15.1 million dollars and in 1994 – 22.4 million dollars. Moldova was benefitting from full support in the relations with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. -https://news.gov.md/en/news/2021/01/01/21000333

Hmm. It's weird how in Moldova, Georgia, and Ukraine a western-backed revanchist government started attacking civilians in a separatist region all of a sudden. And how all three countries had "market liberalizations" against the will of their people. I guess it's just one of those coincidences that seem to happen whenever the US has an interest in a place.

It's the first war by a major power in Europe since WWII.

Are you a child, an american, or did you only start paying attention to history in February 2022?

1. The Troubles (UK vs occupied Ireland)
2. Cyprus War of Independence(UK vs occupied Cyprus)
3. Bombing of Yugoslavia (Nato vs Yugoslavia)
4. Russo-Georgian War (Russia vs Georgia)

I didn't realize that was the very first act of the Rada. I was thinking it was appointing Natalie Jaresko as finance minster. She was an American who became a Ukrainian citizen the same day she was appointed as finance minister. That happened a lot later than I thought though.

It was a poorly-written, unimplementable deal that neither side took seriously.

Then why did Ukraine sign the two separate Minsk agreements if they never intended to follow them?

FURTHERMORE, the Minsk agreement was simply too unpopular in Ukraine for any government to survive implementing it.

Peace with Donbas was popular with Ukrainians. In the most recent elections the candidate that ran on a platform of peace with Donbas won the election and became president. Zelensky then went to the front and gave his "I'm not some loser" speech to Ukraine's militants on the front to try to deescalate the war. Once he failed to reign in his paramilitaries he began agitating for more war.

You are correct that it's unlikely that a Ukrainian government could survive implementing peace with Donbas. This isn't because it was unpopular with the people of Ukraine but because it was unpopular with the people in power. After the US-backed coup far-right elements were placed in positions of power in the Ukrainian government, especially in the police and military. If that failed, the US could have once again opened the floodgates of money from NGOs to anti-government protestors and replaced whoever the Ukrainian people elected with a more "pro-democratic" leader.

You're right that overall the central Ukrainian government wanted war too much to abide by the ceasefire treaties they signed. I just don't think that excuses them. Wanting war too much to do peace is literally what I'm criticizing Ukraine for.

I actually do not, tell me.