• Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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    18 days ago

    NATO spent decades encircling Russia as a hostile and encroaching military coalition of imperialist powers. Regardless of Russia’s reactionary government, it must be understood that western imperialists provoked the war knowingly and deliberately.

    • Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works
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      18 days ago

      NATO isn’t encircling Russia, free countries have made the decision to join NATO, going even so far as to blackmail the US to secure membership. They aren’t absorbed like a hostile takeover. Russia has only itself to blame for alienating its neighbouring countries, just as its war of aggression is to blame for Finland and Sweden joining NATO.

      • Cowbee [he/they]@lemmy.ml
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        18 days ago

        NATO is a military coalition of imperialist countries. My point isn’t that NATO is forced on everyone (though sometimes it is), my main point is that the countries within NATO use it to defend and solidify imperialism, which is why Russia was encircled by NATO.

        • Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works
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          17 days ago

          NATO isn’t an offensive alliance looking to grab land, unlike Russia, so calling ex-soviet states joining NATO an encirclement of Russia is a lie. Putin himself showed that he doesn’t care about NATO “encirclement”, as he not only accepted the “risk” of Finland and Sweden joining NATO, but also pulling troops from the finnish border to use as meat waves in Ukraine.

          • ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml
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            17 days ago

            NATO isn’t an offensive alliance looking to grab land

            Then why the fuck is the US in it

          • BanMeFromPosting@lemmy.ml
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            17 days ago

            Yeah NATO is a defensive alliance because we say so, just like the Nazis are socialists because they say. Is it safe to assume you support the democratic peoples republic of Korea?

            • Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works
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              17 days ago

              Are you suggesting that there is even the remotest possibility that NATO is invading Russia or even threatening to? Do you see any indication for that?

              • BanMeFromPosting@lemmy.ml
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                17 days ago

                Yes.
                NATO and NATO-members has broken several treaties, acted beliggerent towards Russia, has pursued brinksmanship since the 00’s, denied Russia entrance into NATO, kept increasing scaremongering rhetoric towards Russia, and constantly does military exercises with the express purpose of gaming out a war with Russia, or with the purpose of “deterring” Russia in the Baltic sea.

                What is the history of NATOs “defensive” alliance? Bombing libya, bombing Yugoslavia, stopping people from intervening in genocides. What is the history of NATOs members? France is invading Mali, it controls the monetary policy of several African nations;, the US… Let’s just mention one: Cambodia… Okay let’s mention two: Afghanistan; Denmark is the lapdog of the US, now allowing military bases on Denmark proper as well - despite old treaties with Russia promising not to do this; the UK in modern days is likewise a US stooge, really most of the rest of NATO is. And NATO supports Ukraine, a nation that has been bombing its own ethnic minorities for 8 years, in breach of MINSK I and MINSK II.
                Compare this to the agressive wars the “aggressive” “imperialist” Russian Federation has been involved in leading up to the war in Ukraine: 1st and 2nd chechen wars and the Russo-Georgian war. Both border wars, both with much more justification than ANY NATO invasion (though still highly condemnable.)

                The Russian Federation is a reactionary nationalist capitalist hole in the ground, but it has pretty obviously been acting and reacting with understandable reasoning, in a predictable manner, especially compared to NATO.

                Russia sought diplomacy several times before invading. After invading it has tried to negotiate for peace several times. Russia has sought diplomacy with NATO and NATO-members several times, and has been rebuffed almost always. The Nord Stream 2 pipeline was blown up by NATO-members. And, again, the “defensive” alliance has a long long history of aggressive engagements. God just look at what has been done to Syria or Egypt.

                So: Looking at what lead up to the war, looking at the actions taken by the participants, looking at the actions taken during the war, looking at the reasoning and rhetoric of the participants; Yes I see a pretty clear motivation to pursue war with Russia from NATO.

        • Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works
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          18 days ago

          And? A defensive alliance meant to defend against the Soviet Union and its immediate predecessor Russia is upsetting Russia? The shocker. Maybe the Russians should reflect on the fact why every former soviet state wants to join NATO. And Russia can’t join an alliance meant to deter invasions as long as Russia is in the business of invading its neighbors.

          • LemsGhost@lemmy.ml
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            18 days ago

            Well that just shows how much you don’t know about history, originally NATO was not meant to defend countries against modern Russia. A political theorist just decided that Russia will never be a democracy and therefore must be contained. It takes two sides to fight a war. Nobody is completely innocent, it was a series of diplomatic errors that got us to where we are. Personally I wish we would have just started doing something about climate change in the early 2000s but back then every one thought it wasn’t a big deal except Greenpeace, and here we are.