Putin's real aim is to restore his puppet Trump to power.

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Trump was never Putin's puppet. He was, however, unusually sane for an American politician when it came to the Russia question. He thought that America should cease stirring up trouble in the region and that a war with Russia over Ukraine is pointless and wrong and not in America's interest.

If you don't understand already that America (often through NATO and the EU) is the primary aggressor here and Russia is and has always been on the defensive (even when they annexed Crimea), you have some more reading to do.

The "Puppet" narrative, Russiagate (now proven false) and all that was started by factions who want a confrontation with Russia. By painting the situation that way, they made any sort of permanent American cooldown in the region and good relations with Russia impossible while Trump was in charge. It worked pretty well for them, despite the truth of Russiagate coming out during Trump's tenure (media buried it). Trump is gone now and the sabre rattling is starting again.

^^^ So you agree that Russia stands to benefit from Trump's return to power?

Now? I'm not really certain. Russia certainly had high hopes for a normalisation of relations when he won in 2016 (so did I), but that didn't pan out. Seems no matter who is President, the same Washington factions continue to exist and exert their will and the same three letter agencies still ply their mischief abroad.

Revisionism. All four of Trump’s predecessors thought that the US and Russia should have friendly relations. Neither Obama (when Russia annexed Crimea) nor Biden (now) believes the US should directly defend Ukraine.

Ironically Trump was the hardest on Russia despite also occasionally showing undue credulity towards Putin’s lies. Trump kicked out 60 diplomats over the Skirpal poisoning, while Bush effectively didn’t react to the Litvinenko poisoning.


Insert “handshake” meme
Alt-right handshake with alt-left
Text over handshake: claiming that allowing countries to join your alliance is aggression against Russia

Annexation is never a defensive action

If they said it I'm not sure they really believed it, Trump did for what little that was worth. He truly was the anti-war candidate that year.



Yep, in some senses, this was most likely the result of Russiagate. Whatever else he is Trump is often vain and silly - beyond the obvious optics problem that would trouble any politician trying to be nice reasonable with Russia having been called their stooge, he was probably provoked on a personal level too, causing him to attempt to repel the accusations through his actions. Exactly what those who made up Russiagate had hoped.



Of course it can be. Don't forget how important Sevastopol is to Russia. No Sevastopol and Russia goes from medium military power to geopolitical joke. Also remember most wars today are not fought with bullets, but with money and propaganda. The one who fires the first shot is rarely the aggressor, especially today.

Have we also forgotten what happened a few years back? The EU (under an American umbrella) is wooing Ukraine into closer relations with the West (with tons of money and propaganda, Russia no doubt running similar operations to counter it), their original association agreement would have aligned Ukraine firmly with the Western bloc. It isn't so much about the Ukraine joining an alliance as it's about the favourite post-1991 American pastime of placing weapons systems ever closer to Russian borders and from some perspectives deliberately trying to annoy them and make them feel unsafe.

Russia is understandably not happy, after years of broken promises and NATO expansion Eastwards, which they have tolerated although with certain amounts of complaint. The Western Bloc is now doing it in Ukraine, right up Russia's tailpipe. The U.S. nearly blew up the world during the Cuban missile crisis, because the Soviets were trying to station weapons systems some 100 miles off the U.S. coast. If in that scenario, you would have been saying "Cuba is a sovereign country and the US has no right to say what weapons foreign powers place there" then I might take an argument about Russia being the aggressors in this story somewhat more seriously.

Anyway, back to Ukraine. There were some typically Russian style warnings, but a long story made even shorter: Russia made a counter-offer to the Ukrainian government. An objectively better and more generous deal than the one the EU offered.

The difference between the deals is quite staggering. The EU were offering hundreds of millions of dollars in loans, and the agreement would require a vast array of legal and regulatory changes to align it more closely with the EU. The Russian offer was 15 billion, cheap gas and required no legal or regulatory changes on the part of the Ukrainians. There was at least an implicit or perhaps explicit understanding that Ukraine would maintain the neutral status quo. Which deal would you have taken?

Yanukovych did what most sane people would do and took the Russian deal.
So as a response, the eminently peaceable and never aggressive-in-this-story Americans staged a coup d'etat in 2014 (sold in the Western press as a "revolution"), the U.S. backed mob chased off the democratically elected Yanukovych government, getting quite a few people killed in the process and the government was replaced with a rabidly anti-Russian and still technically illegal government.

I fear a lot of people don't know how involved the U.S. was in this blatant coup d'etat.

You had American and European politicians giving speeches to the mobs in the streets, goading them on. Who can forget Victoria Nuland's infamous leaked phone calls where she "picks" who would succeed Yanukovych, some weeks before. The director of the CIA just happens to be in Ukraine at the time. American links to, and funding and training of certain groups organising the protests and even the massacres. Tip of the iceberg and like I said, not even subtle.

Russia has to make its move, it cannot lose access to Sevastopol where its fleet is still based and after all the American/EU gay ops in Ukraine have succeeded in placing ultranationalist Russophobes in charge and it looks very much like they are going to lose access to Sevastopol, even after "playing by the rules" and making a better offer to Ukraine. Is there no hint of defense in this?

Russian relations with the US from 1991 to 2014 and even until the Skirpal poisonings in 2018 were very strong, with many mutual agreements being signed on issues like security, space, and disarmament, joint military operations in Bosnia and Afghanistan, Russian entry into the WTO and normalisation of trade relations, and even the Iran nuclear deal and agreement on Syria’s chemical weapons. The biggest stumbling blocks in the relationship were the Russian reaction to NATO manoeuvres in Kosovo, and the defection of Edward Snowden. Obama even scrapped the Eastern European missile defence plan at Russia’s insistence.


There is a lot to unpack here.

Firstly, something being in Russia’s geopolitical interest does not make it a defensive action on Russia’s part. It would be in Britain’s interest for us to seize control of the Suez Canal and the Malacca Strait, doesn’t make it defensive.

Secondly, you’re misrepresenting events in the run up to the Euromaidan protests. It was the IMF, not the EU, who offered Ukraine a loan. Why? Because Russia imposed trade sanctions upon Ukraine to discourage them from signing an association agreement with the EU. The EU’s main condition for signing the agreement was the release of Yanukovych’s political opponents who he had imprisoned on bogus charges.

Yes, the US shouldn’t have invaded Cuba in 1961. In 1962, Kennedy rightly decided not to respond to the Cuban missile crisis by bombing Cuba, let alone invading.

Presenting the likes of Yatsenyuk as “ultra nationalist” seems disingenuous. They are liberal internationalists seeking closer ties with the EU, which is at odds with nationalism.

Ukrainian society is clearly highly polarised on both regional and generational lines. It’s not unique in that regard. The political system doesn’t seem to be able to handle that polarisation. Again, Ukraine is far from unique in that regard too. In Ukraine’s case, the two positions - closer ties with the EU, and shunning the EU for closer ties with Russia - are pretty opposed, particularly when Russia itself is so strongly opposed to Ukraine having friendly relations with the EU. Where Russia crossed a line that the West didn’t even approach is when the Russian military invaded eastern Ukraine and annexed Crimea. An equivalent would be Poland deciding to annex Lviv. Brennan visiting Kiev is not comparable.

Its one of the few things I remember about trump. After filling the swamp with Goldman Sachs alumni, it was his next controversial move. he owned Raethon shares and used their missles in the attack, so some suggested he did it to make money.

This is most stupid thing I heard.
as if he would not be happier with dozing Eggplant.

Quite the opposite. The US under Biden has a well-thought out foreign policy carried out by experienced personnel. I don't agree with all aspects of that foreign policy, but the fact is that these people are competent to deal with Russia and that makes life harder for Putin. What he is doing is to create a lose-lose situation for Biden that will end with something bad happening and Biden getting blamed (as Biden's media coverage is overwhelmingly negative and the Russians are the experts at making that happen). The result is that the US will eventually return to the Trump "status quo" with or without Trump himself in the White House (depending on the state of his health by then). When Trump was in the White House there was no coherent foreign policy and so the US did not present an obstacle to Putin's ambitions. That is why Putin didn't make the sort of moves he made under Obama and Biden, while Trump was President. Putin is no idiot. He knows that he can eventually bring the Ukraine under his control by non-violent means i.e. getting his loyalists into power in Kyiv by working behind the scenes, but he first needs to get Trump or somebody like Trump back into power in DC.

aha, so Afghan fiasco was carried out by competent and experienced diplomatic personnel.
Same folks that are now spreading disinfo that Putin plans to invade Ukraina... yeah

I don't know if Biden has the same people advising him that advised Bush at the time of the Afghan fiasco. I have better things to do than researching that. At least Biden got us out of there and for that we can all be thankful.

aha, so leaving behind 9 thousand Americans and handing over billions in military material is something we should be grateful.
It surely cannot be done in some more sensible way.
With oh so experienced and well educated people at the helm I expect another mega fiasco.
If there can be something messed up beyond repair, I m quite sure that Biden Administration can safely do it.
So, just now, US spreading disinfo about imminent Russian attack.
Even Ukrainians are calling US out about it.
so yes, highly competent... highly .. whatever.
As for hating Biden.. well, he is old, senile man. Definitely not worth hate. there are much worthier targets of hate.. in his administration, if one really insist on hating someone.

^^^ Oh OK now I get where you're coming from.

and from where Im coming.. just curious.. how far wrong you are.