What does cutting off diplomatic ties with a country mean generally?
I would call it a precursor to unfriendly action.
There are levels of doing this. You might recall your ambassador for consultations up to full diplomatic sundering which means no ambassador, no embassy and no normal channels of communication.
The us has no ties with Iran currently. We had no ties with Cuba forever. Doesn’t mean war but it’s not good
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Interesting that people are willing to spend more on defense but not willing to change their lifestyles.
Is Germany willing to modify their energy policy to reduce dependence on Russian energy. So far the US has done nothing since Biden came into office to increase energy supplies.
Wonder what Europe will do with more defense money. Training and equipment sure makes sense because you never have enough. But will NATO expand? Push forward?
Time will tell.
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Very good point. In my view we Europeans are way too late in thinking strategically instead of going where the energy is cheap and where the ex-politicians are accidentally find unbelievably lucrative jobs. Schröder Germany, Fillion French and Nieuwenhuizen Dutch are all politicians who are Kremlin bought and paid for.
While the politicians are totally ignoring that this is not something new below is a Dutch article from 2013 “natural gas deals over morals”. A few years ago the US argued that Europe let the USA for its defense and at the same time made huge deals with Putin who already had cut of natural gas to the Ukraine earlier. We can’t pretend we didn’t know
This sudden reversal of Europe seems more out of panic than a long term strategy. Building up the military takes a lot of time not just money. And I am not sure that after this crises is over the money will just vanish into “other priorities “.
Yes this is a cynical view but as long as politicians have lots of side jobs and basically gave the European ombudsman the middle finger when she asked that Von der Leyen would publish her secret SMS communications e what do we expect? There is a systematic problem with conflicts of interest.
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All of NATO is complicit here. Long term energy strategy always has been important for self determination but over and over countries put short term politics in front of it. Germany has policy which makes no sense to me which disable all local energy and just import it. But the US has no clue either.
Ukraine should be a rich country full of resources. Given reasonable management I believe they will but it seems like it is full of corrupted purposes and individuals and manipulated by outside forces both West and East.
And in the midst of this NATO, a 30 country military alliance and the EU political organization seems to be a recipe for lack of direction. I’m not sure increasing military capabilities is needed or even a good idea. I think Russia can’t even drive to the end of Ukraine, let alone the North Sea.
Long term China is way more dangerous anyway imho.
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Great point, China (country is much more powerful and much more dangerous than Russia). Then again car companies like e.g. Volkswagen have put factories right in the middle of Uygur concentration camps with the then German Chancellor opening them. Here is an article on Boehmermann a comedian who actually bring really great painful points to the table. You might have to run it through a translator or get a learn German in 24 hours book. (Does only work with Jupiter hours 
The WW2 relevance is that no matter how fantastically people present themselves a lot of us especially the 100% career can be bought and often will put career over common sense or morals. I personally love Eugene Sledge who didn’t want to become an Officer because he didn’t want to send men to their deaths.
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And putting up this BBC article from 9 months ago where the same united politicians gave the Ukraine (and Poland too)/the middle finger by applauding the waiving of the Nordstream sanctions on Russia. If any historian here is looking for subject? No wonder Putin thinks he can get away with it. NATO states complain but lift sanctions and willingly let themselves become dependent on dictator-controlled strategic resources.
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Yeah Another deplorable move from President Brandon.
All this is nothing new. I was reading from the bombing survey on effects from German industry.
The top producer of trucks was Opel, owned by General Motors. The third producer was a Ford subsidiary at Cologne. Opel was heavily damaged during the war and after, Both General Motors and Ford were compensated for damages incurred during the bombing while building vehicles for the war effort. Ford was even building V2 rocket engines.
I don’t object to them building the plants which predated Hitler but to expect and get compensation for their damage is just an ugly side of business over blood.
Personally, I would not have been surprised of Nord stream had suffered a failure of it’s pipeline via a hack attack or maybe an unknown marine vehicle.
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so… that is basically as good as the US acknowledging the Iran doesn’t “exist”, right? If so… what about the people currently in Russia who want to come back to America.
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I’m not sure doesn’t exist is the right term. Maybe we don’t trust them enough to feel safe. Last time we had an embassy in Iran……it didn’t end well.
As for Americans in Russia, they were warned this week to leave. I believe the main reason for this is so many airlines are suspending service it is becoming difficult to guarantee passage.
We still have diplomatic relations with Russia. Shutting those down would be a huge deal considering they are a nuclear armed country with whom we have several treaties with.
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Well, yeah in general keeping talks open is better. Often it happens in secret or via third parties.
Also while again condemning Putin the situation isn’t 100% Evil versus 100% good. To me the Simon Wiesenthal has a great reputation at slamming Antisemitism, Racism, Antilatino black etc etc.
The Simon Wiesenthal center condemned Putin but also the HIDEOUS training of Ukranian extreme right forces allied to the for example the Azov Battaillon. The Azov Battallion uses Swastika like symbols and if that is not evil enough the Adopted the “Black Sun symbol” Which can also be found at Wevelsburg Himmlers “Spiritual” center near Paderborn, Germany. So basically this first order scum and like Mark Felton pointed out in a video Wevelsburg to gamers is also known as Castle Wolfenstein. (but now a very respectable museum).
By the way to complicate matters even more Prime minister Zelensky of the Ukraine is a Jew himself. Not sure what to think if this.
Western countries training far-right extremists in Ukraine - report - The Jerusalem Post (jpost.com)
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There are always going to be bad people slip through the cracks. Just because the Azov battalion exists does not mean this is Ukrainian policy just that bad actors got together and say and do hateful things.
Let’s see what happens now it’s brought to light. I kind of think it’s low on the priority list right now but it will be important for Ukraine to reaffirm this is not what they believe in.
As for the west training them, we have trained all sorts of bad elements. We send weapons to bad people and we support horrific regimes all in the name of geopolitics. We support Saudi Arabia for example.
On the other hand you support the United States which drones more civilians than the rest of the world combined. I saw a story that the Russians were deploying thermobaric missiles which are awful. Yes they are but getting hit by a hellfire missile isn’t exactly a hug.
It’s a complicated ugly world and while I think the Azov battalion should be barred, disbanded and condemned, they haven’t actually done anything yet have they? Maybe I am missing something.
well the apparantly fought in the 2014/2015 conflict and ran prisons were people were tortured, the “Deutsche Welle” told in on of their programs that they now were part of the inland ministerium. OK I understand that in WW2 some Ukranians sided with the Nazi’s after the holodomor. Right now from a realpolitik standpoints they possible (I am unsure here? )are more of liability than an asset. Putin already calls the Ukranians Nazi’s and uses them as proof. Conveniently ignoring that Zelensky happens to be Jewish.
There are lots of sources but frankly all the info right now is unrealiable, the fog of war rules.
What is more important to me is that at least people are talking and hopefully cooler heads will prevail. I am really worried about an escalation here with lots of weapons on both sides being thrown in to force a military solution ending …where?
Like Gerhard said in the other topic said, lesser heroes lead to hopefully lesser civilian casualties. On a positive note, I know some of my Russian friends who supported Putin in 2015 turned anti-Putin because he went way to far now. Hopefully there are many of them.
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What makes this horrible conflict actually interesting that NOW we cannot see in the future. Just a lot of often unreliable info, some actions in the past and lots of people with opinions and political and military actions of which we don’t know the effect. This is a very different view from that of the “historian” who know the effect and has the luxury of reasoning backwards if that made sense.
Not criticizing historians, but decision making in this murky World is difficult.
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When JD and I were looking at updates on the situation in Ukraine, he found this:
An old abandoned GULAG camp (Belichi Gulag):
Might be relevant to the latest TimeGhost video…
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Odd that that site would still be there. In a creepy way.
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Well… they didn’t do so well in the Georgian war too… they won but not without significant casualties. So which begs the question… what exactly did russia do in the military exercises they had back in January if they are still taking heavy casualties in this war?
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I don’t see how, outside of NATO reports that we would know what the January exercises were. I believe there would have been official observers but they don’t publish their reports and satellite photos also aren’t really available.
Maybe they aren’t performing well but Russia is advancing. We think they are doing badly but to my mind more Important is how do they think they are doing. If Putin fired Gerasimov, it sounds bad but Russia has a history of this so not necessarily a bad thing.
This report is more questions than answers I guess which is the point. Fog of war for civilians is real. Those who have answers aren’t talking to us. If they are, I suspect more to spread misinformation than enlighten.
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The case for actually getting information right is unfortunately not so for TimeGhost’s latest video:
I’d say, “So much for giving proper historical context to the headlines of today,” because I have problems to point out with this video:
INDY: Two days ago, the Russian forces bombed the Babyn Yar Memorial, a sacred site of remembrance for tens of thousands of victims of the Nazis from multiple massacres during WWII.
SPARTY: The bombing was not a mistake – they targeted a TV tower that is on the site to knock out public communications in total disregard for what they were striking.
It is true that the Russians were targeting a TV tower on the site, but total disregard? Anyone who’s analyzing the situation without rose-colored glasses can call out flaws in that statement:
Sparty even stated that the memorial itself wasn’t damaged:
It did not damage the memorial itself – but it hit ground that is the resting place of the victims.
As for “hitting ground that is the resting place of the victims,” well…
Ynet’s reporter in Kiev (yes, I’m still using the old spelling) said, after visiting the site, the memorial was not harmed and no bomb, missile or artillery shell hit the site itself.
The damage was caused to nearby Kyiv’s communications and television tower complex, some 300 meters (400 feet) away from the new memorial and a kilometer (3,000 feet) from the old one.
Three missiles – launched from aircraft flying above the cloud cover – did land around the compound surrounding the communications tower, causing great damage to buildings belonging to its administrators.
But the massive tower itself remained unharmed, but for some minor impact from shrapnel and stains caused by black smoke.
It seems the reporting that the Babi Yar Memorial itself was hit was part of the Ukrainian misinformation campaign, aimed at destabilizing the enemy. Therefore, it appears the only reliable sources of information regarding the fighting are the American intelligence agencies and those of the U.K., which are not only able to receive reliable information on events on the ground but are also able to evaluate it correctly.
Mind you, this is from an Israeli source:
Way to poison the well, guys. Not quite a good start. Thought TG would’ve learned not to do it from the last time I criticized a TG video in detail:
SPARTY: The people of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic also suffered the highest percentage of casualties of all Soviet Republics, and the second biggest casualty rate from Nazi crimes against humanity after Poland.
I think he meant civilian casualties, in which case it’s correct. Regarding military casualties, however, ethnic Russians were still the majority of those.
SPARTY: Like with most national ethnicities, including Russians by the way, some Ukrainians did collaborate with the Nazis, but they constituted a small minority of the Ukrainian people – most were either victims of, or fought the Nazis.
True. However, that “small minority” statement is rather disingenuous to throw around indiscriminately, as a general pro-tip. Even small minorities can become nightmares for the entire group.
SPARTY: When the Soviet Union was dissolved in 1991, the newly-sovereign Ukrainian state came together with the Jewish community to create a memorial and continue research into the personal identity of each victim.
Nitpick here, but the memorial center was actually established in 2016 (around the time of the 75th anniversary of the massacre), not 1991.
SPARTY: It is as much a Jewish as a Ukrainian story – the memory of yet another mass murder against the Ukrainian people, that the Russian Armed Forces have now desecrated, while perpetrating yet another aggression on the Ukrainian people.
It’s the same aggression, not another one. And I somehow doubt TG would mention the Azov Battalion and the aggression against the Donbas, however complicated it actually is.
Ukrainians aren’t innocent flower children being beaten up, just as Russia isn’t the good guy or it isn’t me being “pro-Putin” in this situation. Conflicting information and misinformation campaigns from both sides also don’t help. That is why I took a strict pledge of neutrality regarding this conflict both for my students and in internet chatrooms.
War is complicated, and poisoning wells to provide a deliberately one-sided narrative of any war – not just the current one – only makes things worse for everyone involved.
Also, a bit of an irrelevant side note, but JD and I can’t help but notice how angry Sparty was when he said that line. We suggest a calm attitude when approaching a topic like this, especially when information is all muddied.
INDY: Spartacus made an episode covering the Babyn Yar massacre a year and half ago when it happened in our timeline over on the WW2 Channel.
We have edited out the other events of that half year to give you a deeper understanding of the tragedy, and to keep the memory of the victims alive.
It is hard to watch, but an essential part of Ukrainian, Jewish, and human history that must not be forgotten.
If anyone is squeamish at ruthlessness and brutality and if he doesn’t want to learn about human stupidity when studying history, he’s not suited to studying history, period. This is why I don’t use trigger warnings in class – anyone who needs one is not suited for history class. Harsh attitude? Perhaps, but I stand by it.
By the way, here are some New York Times articles to prove that the massacre was never forgotten before 1991, even with Soviet silence on the matter:
October 7, 1961
December 17, 1961
August 4, 1972
So when Sparty says:
When the war ended, the site was purposefully forgotten as part of the Soviet effort to avoid talking about victims of the Nazis as being Jewish, and focusing on the tragedy of WWII as an anti-communist event.
…he’s sorta right, but not quite. See that poem above.
On to the description of the events, he didn’t do too bad a job there. 
JD gave me this map which might be of help:
Yellow is the cemetery, white star is where the massacre happened, east star is where they were gathered, west is where the train station was.
POINT OF INTEREST: The actual location of the massacre was only pinpointed in 2020:
https://www.timesofisrael.com/mystery-solved-babyn-yar-massacre-location-pinpointed-after-79-years/
Even with my acknowledgements of the competent parts of this video though, I would suggest (a) toning down the emotional presentation just a notch (it’s understandable though, considering the war being covered, but it can be easy to manipulate a narrative with emotion, as I have noted in their U.S. Army racism video)…
…and (b) using better and more sources (at least he used two decent ones here, which is better than the single bad source used for the U.S. Army video).
Any changes coming by, please let me know.
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