Lenins2ndCat

Just discovered the displayname feature.

  • 4 Posts
  • 23 Comments
Joined 4 years ago
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Cake day: January 29th, 2020

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  • The Russian economy is worse off

    What metric are you using to determine this?

    the war will end with Russia getting at most Crimea

    This would require the complete and total collapse of Russia and the formation of a new country. Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk are legally Russia under Russian law. There is no mechanism via which they can be ceded. When everyone eventually sits down at the table they legally can not be put on it by the negotiators that form the Russian side.

    I personally think Russia will take everything south of the Dnipro river then hand over the parts that are not Donbass as a political means of showing that the west won against them in some way.

    Even if there were a mechanism by which these could be tabled I don’t see why they would. They are winning, the counteroffensive is achieving absolutely zero, support is very low across Europe and there is very little evidence that their gains will stop.

    What mechanism are you thinking of here? Serious question. How? The only way what you’re claiming will happen could possibly occur is via a massive pushback, but that’s clearly not happening. You’d need nato to deploy and to kick off ww3 properly.

    a coup in the US is completely unrealistic as of now.

    I know. But the factionalism and divisions make it more likely than in Russia at the present moment in time. That was the point, to highlight that is incredibly unrealistic to expect it to happen in Russia after we’ve just had a demonstration of failure with almost no division barring the tantrum that occurred.


  • I think we’re going to end up talking past each other as we disagree and there’s a few things we’d just end up repeating over and over so forgive me for skipping a chunk here. I will respond to this though:

    destroying the economy even further

    “Even further” is an odd choice here. The Russian economy is stronger now than before the war sanctions. The sanctions failed miserably, everything that Russia could no longer get from the west it simply gets from South East Asia (China/India mainly) and the Middle East now. Reddit thinks there was some great economic smashing of Russia but it really horribly failed.

    Winning the war is unrealistic at this time, would take a long time

    “Winning” here is more a question of when parties will get round a table to negotiate again. The war almost ended in April but Boris Johnson put a stop to the deal that would have done that. It could end quickly, it could also take a long time, dependent almost entirely on how long the west wants to drag it out as a proxy war for. There is also the question of whether the US and EU might pivot to a focus on China, which would also result in getting round a table to end the Ukraine war first as they simply do not have the means to focus on both at once.

    And about the USA, yeah that’s a bit of a whataboutism. There is a lot of division there and I think they are one bad president away from significantly worsening the situation. We will see about that too I guess.

    It’s not really whatabout. It’s just useful to have a comparative baseline for “division” to understand what is necessary to create and succeed in a coup. Do you think one would succeed in the US under the current conditions? What factions and groups would need to be involved? This thought experiment is useful for understanding the kind of divisions, alliances and coalitions necessary to making a coup succeed elsewhere. It helps ground your thoughts in a more material reality rather than the fantasies peddled in the media circuit.




  • I think he simply grossly overestimated his support, believing that something more would come of it that did not.

    I just don’t agree that this strengthened the state/Putin. In a way, if someone like Prigozhin without any realistic chance tries a coup and gets away with his life (at least for now) doesn’t this show how weak Russia currently is?

    It has embarrassed Russia for sure, the global south in particular supports Russia a lot and there will be some respect lost through it but that’s not going to change much about why they support Russia (serves their interests to see a multipolar world emerge) so they’ll continue to do so.

    While it may have caused foreign embarrassment that’s not really important in terms of “strength” of the state. The strength of a state is determined by the political and military powers within it supporting it and its institutions. Literally all of them did so which has ultimately served to resolve the question “is it possible for Russia to collapse?” with a resounding “No” at this time.

    By comparison and to do a big whatabout - I would say that the US has a greater amount of division and potential for political and financial factions to attempt to tear it apart. I however don’t think that there is anyone quite as bold or stupid as Prigo to overestimate their support or underestimate the size of the support you need to tear apart and successfully coup a country like that though.

    Like I keep pointing out, the gang of eight were an incredibly powerful coalition that failed. They serve as an example of the kind of coalition you really need to pull this shit off and they make Prigo look like a bit of a joke by comparison. Part of me wonders if members of the Russian intelligence community deliberately led him on into believing he had support in order to create this outcome, but that’s pure speculation. The man isn’t entirely stupid though, so I have to wonder what exactly made him think he would have more support.


  • Lenins2ndCat@lemmy.mltoLemmy@lemmy.mlLemmy is being gentrified
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    1 year ago

    A lot of the people that have come over aren’t people who want decentralisation. They are people who don’t give a shit but are unhappy with reddit.

    They haven’t learned WHY reddit is making this decision. They have no understanding of why IPOs and privately owned companies will always lead to this. They do not understand.

    They are just people that want their content slop, but are also mad. They don’t actually care how the slop is delivered to them they just know they want it and know they’re mad at reddit.

    The result is that they want to come somewhere else and behave exactly like it is reddit, when it is not.


  • Of course he called it off lmao. He had NO SUPPORT. He was totally isolated.

    Compare this to the gang of eight when the communists attempted but failed a coup and you’ll see what a real powerful coup attempt looks like. That failed.

    Look at who supported and took part in that and compare it to Prigozhin’s isolated attempt with absolutely no support, no allies, nothing, while every single other political and military force in the country backed the state.

    Prigo grossly overestimated his position. He thought he would get supporters once it was launched, he got absolutely nothing and he backed out at the earliest opportunity with a guarantee of his life being protected in Belarus. This was accepted by state because the alternative would have been a disaster for Russia with thousands of dead in a battle for Rostov and defence of the outskirts of Moscow.


  • After the events that just strengthened it? Absurd. Anything to avoid actually feeding people, addressing the 33% of children currently in poverty or the constantly declining living standards we have I suppose.

    EDIT: God this place has gone south since all the redditors came over.

    1. When a coup fails, it strengthens the existing state. It has told everyone that might rebel that there is too much support in the existing state for it to succeed. See Erdogan doing it intentionally in Turkey to strengthen and consolidate his power if you want another example of this.

    2. I live in the UK. This is absolutely a fucking waste of our time and energy. Nobody gives a damn about this when a third of children in the country live in poverty and cost of living is through the roof. It is entirely a distraction because Brexit, austerity and successive neoliberal governments have systematically gutted the country. Anything to distract from the fact half the country keeps going on strike or actually paying people more.


  • Wtf? Why are people upvoting this garbage?

    Google, Facebook, Tiktok, Youtube, there are TONNES of “platforms” that literally ban porn content from being uploaded to them. What are you talking about? Not viable? The biggest fucking social media site on the internet does not allow porn, the biggest video site on the internet does not allow porn.

    Redditors have seriously broken brains and only know how to repeat what they’ve read other broken redditors repeat and upvote ad-infinitum without every actually thinking for 5 seconds about how ridiculous what they’re saying is.