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There was no economic or rational factors. The only thing that makes a lick of sense is the irrational.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2022/03/putin-dictator-trap-russia-ukraine/627064/
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2022/3/24/22982864/vladimir-putin-russia-ukraine-war-brian-klaas
Those are a warm-up, but then you have the purges since the invasion began.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/q-and-a/the-purges-in-putins-shrinking-inner-circle
Putin has sort of been the butt of jokes for years for killing anyone who looks at him funny. He's a KGB stooge, who made his career out of backstabbing and paranoia. His entire inner circle were afraid to tell him the truth, because he would kill them if they did.
He's never been "savvy", he's just been willing to kill as many people as necessary to secure his own power.
The classic authoritarian dictator who throws people out of windows for saying no. And whose vaulted military had body armor made of cardboard, because the corruption was so ingrained that every single level was accepting bribes and stealing shit.
I'm surprised that they're still going, but Russia has shown the world that they're a third rate military, at best.
As to Palestine. It doesn't matter what the resistance movements call themselves now. Israel will just say they're Hamas, and no one likes Hamas. There are good reasons not to like Hamas, they're religious extremists who want to kill all Jews.
And for decades, Israel has funded Hamas behind the scenes, while coming down extra heavy on any other resistance movement. And now it's all paid off for them because they can just claim that anyone they kill was actually Hamas.
https://www.timesofisrael.com/for-years-netanyahu-propped-up-hamas-now-its-blown-up-in-our-faces/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2014/07/30/how-israel-helped-create-hamas/
This tactic of creating the perfectly detestable opposition has been used in quite a few places. For example, Greenpeace gets a lot of money from oil company heirs. Specifically the Rockefeller family.
I doubt anyone from Hamas, or Greenpeace, ever took orders from the people giving them money. They were given the money with no strings attached, because they were already jackasses. The money just extended their reach.
There are absolutely rational reasons for Russia to invade Ukraine.
Looking back to the dissolution and subsequent plundering of the USSR, there became a rising Bourgeoisie within the Russian Federation. Since there wasn't already Imperialist infrastructure for the Russian Federation to exploit the Third World (large, monopoly and financial Capitalists with international footholds), Putin tried to join NATO and join hands with the rest of the Imperialist western nations, and take "their share" of the super-profits. This was denied, and thus began a long few decades of growing tensions between NATO and the Russian Federation.
Ukraine on the other hand has been increasingly militarized, with anti-Russian sentiments rising. NATO increased expansion against Russian requests, leading to Russia trying to forcibly demilitarize Ukraine.
Regardless of morals, there is a material basis for this conflict.
As for Palestine, again, the oppressed have the rights to use violence to free themselves, especially if non-violence hasn't worked, and in the face of genocide.
Ukraine has been super militarized with anti-Russian sentiments rising since they illegally stole a part of their country in 2014 and started providing money, arms, vehicles, and soldiers to separatists premised on said separatists murdering their fellow citizens and providing a thin pretext for Russia ultimately taking more of Ukraine.
Given the profoundly destructive nature of any such conflict with Russia and the impossibility of winning or even surviving without a coalition of supporters there is zero chance of Ukraine ever starting a conflict with Russia itself.
Given the risk of nuclear war and the impossibility of pushing Ukraine to start such a conflict there was never any chance of NATO either starting such a conflict OR being able to start one by proxy.
It's hard to argue that Russia had security concerns when the only person in a position to light this candle is themselves.
NATO was virtually entirely a mutual defense pact vs Russia in their previous incarnation as the USSR. Inducting Russia into NATO would only serve to give them veto power and influence on an org which virtually exists to defend against THEM! It makes no coherent sense nor would it somehow provide the Russians some share of "super profits" it would solely give them an opportunity to undermine NATO which is why Putin wanted it.
The material basis for stealing the Ukrainians country from them and murdering its children is that by doing so they gain access to tax payers, resources, people, strategic resources, land, fossil fuels etc. Based on what we know about their strategic planning we have every reason to believe they thought this would be an inexpensive and quick affair that would be concluded in a matter of days with minimal loss of life.
It is purely a function of avarice, stupidity, and immorality. It is no more complicated than asking why a burglar invaded a home and took the lives of people there when he just ended up leaving bloody himself. They did it because they thought it would profit them and because they thought they could get away with it.
This "defense pact" has invaded, bombed and destroyed many countries within only my lifetime, it's a laughable statement unless your historical horizon is less than a decade.
Living in America it's incredible to me how people I run into don't even know the countries that their own government has invaded using its "defense pact", or pay attention to people whose lives they've ruined, and thus can't even understand why people see them as a threat.
That's some blatant Russian propaganda there. Blame NATO twice for Russian imperialism.
The "Russia had to invade a sovereign nation because they were talking about joining NATO to prevent Russia from invading them" logic has some holes to it.
The fact that Russia has invaded their neighbors 14 times since the end of the cold war tells you why one of their neighbors would want to join NATO.
Also, remember that time that Russia shot down a commercial airliner? The Ukrainians sure as hell do. That was the true beginning of the invasion, which is why Ukraine was in talks to join NATO.
And yes, people have the right to defend themselves. But the Israeli government has locked down the anti-terror propaganda, because Hamas is pretty vile as far as organizations go. It's why Israel let Hamas grow and become powerful, and why the Israelis paid to keep Hamas in power for the last decade or so.
As long as Israel can point at Hamas, they have just enough of an excuse to claim their ethnic cleansing is actually just an anti-terror campaign.
Hamas is a full on terrorist organization, not that all terrorist organizations are bad. Or rather, there are some causes where a terrorist organization is the appropriate response. John Brown tried it. So did Nelson Mandela. But Hamas is a religious extremist terrorist organization. One that has distasteful views, and was sort of put in place by Israel for those views.
You see what I'm getting at here? Hamas is fucking evil, and Israel has mostly succeeded in making Hamas the face of Palestinian resistance against Israel.
I doubt many of the original leaders of Hamas are still alive, but that doesn't matter either when Israel can just lie and say that whoever they kill is Hamas. It's a bit maddening, and I doubt there's an answer to it all except for the other Palestinian resistance groups to step up their social media game.