The Ukraine Game Was Rigged Against Russia From the Start
Dumb game, shouldn't have gotten tricked into playing it.
I’m not going to spend a lot of time teasing today’s point out.
Imagine a game where the two opponent’s terms of victory are different. One side has very difficult terms of victory (Russia) and the other simply has to take its time losing (Ukraine).
Imagine it’s a game of capture the flag or something. Russia has to capture Ukraine’s flag, but Ukraine doesn’t really have to capture Russia’s to win, only prevent theirs from being taken. The whistle sounds off and Ukraine starts eating its flag as Russia sprints to close the distance between them to try and perform the Heimlich maneuver.
The game is rigged, basically.
Whether or not Ukrainians will admit it, they are a part of a greater shared East Slav civilization. Because they won’t admit it though, they are able to scale down their ambitions dramatically. Instead of being part of an independent civilization and power bloc, they want to be a satrapy of Washington, which is, in turn, a satrapy of Israel. What can I say other than if you set your sights low in life, it’s much easier to succeed.
But carving them and their lands off is a mortal blow to Russia. If Russia is trying to remain a relevant power in the world, they cannot continue to do so without Ukraine. The “people” running Ukraine however, only have to make sure that reunification is as traumatic, bloody and expensive as possible. They have no qualms about breaking the country so that Russia cannot have it. That is why, the quick, surgical strike option on Kiev was actually the correct one, given how badly the situation had deteriorated. The only problem was that it was totally bungled either deliberately or not - doesn’t matter really. (Deliberately).
This is why Russian rhetoric is so conciliatory and open-handed to the Ukrainians. This is why Ukrainians are so hate-filled and rabidly anti-Russian.
It’s like a husband trying to calm down his histrionic front-hole who is trying to force through a divorce and damage the family irreparably.
One party has more ambitious goals - he wants the family to survive, he wants to keep cooperating and working together instead of burning through everything that the pair built together on expensive divorce lawyers. The other party simply wants to make the other side hurt and to extract a pound of flesh from them when it is all over.
The terms of victory are totally lopsided.
Dad needs Mom, but Mom’s got a new suitor that promises to take real good care of her and her stupid fat ass.
…
But this is a sort of clinical, sterile analysis of the situation and it presumes the Russian state behaves rationally and systematically in pursuit of its own interests, which, as the war has shown, simply isn’t the case. Russia is instead pursuing the interests of the various feudal and oligarchic lords who squat over its manpower, military, moral and economic resources and historical legacy.
Ukraine, meanwhile, isn’t pursuing any rational self-interest policy because the people who run Ukraine aren’t Ukrainian and Ukraine can only exist in its current incarnation as a battering ram to be used against Russia to the last drop of Slavic blood. Neither is Germany or anybody else being forced to sacrifice their quality of life for a chance to morally preen on social media actually.
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Morality and the masses are a bad mix. The people who are most incapable of actualizing any moral code whatsoever in their lives are the ones who shriek about their sacred values the loudest and try to impose them on others while baying for the blood of anyone who refuses to convert to their Love Happiness Freedom Tolerance Puppies Ukraine Democracy Global Warming Fauci Ouchi death cult. That’s all that Twitter is. A place for the scum of the world to converge and vaginalize endlessly about their superior morality values to try and extract money, attention and veneration from people slightly dumber than they are.
Morality is just a weapon in the hands of evil people. Moral people don’t moralize at others. Evil people are the first to moralize. You can say that morals and morality has a place in society, but I have never seen immoral people adhere to moral codes, only to laws, and then only grudgingly.
Why even have moral codes when only naturally moral people will follow them anyways?
It’s like having regulations in the economy. Big businesses will always be able to avoid them. Regulations are a de facto tax on small businesses. So too are the moral codes that are then de facto used to browbeat moral people by people who are immoral enough to use moral codes as weapons against people who are moral enough to actually be affected by such a tactic. Following?
Actually, one of the slyest and most manipulative people that I’ve ever known is one of those big Bible-thumper types. He is quick to try and moralize at you and everyone else in his life despite being … well … being what he is. Occasionally, I will try to throw his morals back at him when I’ve started to get annoyed by the incessant preaching. But this never phases him because he is incapable of applying any moral code to himself, only to others. Playing the morality game with immoral types is a bit like Russia trying to woo Ukraine back by saying, “we love you guys, come back!” You will always lose because the game is rigged, man.
Stop playing it.
I keep hearing here in the U.S. from the anti-establishment right and left (Scott Ritter, Douglas Macgregor and friends) that the Russians have the Ukrainians and the West right where they want them and that a massive Russian blitzkrieg will be launched this winter to smash the Ukrainian Army to bits. Also, some also believe that Russia is holding back its best troops and equipment in order to strike at the most decisive moment. I stopped listening to Macgregor early in the war when he claimed that the bulk of the Ukrainian army was being destroyed in southeast Ukraine in one giant cauldron battle where the Ukrainians were completely surrounded and being annihilated. The mainstream media here (State propaganda) is a joke, but some of these other people are jokers as well, It makes no sense that Russia is wiping the floor with Ukraine (according to these people) when Russia has given up half of its territorial gains in Ukraine. I do not know how this is going to turn out, but the best I can tell is that it is close to a stalemate for the time being. Thank you for your articles as they seem grounded in reality as to the war, which is hard to find these days.
Good point in regards to morality and laws. There can be no denying what so ever that the Russian leadership and 5D scam artist are insisting on framing the war as a moral crusade to reunite with the good people of the Ukraine as well as existential to defend Russia from NATO. However the Russian leadership are the most lawless and immoral people in Russia, does make you think...why are the most overtly cynical and those that benefit from Russias "laws for thee but not for me" system the most adamant that the war must be conducted with the maximum amount of restraint and consideration for the Ukrainian side.
In general Russias crook class doesn't comment much on the war but their control of how its fought is directly observable with the ridiculous disadvantages foisted on the Russian army. These disadvantages are than spun by the 5D Kremlin bots and the government as being the result of humanitarian overtures to the people of Ukraine. That cynical tactic is actually very effective against Westerners sympathetic to Russia for whom having genuine moral high ground is important. Against Russians it doesn't seem to work as much from my ancedotal observations hence Russian society having a more realistic understanding of whats happening right now.
Ive seen quite a few videos of Russian boomers saying that all Ukrainian POWs should be executed. That also seems to be the opinion of all the taxi drivers ive spoken with about the war. At the bus stop I over heard a conversation between 2 Babushkas and one said Russia needs to carpet bomb Kiev, the other said her nephew lives there. The first Babushkas than says in total sincerity that she hopes he wont be hurt during the bombing. The Rusich guys have overtly stated that taking prisoners is stupid and Vladlen Tartarsky has sideways hinted at it and he calls for declaring the whole AFU a terrorist organisation.
My general impression is that Russian does not view the Ukrainians with any charity right now. They do view them as brothers, but brothers they really hate. A really good example of the tactical kindness idiocy is the recent unilateral ceasefire for Russian Christmas imposed from above by Moscow for the Russian side. Western Russia sympathizers seemed to really think it proved some moral point about how the Russian leadership are better people for whatever thats worth. And its worth absolutely nothing. Russians just thought it telegraphed weakness, stupidity, and was a bad sign that Moscow is living in a parallel reality where Russias enemies can be reasoned with or shamed.