Easy. Ukraine is in the process to join NATO, assisting them before that formally happens wouldn't be an issue from my point of view.
Russian invasion of Ukraine | Fewer tweets, more discussion
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It's a good point. I certainly can see no sort of Article 5 claim here. Technically the US and UK could justify some form of intervention on their part on the basis of the Budapest Memorandum. It's not clear cut but is a half-usable international law justification.
But any participation of NATO countries should then be on an individual sign-on basis by each country, not compelled by any of the NATO treaty aspects.
If civilians, neutrals and/or humanitarian forces are in danger, couldn't they use a reasoning similar to the one used in Yugoslavia in the 90s?
If you mean Operation Deny Flight, that was a NATO enforcement of a United Nations imposed no fly zone. And it didn’t mean shooting down Russian air craft in air to air combat.
If they want to be world police sure, if they want to be a purely defensive alliance no. NATO isn't a purely defensive alliance, of course, this is just an issue because some people for some reason feel the need to claim that it is. They do missions all over the world.
Kofman is pretty sober on Kherson being liberated in 2022.
Kofman is the expert that said that Russia would be exhausted in 3 weeks?
I don't think any expert can predict what will happen in any degree
Because Ukraine is not Russia, Is not NATO doing anything to russia in russian territory but helping another nation to defend themselves in their territory.
Yes, Putin is a scumbag and wrong. And he is a thug. If tomorrow NATO announces that he has one week to leave Ukraine, including Crimea, or the NATO air force will decimate all Russian forces inside Ukraine, then he would leave Ukraine and there will be no nukes, no WW3, no nothing. That's what thugs do, they push as far as they can, till a bigger thug appears.
Of course, this is not going to happen because the West is full of faux "leaders". And that's the reason Putin started all this, he actually thought the West would do even less, but that old guy Biden surprised him by giving a lot of money and guns to Ukraine. If it was up to the EU only, the Ukrainians would be decimated. (And Zelenskyy, the comedian, was a huge surprise, too. )
The silver lining is that Ukrainians might win alone, which will give them immense pride going forward, and hopefully they will be able to establish a stable democracy like the other countries in Europe. Unfortunately, they have paid an extremely heavy price because the West did very little, very slowly.
As I said earlier, there will be no such thing as WW3 happening here. Of course, nukes will destroy the world. But that's different than WW3 happening over this war. No one is joining the losing side, so the west (whoever they are) will just make sure of the weakening of the Russian military in this war and Putin will be fighting this alone.
The only concern here is Putin launching nukes.
The only concern here is Putin launching nukes.
No thanks, we already have one.
I would suggest "the West" have done quite a lot but rather slowly. With hindsight they should have reacted more like this in 2014 but then they were all bought and paid for with Russian money, it was a different time. The response has also been somewhat uneven between countries but most countries have at least been helping to a significant degree. The Germans for example have been very slow but they have implemented the sanctions, filled the gas reserves, sent their Iris-Ts, Panzerfausts and other equipment, I think they've sent money as well...it's not nothing.
Forget the nukes, without the nukes we'd have some other excuse for doing nothing. The Srebrenica massacre happened in July 1995 (with Dutch peacekeepers around), and NATO finally intervened only in 1999, four years later, after there was another war in Kosovo. Was anyone afraid that Milosevic will use nukes? Of course not, he didn't have any. It is just that the West is very very slow to intervene. There are "red lines" that actually mean nothing, like the time Assad used chemicals which was Obama's "red line". Obama did nothing, some meaningless sanctions.
To be fair to him, his following posts qualify that statement a bit and he wasn't that far wrong. Russia was an exhausted force and abandoned its entire operation in the North not long later.
edit: It was actually 3 weeks almost to the day that they withdrew from Northern Ukraine
To be fair to him, his following posts qualify that statement a bit and he wasn't that far wrong. Russia was an exhausted force and abandoned its entire operation in the North not long later.
edit: It was actually 3 weeks almost to the day that they withdrew from Northern Ukraine
Maybe now but not by the end of march. Also, i think i recall that russia would not mobilize, but i might be wrong. All in all, i dont think any analist had it right in predictions more than 3-4 weeks. And i doubt they know how kherson front will play seeing such a strategic important place
I mean it won't happen but hypothetically I don't see how NATO setting up a no fly zone over for example Kyiv to intercept missiles attacking a civilian population would be an attack on anyone. To the best of my knowledge Russia aren't flying jets or helicopters anywhere near Kyiv so there would be little chance of a situation arising where NATO forces would be shooting at Russian aircraft.
Also, please forget WW3. A World War needs two sides or similar strength. NATO is one side, what is the other side? The Russians? The Russians do not have any military strength, they can't even beat Ukraine. NATO vs Russia is something like France vs Malta, it is completely meaningless. Using nukes is also not a World War, it is suicide, and it will be over in a matter of days. No, Putin does not want to commit suicide, his Russist ideology is not crazy enough. If he was some hard-core religious fanatic, then maybe... but he isn't.
Well comparing Russia to Malta is kind of absurd though.
The Yugoslavians didn't have nukes.
Let's face it, that's the only reason why Moscow hasn't been flattened and Putin dead.
Much as I am 99% sure he wouldn't use them, he's got enough of a threat in that 1% to make sure we don't intervene militarily. Shit as it is.
It doesn't really matter what justification NATO members would use if the other side lobs nukes does it?
WIthout nukes, why do you think that the West would have a war with Russia, while they did nothing in Serbia for 4+ years?
Because the chance to take out Russia like this only comes around once in a blue moon. They're the old foe.
Serbia was a regional conflict. Awful as the Balkan war was it's not the same scale of importance to NATO higher ups I'd imagine.
You already see it in how much we've sent to Ukraine to effectively fight for us.
Take Russia out? Who wanted that? Europe wanted to finish Nord Stream 2 and keep investing in Russia. There are still many in Europe who want to end the war and get back into business. Do you really think Scholz would be willing to attack Russia? I can't see it.
Civil war is a war within a country
A war is when it’s between two ethnicities (ie Russia and Ukraine)
If multiple nations get involved ( ie nato v Russia) it would in theory become a world war (ie it became a world war when Germany invaded Poland, then France , Belgium, Holland etc despite it only being one aggressor)
A WW is fought around the world. WW2 Was fought on all continents (except Antarctica, and the Americas saw only very few attacks or naval battles). A war about Ukraine still is just a regional thing as long as no ither fronts are opened.
There were several countries involved in the invasion of Iraq and that wasn't considered a World War. To be honest all this talk of WW3 in relation to the Russian invasion of Ukraine has puzzled me, unless China got involved (either in europe or in relation to Taiwan) then it wouldn't really be a World War.
This can't be seriously official government position, can it? Without a source sounds like someone drunk and frustrated made that proposal.
How the feck can they guarantee the safety of Russian ships that are firing missiles at them?
What planet does this fool live on.
They have nukes.
OK, so Nato planes then. What could go wrong.
So you're saying that a war that involves a nuclear power is a world war?