SeborrheicDermatitis [any]

I wasn’t referring to the US as one of the ‘less murder-y’ ones because it is a settler-colonial state. Though those killed by law enforcement in Iran are still considerably higher, e.g., during the Jina Ahmini protests over 300 were killed in only a month. This is even if you count literally every US police murder as part of a campaign of political repression, of which plenty were but certainly not all.

I don’t know why you thought I was as I didn’t even remotely begin to say it?

IDK how anyone-whether Hexbear or not-can possibly deny the fact that different governments rely on coercion to differing extents to maintain control.

Some governments are more willing to resort to violent repression against their domestic enemies than others, though.

e.g., places like Iran, Saudi are quicker to do so than most, even for internal enemies of equivalent threat to the state itself.

For instance:, during the Jina Ahmini protests over 300 were killed in only a month.

All states and all governments use violence or the threat of it to uphold their rule, but some are more reliant on violence versus other methods of control than others…

Plus some are more willing to use violence in foreign policy vs domestic policy.

That’s fully understandable and probably the better take tbh. If I was in social science mode I’d agree with you, this is just my rough vibe from collating stuff so I fully appreciate that.

Tbf both were a sign of a troubled state but the Wagner mutiny was waaaaaaaaayyy more serious than Jan 6.

I have a few friends who do that I trust in this matter + I follow a lot of people on both sides of the war (support-wise) who do speak Russian and who report it into English. While this doesn’t give as good a view as someone who actually speaks Russian, it still provides a good view overall and I haven’t had any reason to doubt my conclusions on this matter accordingly.

Of course, you are under no obligation to believe me, and I obviously wont take offence or whatever if you disagree, it’s just what I believe based on the evidence I have collated. It’s impossible to be certain until proper quantitative data is put together in a good study, though.

There has been no quantitative data released but based on solid reporting in re-taken areas e.g., Bucha it is evident that there were large-scale arbitrary executions.

By contrast, Russian media has presented little evidence of large-scale executions. There have been individual cases but there is no evidence to suggest it is as systemic.

While you are right to critique my claim, which I should not have made with such certainty perhaps, one can collate the available evidence and make a claim with reasonable-albeit not total-confidence. If Russia did have evidence of large-scale execution of PoWs, they’d obviously put it in their own friendly media outlets + it would be in Russian Telegrams.

Bad source for sure though there is ample evidence (you can watch videos of it) of quite large-scale execution and torture of PoWs among Russian and Wagner troops. It has happened on both sides but certainly far more on the Russian side…

I don’t think volunteers in the army itself count as mercenaries. Certainly I see no reason why international law as such doesn’t apply to them.

I really don’t think it is good to justify arbitrary executions of PoWs.

The Taliban were willing (after a bit of threatening and cajoling) to hand Osama bin Laden over to a third party for him to go to trial. There was no need to invade based on the justification as the Taliban were genuinely afraid of the invasion and were willing to co-operate, just as they have been now. In the end, the invasion did nothing anyway and Al Qaeda’s peak came AFTER the Taliban was toppled. There was never any chance of a cohesive post-Taliban government emerging from the Northern Alliance. By this point the US had decided on war and the whole MIC machinery was rolling, so it was too late to turn back (as US leaders thought, with their reliance on a captured media and lobbying from the MIC creating strategic liabilities within the US state).

The invasion was not necessary for US security aims and certainly could never have bettered Afghanistan, though.

Not sure if they’re targeting it that effectively, not seen articles saying so yet but might be wrong. I think they’re targeting civilian infrastructure as much as strategic infrastructure (same mistakes the Nazis made in the Blitz!).

If that’s their actual justification rather than just what they tell the media then it is flabbergastingly incompetent.

Maybe they just didn’t want to deplete their own stocks and don’t really care how the counteroffensive goes as long as they can continue selling weapons but then there are flaws in that logic, too, since it degrades the idea of invincibility and total technological superiorty that the western MIC have tried hard to portray in recent years. I don’t know, maybe there are just idiots in the top brass of the US political-military institutions but you’d think they’d be more smart than thinking “gumption” can carry the day.

I agree with you in terms of the dysfunction of Ukrainian political strategy surrounding Bakhmut. Politicians w/ no military planning experience intervening in what was previously a well-run campaign to achieve a symbolic victory against the advice of their own generals and even western advisors.

Though it was a big blunder on the Ukrainian side, yes. Political leaders interfered in military strategy when they shouldn’t have done. IIRC DW reported that some senior Ukrainian military leaders wanted to make a tactical withdrawal but the government vetoed it.

IIRC Ukraine still controlled part of the T0504 highway within the city at their worst point and since then they’ve taken back a couple of blocks.

Yeah western intelligence didn’t want Ukraine to die on the hill of Bakhmut (figuratively), Ukrainian leadership chose it for symbolic/domestic reasons rather than strategic. They never did take the whole city though and have since fallen back a bit, with the Ukrainian counteroffensive managing to take a few blocks back. Not too much, though. Ofc Russia has had the gradual advantage in Bakhmut for most of the last year but it was a grinding, incredibly slow, incredibly damaging battle for both sides. It was perhaps unwise for the Ukrainian leadership to make that move, though.

Sorry, I meant Zaporizhzhia. I am pretty muddle-brained atm as I have my increased anxiety meds dose recently.

I’m very confident the parts of Ukraine that have been trying to leave since 2014 mostly want to leave. I know ethnic Russians and Russian speakers are most heavily concentrated in the east, not just in the pre-war separatist regions but surrounding them, too. I’m sure war breaking out caused a lot of people who were on the fence to pick a side, and I can imagine someone who speaks Russian at home but wasn’t radical enough to be part of a pre-war separatist movement throwing in with the much stronger country, that speaks their language, that doesn’t have troops running around with neo-Nazi patches and flags.

Certainly some did, especially in the Donbass regions, but AFAIK never as much in Zaporizhzhia or Kherson-there is significant data to show that, while obviously Eastern Ukrainians have had a difficult relationship w/ the central government, they still opposed the Russian invasion and supported defence efforts.

What I’ve seen is breakdowns of ethnic Russians and Russian speakers, which are predominantly in the east. I’ve also seen pre-war election results that show these eastern regions disagree with western Ukraine on national politics.

Yes, you are right, but voting patterns show there is this polarisation between east and west Ukraine, but that does not ipso facto imply support for the Russian invasion, much less annexation into the Russian state. There is polling to suggest that even in Kherson, Kharkiv, Zaporizhzhia, and such, there was widespread opposition to the invasion and a ‘rally-to-the-flag’ effect had led to a temporary support in all regions (Donbass not included) for Zelensky and for the Ukrainian defence effort. As I say I can go digging for them if you’d like. I am not saying all Ukrainians hate Russian language and that there is no autonomist movements in the east, just that the data I have seen indicates widespread opposition to the invasion and annexations. However, there is a lack of data in the Donbass region so I simply do not know what people support or think in there as the L/DPRs were not democratic.

I know, I’m very #blessed.

Because modern China is not socialist and its leadership has no intention of moving in that direction (indeed, they are moving in the opposite direction, including under Xi).

China isn’t about to invade Taiwan anyway. Not much strategic gain + the Chinese leadership is smarter than the Russian one.

Then why did Russia fail to take Bakhmut, do you think?

Also thank you for the link. ISW has posted some bad content in the past and this helps to explain it, I think. I appreciate it.