Larssen wrote:
And so the glee with which many were spectating this war turns to hatred. I see it in the political class as well. They were practically falling over one another in ever more calls for support to the war effort, sanctions towards the Putin regime, and so on. All of it justified, of course. But if we're seeing Putin order his nuclear arsenal on 'high alert' and only a few hours later they're already ejected from SWIFT, and a few hours afterwards Borrell is boasting about donating fighter jets to a proxy war, and the next morning we're already reading about new rounds of sanctions all with no patience for a response from the Kremlin..
Well too fucking bad, the Kremlin isn't going to give a response until they're strangled so no point waiting.
I'm sure we should have continued shipping iron or and oil to the Nazis after Poland was invaded because 'muh economy'
This might be too much of an insight but decision making in the last few days has been little more than top officials and politicians making emotion-based calls, with little regard for the frameworks that are supposed to guide their actions and with little if any discussion with their supporting staff. You wake up and whatever you did yesterday no longer matters. Who can even keep up with this barrage of sanctions? It's also madness the way in which each of them is openly proclaiming their exact contribution to the Ukrainian war effort. Every 'book' is being thrown out the fucking window.
This isn't going to happen according to the "International Relations for Dummies" playbook as Putin has thrown out everything he's signed up to and he's erratic and umpredictable.
Everyone proclaiming what they're doing - Putin is a deranged bully, the only two things he will understand are a solid punch in the face and an array of allies making clear very publicly he's not getting what he wants.
With the benefit of hindsight it would have been easier, knowing he's unhinged, to call his bluff and agree a moratorium on Ukraine invading NATO. Probably would have made exactly no difference but worth a go.
Putin clearly miscalculated, as I would have done based on the West's past history, and has no way back, only forward.
Now the situation is shit, Russia can besiege and bombard the various cities for as long as they like.
How long will we stand by and watch that? What can we do exactly?
Besides hoping someone puts a bullet in him due to internal pressure from sanctions, creating a non-nuclear escalation or hoping the Ukrainians somehow win I'm not sure what there is.
Obviously there should be a Europe-wide open door for temporary sanctuary, we're moving too slow on that.
