2 hours ago, FlorC said:

I was not surprised.

Tomorrow's news today (yes Alex Jones) predicted this months earlier.

I predict that my clock will show 4 o'cock today. I also predict that the sun will rise and will set tomorrow. My clairvoyance is strong because I can see the water rising on the beach today, and it will also be very low later on.

On 9/30/2025 at 11:20 AM, Sydebolle said:

Not quite Sir, the civil war in Ukraine goes back to 2014 with a well hidden genocide as we know. The Russians were teased ever since the re-unification of German's communist German Demoractic Republic (GDR) with West Germany. That meant that GDR left the Warsaw Pact to join NATO, as West Germany is a NATO member. 
The unification and subsequent release of GDR into NATO, under the watchful eyes of the Americans, was agreed upon between Kohl (West German Chancellor) and his foreign minister Genscher, the Soviet Secy General Gorbachev and his foreign minister Shevardnadze, the NATO Secy General Wörner in Minsk. The Soviet condition to their agreement was, that NATO would not expand any further to the East; that was the agreement 30 years ago. 

Warsaw Pact collapsed 2009, the NATO expansion went unhindered East and has all the hand-writing of short-changing USSR/Russia oncemore again. In October 1962 US President Kennedy promised USSR Secy General Khrushchev to close the US military bases in Italy and Turkey .... provided the Soviets would withdraw from Cuba. Khrushchev left Cuba and the US did not do a thing which brought Khrushchev's career - who lost face big time among the Comrades - to a screeching end at the Kremlin. 

Fast forward 20 years ahead, a tit-for-tat deal again and NATO did not stick to their part of the commitment. Putin walks into the Kremlin 20+ years ago and is meanwhile the longest serving sparring partner in this story. If you are aware that Putin is not Russian but a Soviet by mindset (he spent his formative years as a Soviet; more than half his life (40 years) as a Soviet and has seen it all. 

Well, if you ask me, you can tease something or somebody so and so long until the dam breaks and the dam broke 3 ½ years ago. Arguably he could have resorted to non-violent methods like switching off the gas supplies to the West due to "maintenance work on the pipelines" which could take years. But given spineless European leadership, the puppetmistress Von der Leyen and her puppets across the road at NATO ........ 

To conclude, listen very very very careful, what Russians say as in most cases they are patient until they had it - and in this case I can understand Russia in general and Putin in particular. 

Game over soon - for Ukraine and plenty of reparation business for the West on behest of the West and paid for by the Ukrainians with wheat supplies for the coming 50 years or similar - see Iraq where oil flows as barter pay-back for the next decades ........ 

What narratives such as yours fail to take into account is, all of those people who lived under Soviet domination for decades (and, for many, Russian domination for centuries) have their own agency; they have the right to decide for themselves which direction to go in. And during the 1990s nearly all chose to join “the West” by seeking membership in the EU and NATO. Not that the neoliberal capitalist model is without its own flaws, but it clearly offers a greater chance of freedom and prosperity for ordinary people than anything the Russians have offered through most of history.

 

And however you read the “promise” made to the Russians that NATO would not expand further east than the former East Germany (and the specifics of that “promise” are debatable), such a promise means nothing to people in Poland, Estonia, Ukraine, etc., because, again, they make their own choices as to where they see the future of their own countries.

 

Slovakia or Romania or even Ukraine being in NATO is no threat to Russia -- nobody is marching on Moscow (the only “army” to have done that since WWII is Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner Group a couple of years ago, and they didn’t get very far). In fact, in the 1990s, there was a great deal of cooperation between NATO and Russia, until Putin got power and started dreaming he was Peter the Great. Ideally, such cooperation can resume once Putin is gone. The Russian people certainly deserve better.

17 hours ago, FlorC said:

No not because the Russians failed but :

Moldova's Pro-EU Party Wins Key Vote After Govt Ban On Several 'Pro-Russian' Parties.

https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/moldovas-pro-eu-party-wins-key-vote-after-govt-ban-several-pro-russian-parties

 

Authoritarian EU behind this , just like in Romania.

More Russian propaganda. They have been banned for some reason....

 

"On Friday, the commission excluded the Heart of Moldova and Moldova Mare parties, citing allegations of illegal financing, voter bribery and undeclared foreign funds. Both parties had campaigned on closer ties with Moscow, challenging the pro-Western government ahead of Sunday’s ballot."

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/26/moldova-bans-pro-russian-parties-ahead-of-sundays-election

 

Anyway, three other pro-Russian parties participated in this election and they did not win.

 

And once again, this lie about the EU. It plays no role in national elections in member States. 🤣

Translation: As we told Finland in 1939, we have no plans to invade you.

 

Also: the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in 1939 guaranteed that Germany would not attack Russia.

2 hours ago, Cory1848 said:

What narratives such as yours fail to take into account is, all of those people who lived under Soviet domination for decades (and, for many, Russian domination for centuries) have their own agency; they have the right to decide for themselves which direction to go in. And during the 1990s nearly all chose to join “the West” by seeking membership in the EU and NATO. Not that the neoliberal capitalist model is without its own flaws, but it clearly offers a greater chance of freedom and prosperity for ordinary people than anything the Russians have offered through most of history.

 

And however you read the “promise” made to the Russians that NATO would not expand further east than the former East Germany (and the specifics of that “promise” are debatable), such a promise means nothing to people in Poland, Estonia, Ukraine, etc., because, again, they make their own choices as to where they see the future of their own countries.

 

Slovakia or Romania or even Ukraine being in NATO is no threat to Russia -- nobody is marching on Moscow (the only “army” to have done that since WWII is Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner Group a couple of years ago, and they didn’t get very far). In fact, in the 1990s, there was a great deal of cooperation between NATO and Russia, until Putin got power and started dreaming he was Peter the Great. Ideally, such cooperation can resume once Putin is gone. The Russian people certainly deserve better.

Russia's main problem is its failed model and government. It's repellent to other nations, except when they are governed by autocratic leaders. People don't want to live under Russian rules, and in particular when they have already experienced Russian or Soviet domination.

 

Had Russia been ruled by a competent leader and government, focused on the well-being of its citizens and on realising the huge economic potential of this country, Ukraine would probably not have distanced itself from Russia.

7 minutes ago, candide said:

Russia's main problem is its failed model and government.

 

Well, I would hazard a guess that losing 20 million souls to save America, the UK and the entire world from Nazi Germany was possibly also a teeny weenie little problem for Russia.

 

Not to mention being saddled with the world's worst political system, communism, for over 80 years.

7 minutes ago, Cameroni said:

 

Well, I would hazard a guess that losing 20 million souls to save America, the UK and the entire world from Nazi Germany was possibly also a teeny weenie little problem for Russia.

 

Not to mention being saddled with the world's worst political system, communism, for over 80 years.

Mainly to save Russia after Hitler broke the agreement. And the Sovier Union collapsed more than 30 years ago.

 

Not worse than Poland in the 80s, which lost 20% of it's population during WW2, and was then exploited by the Soviet Union.

 

And Russia had a huge potential, thanks to its natural resources, and also its human resources (in particular in S&T).

 

China was in a much worse state, and the Soviet Union was much more advanced than China. See the difference in terms of economic and technological development? 🙂

58 minutes ago, candide said:

Mainly to save Russia after Hitler broke the agreement. And the Sovier Union collapsed more than 30 years ago.

 

Not worse than Poland in the 80s, which lost 20% of it's population during WW2, and was then exploited by the Soviet Union.

 

And Russia had a huge potential, thanks to its natural resources, and also its human resources (in particular in S&T).

 

China was in a much worse state, and the Soviet Union was much more advanced than China. See the difference in terms of economic and technological development? 🙂

 

Mainly, yes, but the net result was that they defeated Hitler for America and the UK, at a cost of 20 million people, their best and brightest.

 

Far more losses than Poland in absolute terms, if you don't look at proportion of population size.

 

The natural resource curse is well known and not as much of a benefit as one would think. Plenty of countries with natural resources do not achieve economic superstardom.

 

I would guess that Russia's military spending has also caused some problems for its economy.

 

For a long time of course Russia, or rather the USSR, was seen as technologically more advanced than China. It is only fair recently that China obtained the mantle of technological superpower, mostly on the back of stolen technology, stolen from the West.

 

1 hour ago, Cameroni said:

Mainly, yes, but the net result was that they defeated Hitler for America and the UK, at a cost of 20 million people, their best and brightest.

The net result was that STALIN defeated Hitler for his/Russia's benefit to the detriment of Poland, most of Eastern Europe and the Balkans, America and the UK!

2 hours ago, candide said:

And once again, this lie about the EU. It plays no role in national elections in member States. 

Yeah right , dream on.

1 minute ago, FlorC said:

Yeah right , dream on.

In other words, you have nothing! 

3 hours ago, candide said:

In other words, you have nothing! 

The EU has hardly been shy about meddling in the elections of its member states. Earlier this year, former EU commissioner Thierry Breton openly admitted on French television that Brussels was largely to blame for cancelling Romania’s presidential elections last December. The Romanian Supreme Court prevented the second round of voting, ostensibly due to fears that the leading candidate—the radical right-wing, Eurosceptic Călin Georgescu—had been compromised by Russian involvement. The election was stalled and Georgescu was banned from participating, according to Breton, on the say-so of the EU. As if this stunning admission wasn’t bad enough, Breton went on to boast that “we did it in Romania and we will obviously do it in Germany if necessary.” 

 

From :

https://europeanconservative.com/articles/commentary/whos-really-meddling-in-european-democracy/

52 minutes ago, FlorC said:

The EU has hardly been shy about meddling in the elections of its member states. Earlier this year, former EU commissioner Thierry Breton openly admitted on French television that Brussels was largely to blame for cancelling Romania’s presidential elections last December. The Romanian Supreme Court prevented the second round of voting, ostensibly due to fears that the leading candidate—the radical right-wing, Eurosceptic Călin Georgescu—had been compromised by Russian involvement. The election was stalled and Georgescu was banned from participating, according to Breton, on the say-so of the EU. As if this stunning admission wasn’t bad enough, Breton went on to boast that “we did it in Romania and we will obviously do it in Germany if necessary.” 

 

From :

https://europeanconservative.com/articles/commentary/whos-really-meddling-in-european-democracy/

Lol! This not what he said. This is what Musk said that he said! Another proof, if needed, that Musk is a MAGA liar! 

 

He said:

«Attendons de voir ce qu’il va se passer et pour l’instant, gardons notre sang-froid et faisons appliquer nos lois en Europe, lorsque celles-ci risquent d’être circonvenues et qu’elles peuvent, si on ne les applique pas, conduire à des interférences. On l’a fait en Roumanie, il faudra évidemment le faire, si c’est nécessaire, en Allemagne.»

 

https://www.liberation.fr/checknews/thierry-breton-a-t-il-avoue-que-lue-avait-annule-lelection-en-roumanie-et-comptait-faire-de-meme-en-allemagne-20250112_HT2XIUM47ZAPFDGPZQOPMVFX7Y/

 

Which is translated by Google as:

"Let's wait and see what happens, and for now, let's keep our cool and enforce our laws in Europe when they risk being circumvented and when, if not enforced, they can lead to interference. We did it in Romania, and we will obviously have to do it, if necessary, in Germany."

 

As you can see, there is no mention of interference by the EU, it's a lie! It's just about enforcing laws. 

 

Also here, Breton's reply to Musk.

 

 

23 hours ago, Cory1848 said:

What narratives such as yours fail to take into account is, all of those people who lived under Soviet domination for decades (and, for many, Russian domination for centuries) have their own agency; they have the right to decide for themselves which direction to go in. And during the 1990s nearly all chose to join “the West” by seeking membership in the EU and NATO. Not that the neoliberal capitalist model is without its own flaws, but it clearly offers a greater chance of freedom and prosperity for ordinary people than anything the Russians have offered through most of history.

 

And however you read the “promise” made to the Russians that NATO would not expand further east than the former East Germany (and the specifics of that “promise” are debatable), such a promise means nothing to people in Poland, Estonia, Ukraine, etc., because, again, they make their own choices as to where they see the future of their own countries.

 

Slovakia or Romania or even Ukraine being in NATO is no threat to Russia -- nobody is marching on Moscow (the only “army” to have done that since WWII is Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Wagner Group a couple of years ago, and they didn’t get very far). In fact, in the 1990s, there was a great deal of cooperation between NATO and Russia, until Putin got power and started dreaming he was Peter the Great. Ideally, such cooperation can resume once Putin is gone. The Russian people certainly deserve better.

Agree to your statement except that Ukraine is not NATO. Explain the 4,000 American troops with NATO-colours on New Year's Day along the Polish-Russian border for no apparent reason (except teasing the Russians?). Putin empties the McDonalds in Moscow, flew those burgers to the border and handed over burgers to those freezing American boys - not having a clue why and what on Earth they were doing along said border - and wished them a happy new year. 

NATO is the issue, not Ukraine. The Russians believed that NATO would stick to their part of the deal which did not happen. It was not the Polish or Estonians begging for a switch from Warsaw Pact to NATO; NATO actively canvassed the respective governments to join - for apparent reason and possibly with some convincing arguments handed over to the powers-to-be in little brown manilla envelopes? Truth will never come out, of course, but the average Ferenc, Igor or whoever else had no reason and mostly no understanding of the difference between both. And that's my point; as long as Brussels breathes down those most incompetent politician's neck ........ 

 

On 9/30/2025 at 3:30 PM, Alan Zweibel said:

Less similar than Spanish is to Italian. Less similar than Italian is to French.

 

Ukrainian and Russian share roughly 55% to 62% lexical similarity, which is not enough to make them mutually intelligible—no more than an average English speaker could automatically comprehend Dutch. In practice, Ukrainian and Russian have vocabulary differences that can quickly confound a non-native speaker.

https://www.trustedtranslations.com/blog/do-ukrainians-and-russians-speak-the-same-language?utm_source=chatgpt.com

 

Spanish and Italian have around 82% of their vocabulary in common. This doesn't mean that the words are exactly the same between the two languages, but that they have similar roots and that they are linguistically related.

To compare, Italian has 89% of its vocabulary in common with French and Spanish has 89% in common with Portuguese.

https://autolingual.com/italian-vs-spanish/?utm_source=chatgpt.com

While all this is true (I assume, at least) it remains a fact, that Ukraine is even newer than Israel; 30+ years ago Ukraine did not exist and was a part of the Soviet Union. All Ukrainian I met (possibly 20 from all over today's Ukraine) spoke Russian (as well); possibly due to the fact that they are all over 60 years old.

15 minutes ago, Sydebolle said:

While all this is true (I assume, at least) it remains a fact, that Ukraine is even newer than Israel; 30+ years ago Ukraine did not exist and was a part of the Soviet Union. All Ukrainian I met (possibly 20 from all over today's Ukraine) spoke Russian (as well); possibly due to the fact that they are all over 60 years old.

The Soviet Union was an union of states. So Ukraine as a state did exist during the Soviet Union.

2 minutes ago, stevenl said:

The Soviet Union was an union of states. So Ukraine as a state did exist during the Soviet Union.

Actually, it was a union of republics. Which only makes your case stronger.

21 hours ago, Sydebolle said:

Agree to your statement except that Ukraine is not NATO. Explain the 4,000 American troops with NATO-colours on New Year's Day along the Polish-Russian border for no apparent reason (except teasing the Russians?). Putin empties the McDonalds in Moscow, flew those burgers to the border and handed over burgers to those freezing American boys - not having a clue why and what on Earth they were doing along said border - and wished them a happy new year. 

NATO is the issue, not Ukraine. The Russians believed that NATO would stick to their part of the deal which did not happen. It was not the Polish or Estonians begging for a switch from Warsaw Pact to NATO; NATO actively canvassed the respective governments to join - for apparent reason and possibly with some convincing arguments handed over to the powers-to-be in little brown manilla envelopes? Truth will never come out, of course, but the average Ferenc, Igor or whoever else had no reason and mostly no understanding of the difference between both. And that's my point; as long as Brussels breathes down those most incompetent politician's neck ........ 

 

Don’t you dare tell me what the Estonians perceived or did not perceive with respect to the Warsaw Pact vs. the EU/NATO in the 1990s. I’m an Estonian. Don’t pretend that you know what the “average Ferenc” understood of the situation at that time, or that you know enough to judge the “competence” of their leaders.

 

Sure, NATO and the EU actively invited new members who qualified (note that last bit: *who qualified*), and if the Russian leadership felt like some “promise” had been broken with those organizations’ eastern expansion, well boo hoo. And of course the “military industrial complex” usually plays some role in military alliances, as long as the global defense industry is permitted to be a profit-seeking activity. But the primary factor here is eastern and Baltic Europe’s headlong rush to join Western institutions in the 1990s, while they had a window of opportunity, and ON THEIR OWN VOLITION, knowing full well -- and knowing a LOT better than you do apparently -- that Brussels is a far more cooperative, and judicious, and beneficial “overseer” than Moscow. There’s nothing more convincing than historical precedent.

1 hour ago, Cory1848 said:

Don’t you dare tell me what the Estonians perceived or did not perceive with respect to the Warsaw Pact vs. the EU/NATO in the 1990s. I’m an Estonian. Don’t pretend that you know what the “average Ferenc” understood of the situation at that time, or that you know enough to judge the “competence” of their leaders.

 

Sure, NATO and the EU actively invited new members who qualified (note that last bit: *who qualified*), and if the Russian leadership felt like some “promise” had been broken with those organizations’ eastern expansion, well boo hoo. And of course the “military industrial complex” usually plays some role in military alliances, as long as the global defense industry is permitted to be a profit-seeking activity. But the primary factor here is eastern and Baltic Europe’s headlong rush to join Western institutions in the 1990s, while they had a window of opportunity, and ON THEIR OWN VOLITION, knowing full well -- and knowing a LOT better than you do apparently -- that Brussels is a far more cooperative, and judicious, and beneficial “overseer” than Moscow. There’s nothing more convincing than historical precedent.

Are we having a bad day and an even worse temper? 

The average citizen had no clue back in the day; all this was decided by the respective governments and their - in some cases - convincing opposites and tools. 
Ferenc is not Estonian but Hungarian - in case you dare to know and your nationalism is duly noted but relatively irrelevant to the point I rose in yesterday's comments. Cool it, lay back, have a G&T - the initial subject was and is that Navrov declared no attack but will certainly defend Russian (neither Estonian nor Hungarian or Polish) interest. And that, Sir, was the subject so don't lose it over your self-confidence, will you! 

57 minutes ago, Sydebolle said:

Are we having a bad day and an even worse temper? 

The average citizen had no clue back in the day; all this was decided by the respective governments and their - in some cases - convincing opposites and tools. 
Ferenc is not Estonian but Hungarian - in case you dare to know and your nationalism is duly noted but relatively irrelevant to the point I rose in yesterday's comments. Cool it, lay back, have a G&T - the initial subject was and is that Navrov declared no attack but will certainly defend Russian (neither Estonian nor Hungarian or Polish) interest. And that, Sir, was the subject so don't lose it over your self-confidence, will you! 

No, I was having a fairly average day, but your statements about the cluelessness of “Ferencs and Igors” are patronizing and insulting. And my “self-confidence” comes from having personal experience with events from only three decades ago. If you also have personal experience, I’m happy to listen. If you get your information primarily from RT, then let’s not waste our time.

 

Speaking more kindly, I’ll just say that your statements are ill-informed. I can’t speak definitively for Hungarians or Poles (though I know plenty of them, too), but the “average citizen” in the Baltic states very much “had a clue” in the 1990s, and indeed going back many decades under Soviet rule, after their countries were forcibly annexed into the Soviet Union in 1940. Many “average” Lithuanians lost their lives after Lithuania’s declaration of independence (under Vytautas Landsbergis) in 1990. A year earlier, in 1989, about 2 million “average” Balts formed a human chain across the three countries protesting the continued Soviet occupation. That’s one in every four Balts. While the demonstration was planned to coincide with protests in Western cities against Soviet human rights violations, it was organized locally.

 

I’ll promise to try to be nicer <stupid smiley face> if you promise to broaden your sources of information. OK? You take care now --

On 10/3/2025 at 11:26 AM, Cory1848 said:

No, I was having a fairly average day, but your statements about the cluelessness of “Ferencs and Igors” are patronizing and insulting. And my “self-confidence” comes from having personal experience with events from only three decades ago. If you also have personal experience, I’m happy to listen. If you get your information primarily from RT, then let’s not waste our time.

 

Speaking more kindly, I’ll just say that your statements are ill-informed. I can’t speak definitively for Hungarians or Poles (though I know plenty of them, too), but the “average citizen” in the Baltic states very much “had a clue” in the 1990s, and indeed going back many decades under Soviet rule, after their countries were forcibly annexed into the Soviet Union in 1940. Many “average” Lithuanians lost their lives after Lithuania’s declaration of independence (under Vytautas Landsbergis) in 1990. A year earlier, in 1989, about 2 million “average” Balts formed a human chain across the three countries protesting the continued Soviet occupation. That’s one in every four Balts. While the demonstration was planned to coincide with protests in Western cities against Soviet human rights violations, it was organized locally.

 

I’ll promise to try to be nicer <stupid smiley face> if you promise to broaden your sources of information. OK? You take care now --

The subject is Warsaw Pact vs NATO; forget about the entire rest. Sachs' con·cise speech is self-explanatory and one realistic possibility to defuse the wick. Of course it would affect USD 800 billion not being spent on European taxpayers burden to feed the war gear and armament industry ....... money talks, b"*ç%"*çt walks. The old game, again, over and over again :-(
 

22 hours ago, Sydebolle said:

The subject is Warsaw Pact vs NATO; forget about the entire rest. Sachs' con·cise speech is self-explanatory and one realistic possibility to defuse the wick. Of course it would affect USD 800 billion not being spent on European taxpayers burden to feed the war gear and armament industry ....... money talks, b"*ç%"*çt walks. The old game, again, over and over again.

 

With no disrespect to Jeffrey Sachs, he is widely seen as a Russian apologist, and I agree with such assessments. While acknowledging the dangers of extreme forms of nationalism, I tend to favor national sovereignty and the rights of nations to determine their own future, as opposed to the great-power politics and “spheres of influence” that were prevalent in the nineteenth century, which Putin wishes to resurrect. Here’s one article that rebuts Sachs’s views:

https://www.nzinitiative.org.nz/reports-and-media/opinion/the-wilful-blindness-of-putins-apologists/

 

 

 

Russia sinks to even lower depravity Deliberatly targeting a Passenger Train.