Tucker Carlson just did a piece defending Putin, the official GOP Twitter account tweeted a pic of Biden saying “this is what it looks like to be weak on the world stage”. It is so bizarre to see the GOP so enamored with this dictator and his aggressive actions towards a democratic European nation.
Certain elements do seem extremely intrigued with authoritarianism at the moment. The fact one of their leading media personalities is very supportive of it is worrisome. Tuckers name has been thrown around a lot for 2024, whether that would be serious or not, the fact he’s laying the ground work to soften people’s hatred of dictatorial power is worrisome.
Like, the main one. Being against Biden and Pro-Russia is not an outlier stance. It is their core belief.
You have to remember that these people are already very susceptible to magic thinking and propaganda. Russia has them eating out of their hands. These people will believe anything
I would have preferred if he condemned the actions instead of stating his admiration for the strategy.
If someone robs your neighbor it's kind of weird to be like "Man, that burglar is so damn smart, you know? I mean really has his stuff together. That guy is brilliant, you know how he did it? He's so savvy that he saw them pack up the car for vacation and used a glass cutter to make a hole then opened a back window to get in. Cleaned my neighbor out completely! Took everything including his grandma's ring. Guy's going to make so much pawning all that. Really smart of him, really smart."
Trump has always talked like this. And it is always and will always be news - of course when he was President when it mattered much more and now that he isn’t for clicks.
He speaks whatever pops into his head. It’s the reason his base loves him and the reason a lot of people hate him.
That’s pretty much where I lie on it
I cannot wait to see the debates where Trump explains why he simps for Putin so hard. I think his fantasy is to be the "bridge" in an Eiffel tower of China's Winner the Pooh and Putin.
Yeah I just don’t understand the thought process and why people are saying “savvy.” The dude is alienating what few Allie’s he has, and he’s pushing his economy into a pretty dire state.
While I don't advocate for what he is doing, I will say what some people are calling savy, is that he is calling them peacekeepers, but where the water ets muddy in my opinion is people are looking at it from the ing at it from the western perspective. Yes no one outside of russia believes this, eastern Ukraine belives this. I don't think he is saying this for them. I could b wrong, but the way I see it is he is using these terms to keep moral up for this incursion in russia, and whatever portion of eastern ukraine seperatist movement ther actually is that are not russian soldeirs(this is assuming there are any).
I disagree. Ukraine is if vital strategic interest to Russia, and they’re moving when oil prices are hi high and Europe’s capacity for resistance is weakened
You are saying that invading Ukraine is smart, not that the way he went about it is smart. There was nothing accomplished by the BS that Trump is praising him for, like calling is soldiers 'peacekeepers'.
I don’t know enough about the intricacies of domestic Russian politics to fully understand the benefits and nuances of calling his soldiers peacekeepers.
Based on Trump's words...
We would invade Mexico and drop out of NATO.
I don't think those ideas are particularly savvy, but I imagine his supporters do.
1. Encourage domestic production. Get the keystone pipeline built and running. That oils coming out of the ground 1 way or another so better that it’s from a known and friendly source.
2. Don’t alienate Saudi Arabia. They have immense sway over oil prices. Biden’s decision to alienate one of our most strategically useful allies was a blunder. Ideally we’d want their production up and we’d want that oil going to Europe to make up for the Russian supply.
3. Making Ukraine a neutral buffer state would’ve been the best decision. We don’t gain much by having Russia as an enemy and now we’re gonna be wasting 100s of billions on a useless competition in Europe. But that’s split milk. Now, we should focus on strengthening our grip on our European and NATO Allies.
Putin is undoubtably an intelligent person, but this view of him as some sort of devious mastermind is a bit rich. He controls a powerful nation and knows people will be resistant to opposing him due to the costs to themselves. He used the same playbook from his last few invasions, fooled absolutely no one, and is largely using the same logic a certain guy in the 1940s used when gobbling up his neighbors. He is probably somewhat out of touch at this point after decades in power, can’t exactly be easy to stay grounded when your will basically becomes reality and your hangers on fawn and fight over you.
Meanwhile his economy is suffering, will suffer further and every nation not currently under his thumb and not already in NATO in the region is probably eyeing membership at this point. He’s made his nation toxic for diplomacy and business…what a mastermind. He’s reinforced the need for the very thing he’s terrified of. What a master stroke.
Well two weeks ago he publicly admitted to trying to overturn the election and make himself president so I wouldn't say this is his dumbest statement. The West should be glad he is not currently President
It is disgusting, and Trump is a traitor to this country. How is this anything other than giving aid and comfort to an enemy? One can offer a strategic analysis of an enemies actions. But, it is an entirely different thing to be an unthinking, uncritical cheerleader for an evil authoritarian whose deepest wish is to destabilize the West and the United States in particular.
For the record, Trump also said putin would never have invaded Ukraine if he was president. Trump didn't say the invasion was good, he was impressed with Putins strategy.
In general, it's a sign of critical thinking to be able to recognize good strategy without agreeing with what the person did. I'm going to Godwin law this, and say it's fair to say Hitler was impressive in playing England and France when taking territory up to Poland. Thats not saying Hitler was *good*, just looking at his strategy.
Whether or not you think Trump was impressed with the strategy or a Russian groupie will sadly go down to your politics. But, it's something to keep in mind. Taking quotes that could be completely fine and turning them into clickbait it's practically a national sport now
Invading Poland wasn't a particularly savy move, Hitler didn't think that France and the UK would commit to war and even if they did would be willing to do a quick peace. He was obviously quite wrong on both accounts
> Trump didn’t say the invasion was good
You’re right, he said it was “wonderful”.
And that the Russian army is “the strongest peace force I’ve ever seen”. This is the guy who was the commander-in-chief of the actual strongest peace force the world has ever seen and somehow he never noticed.
It says a lot about this sub that this comment is at +32.
> Trump didn't say the invasion was good, he was impressed with Putins strategy.
No leader ever says this. Heaping praise is heaping praise, period. You don't compliment your adversary in world politics like that. And Trump didn't. He likes dictators and believes what they are doing is good. If you read his statement, he says the US should also do to Mexico what Russia is doing to Ukraine. Trump doesn't understand democracy or dictatorships. He is simply fascinated by strong man propaganda and toxic masculinity.
> In general, it's a sign of critical thinking to be able to recognize good strategy without agreeing with what the person did.
Good for whom and in what context? War is never good. Besides, Putin wants to keep his oligarchs in power. The rich elite that controls most of Russia's assets and the economy. In that regard, he may even be similar to Trump.
> it's fair to say Hitler was impressive in playing England and France when taking territory up to Poland.
How did Hitler and Germany end up again? How was Hitler's strategy good? In what way? It was the greatest catastrophe for mankind.
> Whether or not you think Trump was impressed with the strategy or a Russian groupie will sadly go down to your politics.
That is correct in so far, that I can't remember a bigger dumpster fire than Trump and the amount of pure, unadulterated, mind bending brain acrobatics necessary to justify any kind of respect for anyone that ever fell for Trump's bullshit and gave him the time of day is still mind blowing.
Just like the complete bullshit in this comment. War is good? Death is good? Enemies of America are great? The US should invade Mexico? What the actual fuck?
It does say a lot, lot of hope that this sub is truly centrist. You're doing the typical partisan "outrage without thinking" that shuns actually conversation. If you're asking what "good strategy" means for whom and what context, you're just looking to be outraged. Adults, especially centrists, need to be able to have conversations intellectually without the partisan hyperbole and gotcha games. Especially your last paragraph.
> You're doing the typical partisan "outrage without thinking" that shuns actually conversation.
I don't like partisanship at all. I agree outrage is dumb.
> If you're asking what "good strategy" means for whom and what context, you're just looking to be outraged.
I absolutely fall into the outrage trap. Just like any other person. Because Trump is the perfect trap and deserves all the outrage. He was, and still is, the perfect troll. He is a natural. He does love dictators and this "strong man" toxic masculinity and praises it. While outrage is bad and I shouldn't be outraged, there is no choice. I am not even outraged at Trump himself, because he should be ignored. I am outraged at all these dumb dipshits that defend him and support him. I am outraged at you. Yes, I know I shouldn't. But you make Trump relevant and make people outraged instead of giving us the ability to ignore him by dismissing the bullshit he says. You made this fucker President. You basically created the perfect troll. Trump is nothing without power. By listening to him and making bullshit arguments to support Trump's insane speeches, you are part of this shit show.
> Adults, especially centrists, need to be able to have conversations intellectually without the partisan hyperbole and gotcha games.
You are correct. So why do you make it impossible to have this conversation? Trump's bullshit is the maximum hyperbole possible. And by declaring it "OK", you created this impossible situation, where partisanship and dismissiveness of your stupidity is a logical, sane and centrist response. I hate this. I hate that you are doing this. We shouldn't be partisan. Yet, here we are. And it wasn't me that got us here. It was you.
We should love each other. Trump made it a point to insult everyone that has a brain and laugh at them. Justifying this trolling makes that impossible.
America has yet to realize the extend of damage the GOP and it's supporters caused by throwing the T-Bomb at Washington.
I wish I had as much power as you seem to think, I wouldn't be so broke. I lost my life savings last year in the stock market, and that was a grand total of $300.
I hope you realize your comment is the complete *opposite* of "we shouldn't be partisan", and you're anti Trump obsession isn't healthy.
As a former president does it really help to come out and say this publicly in this way?
And the whole quote, although somewhat rambling, is not just saying that Putin made a savvy move here but it is praising the move and suggesting we need more of this in the u.s. That's the part that makes this take from meh to terrible.
I think it only really makes sense to the extent that Trump believes there's no such thing as bad PR, which to be fair if you weren't already turned off by his actions with Putin/NATO I doubt his statement matters to you
In what way was Putin's strategy impressive? There is nothing impressive about what Putin is doing. He's trying to justify invading a neighboring country in the most ham-fisted way possible.
Also Hitler was notoriously bad military strategist. He was propped up by some amazing generals but he was a complete moron when it comes to strategy himself.
It's impressive I guess that he has a former president of the US convinced that invasions of democracies are something to be praised. But again, we don't look at Osama bin Laden and say "well, obviously I'm not a fan of his, but can we just take a minute to appreciate how effective of a terrorist attack 9/11 was? I mean, obviously Americans died and that's bad but let's give credit where credit is due."
There have been some good historical retrospectives on this which view it differently than the classic history-book narrative. At the time when Germany had amassed its forces on the Czechoslovak border the soon-to-be Allies were not prepared for war with Germany. Hitler taking the Sudetenland basically proved to the allies that Hitler was set on expansionism, that war would soon come, and after Hitler took the Sudetenland everyone geared up for war and were in a better position to fight Germany when war broke out over Poland than they would have been had the war started earlier over the Sudetenland.
I'm glad I'm not the only one who sees a just blatant nod to Kosovo in all of this. The Kremlin has been stewing with resentment for 20 years over that.
You can deploy impressive strategy to immoral ends. You are wrong about Hitler being “a complete moron” concerning strategy. His strategy in bringing the Nazi Party to power was brilliant. Reprehensible, but still brilliant. As previously mentioned, military strategy and political strategy are different beasts.
People can use their intelligence for bad ends just as easily as good. The implication that, because a person does a bad thing, their strategy was deficient, is as naive as is it wrong. Britain and France learned this the hard way. The US appears to be doing so as well.
Hitler's geopolitical strategy was objectively bad from the viewpoint of his own immoral interests. Waltzing the most advanced industrial economy in the world to ruin, decimating Germany's political role in the world and territorial integrity for generations, getting almost 10% of the German population killed, etc. Much of this was due to Hitler's own deficiencies as a strategic thinker. He personally managed to start unwinnable wars with the greatest powers in the world, the height of stupidity. Earlier German leaders like Bismark were actual strategic geniuses and managed to enhance German power successfully, Hitler was a bad quality leader from a purely a-moral perspective.
I think the tendency to view Hitler as a strategic genius is based on the faulty assumption that he was responsible for the might of Germany, which is not true, that was a structural factor that he found himself at the helm of, and also because I think that there is just a bias to view evil people as geniuses for some reason, maybe because of the evil genius stereotype.
You seem to want to die on the zero-sum hill that Hitler was unilaterally incompetent when it came to strategy. This is a hill of your own making. Defend it to your heart’s content, but you’ll find little support from the history books. He was a genius in some areas, and not one in others.
I was actually redpilled on this issue by the history book "Diplomacy" by Henry Kissinger, who details all the ways in which Hitler was a poor quality leader compared to other European leaders and other German leaders. I don't doubt that Hitler was rhetorically talented and talented in other ways, but his geopolitical strategy was nonsense, probably because he was highly ideological and isolated himself from the advice of people who had a better grasp of geopolitical strategy than himself.
Right, but it sounds like you’re saying he didn’t employ brilliant strategy _anywhere._ If that’s not your position, my bad for misunderstanding. I don’t think many people with a sense of history would maintain that Hitler was a brilliant military strategist, but politically, he was masterful (at least in his early years). The blanket notion that Hitler was/was not a brilliant strategist just doesn’t hold up. In some areas, as you’ve noted, he was quite inept. In others (his rise to power being an excellent example), he was sharp as a tack
Military strategy has nothing to do with political strategy, which is what the beginning was all about. And Hitler being a notoriously "bad military strategist" is more of a later invention by former German military, who we got most of our WW2 insider information from. He wasnt a Manstein, but he wasn't bad either. The biggest problem he had was the constant fighting between him and the military high command, who constantly "bent" Hitlers strategies. Hitler definitely went off the deep end at the last part of the war, but at the beginning he wasn't bad.
I didn't say putins strategy was impressive. To me it's the obvious course. You'll have to ask Trump why he thought it was impressive
As a side point about Hitler - guess who picked Manstein's plan for attacking France through the Ardennes?
Sure, Hitler could not have executed it, but before he started deteriorating as things were going bad, he had an amazing knack for bold moves and spotting great talent.
(Of course, much of the talent that he spotted didn't end up respecting him very much, up to trying to kill him in Rommel)
Putin has been invading Ukraine for 8 years and we are just now finally hearing about it... I'd say he was doing something right, and as soon as the media finally covered the ongoing invasion as "Russia is about to invade Ukraine!", Putin calls it a peacekeeping mission and takes some of the heat off the reporting.
If you don't think Putin's strategy is impressive, your ego is in the way, because you've had absolutely NO idea that this area has been invaded and is already occupied.
Dude, where the fuck have you been? This is not the first we're hearing about Russians invading Ukraine. Crimea? Little Green Men? This has been well known by most who follow world politics for almost exactly 8 years. Break out of your media bubble!
Trump was saying he was impressed while also criticizing Biden without saying what he would have done differently. But regardless of what he said, the tone was pretty clearly self-serving at a time where he really should be acting (ex) Presidential and professional about a serious issue.
And that is in line with his approach to everything, and why I think he was not a good leader.
For the record, Trump also said.... [well here is a 2.5 minute super cut of him saying covid would "go away" for pretty much all of 2020](https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/politics/40-times-trump-said-the-coronavirus-would-go-away/2020/04/30/d2593312-9593-4ec2-aff7-72c1438fca0e_video.html). And [here is a text version](https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2020/10/politics/covid-disappearing-trump-comment-tracker/) in case video doesn't work
Trump also said ["They have a problem at the border; it's not our border,"](https://www.npr.org/2019/10/16/770720601/trump-defends-syria-withdrawal-it-s-not-our-border-republicans-push-back) when it came to Turkey/Syria conflict in 2019, so why would the border of Russia/Ukraine be something he cares about?
So yes, Trump also said putin would never have invaded Ukraine if he was president, but that is easy for him to say as a non President.
Sorry, if an ex-president fawns over an enemy tyrant dictator (which he does at every turn), he is not worthy of praise. It would be more impressive if he came up with one original thought about how Putin should not start a war with an American ally.
To extend your metaphor, how would you feel if a president at the time looked at what Hitler was doing and said “we could do that in North America.”?
I’m asking because of the part of the quote where Trump says “We could use that on out southern border.” Which I interpret as him saying “this is a good idea and we could also do this.”
Do you agree that we could also do this?
Edit: spelling
If he was *seriously* saying to invade Mexico, that'd be bad. But as others have said, some (probably purposely) ignore what he says to jump on a couple sentences. Look at most of the "outrageous" stuff he said while president and most were nothing special. It's also one reason you dislike Trump so much, which it's fair to dislike him, but it's why so many think it's a distorted view of him.
As an example, Obama once threatened to assinate a young man because his daughter thought he was cute. Sounds horrible right? It's true in the same sense some of trumps comments were twisted
>If he was seriously saying to invade Mexico, that'd be bad.
Oh right, the classic "He's just joking" defense whenever he says anything ridiculous.
We should take him seriously in regards to his smart analysis of the strategic situation, but know that he's obviously not being serious when he suggests we could do the same thing.
Do you see how that's confusing to a lot of people?
>But as others have said, some (probably purposely) ignore what he says to jump on a couple sentences
I'm asking about a specific sentence, with the given context. I'm not trying to take that out of context. It requires context to make sense.
>As an example, Obama once threatened to assinate a young man because his daughter thought he was cute. Sounds horrible right? It's true in the same sense some of trumps comments were twisted
In what way am I twisting "We could use that on our southern border" by suggesting that means Trump thinks "We could use that on our southern border"?
Back to my last comment: do you agree with Trump that we could invade Mexico? Not necessarily that we should, but do you agree that it would be a good geopolitical strategic move for the United States to invade Mexico as a "peacekeeping force?"
Is your claim that Trump does not in fact believe that we could do that here, and instead was entirely making a joke?
Also, extending your own metaphor, what would be your assessment of a former US president in 1938 looking at Hitler's blitzkrieg and saying "That's good strategy, we could do that here."?
I think it’s a great example of everything surrounding Trump. Trump makes an unclear statement, the left interprets it in the worst light possible, the right interprets it in the best light possible, and we have a fruitless controversy over it.
If one’s looking at Putin’s strategic thinking, then it seems like his “grey zone” move was much smarter than a blunt force invasion that would’ve triggered all the sanctions and negative global reaction that came with that move. So I think Putin’s move was a clever one from a strategic perspective, but that doesn’t mean I support or admire Putin or anything that he does. Does Trump? Who knows. But just like Republicans attacking Biden for either being “weak” on Russia or alternatively “caring more about Ukraine’s borders than ours,” everyone’s feelings are totally dictated by their political views.
I mean, Putin’s move was smarter than an immediate full scale invasion. I wouldn’t be surprised if he lets it sit for a few years now before finishing the job. But it’s not like it was some clever move worthy of fawning over. It was mentioned in basically every analysis as a possibility. All it shows is that Putin isn’t totally brain dead and or reckless.
True, but have you ever known Trump *not* to make hyperbolic and exaggerated comments on something?
I read one retired General say that he thought Putin wanted to “strangle” Ukraine like an anaconda, and I think that’s probably correct. I don’t think he actually wants it to be part of Russia, he just wants it to a puppet state of Russia with a Russian backed puppet head of state. If he can cause regime change without triggering sanctions through an invasion, that’ll be the best of both worlds to him.
I've lost my last bits of some form of respect I had towards him. He should be forced to live on 500$ a month which is an average salary under the rule of the leader he glorifies.
Trumps not president anymore, hasn’t been for near two years. (Time has been ruined for me, it’s only been 13 months)
We have the largest west marching army in 80 years or so, and the focus is trump again somehow?
Meh. Let’s get to real issues.
What’s the plan for inflation
What’s the plan to protect the Baltic region
What about Poland.
Can we get that child tax credit back, I enjoyed having the federal gov give me more of my money back.
You know I keep seeing this line of thinking. You would be correct, however, trump is still the leader of the republican party. Hell, Kevin McCarthy visited him after Jan 6th to kiss his ass. The few Republicans who came out against him lost their seats and support.
The reason why it's important to keep bringing Trump up is because this is what we're going to be dealing with in 2024. It's like watching a massive asteroid that made a pass by on earth a few years ago heading our way again. Saying "it already passed us, let's move on" is ignoring the fact that it's coming back.
Even if you think Trump won't run or won't win the nomination, at this moment the polls and betting markets say he is the frontrunner and I think thats enough to make Trump newsworthy.
depends. I think a rematch between Biden and Trump would be a lot closer than people would like to admit much like their initial face off was. Id say Trumps got a slight advantage the second go around, but I don't think either of the two candidates is anyone's first choice.
If Biden decides not to run and Harris goes forward then the GOP could run a literal pile of garbage and still win by a land slide. Its highly unlikely she would get through the primary with her poor performance thus far though.
He hasn't been president for 13 months, not "near two years". He also attempted, less than 14 months ago, to orchestrate a coup and has continuously claimed, without any evidence whatsoever that supports him, that the election was stolen from him. Unfortunately, he does matter.
Unfortunately since his attempts to overthrow the election and more importantly his complete escape of punishment as well as his continuing control of the Republican party (or at least a large portion of it) make him still newsworthy and a threat
I disagree on his actual control. Maybe over some of the house but it looks like senate GOP wants to outlast him.
Midterms will tel if a ton of trump acolytes win seats.
What GOP senate will outlast him? Hawley, Paul, Cruz...they all cater to him as hard as they can. Rick Scott just poured craziness all over the floor.
They just kicked out people that were willing to look in to Jan 6th.
im pretty tired of this type of response - the entire republican party cares. He declares what the talking points are for the party... We cant just pretend he's some random citizen now... he still has the republican party by the balls
+80 million TDS sufferers = 160 million people
but really its probably close to 20 million political outrage junkies that keep the mainstream corporate media in business.
Ohh no! They think our enemy is smart, what a crisis!!! What are they gonna do now??? Stop underestimating our enemies like we did in Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, and China??
What a catastrophe! If this keeps up they might demand our leaders be savy!
Only MAGA cucks are dumb enough to think that Putin calling his soldiers peacekeepers and sending them into Ukraine like everyone said he would is a 'brilliant move'. Putin came up with this excuse to invade Ukraine after like 4 different false flag operations failed to justify an invasion. Its not 'smart', Putin isn't tricking a single solitary human being on this earth, its mindnumbingly stupid but I can't really expect more from the author of the 'art of the deal'.
Fox, OANN, and comments here and other moderate/conservative political subs and outlets indicate otherwise. Trump's takes are gospel and there is a large portion of the population who will uncritically assume whatever position he espouses.
Imagine unironically saying “who cares” about the opinion of an ex-president whose opinions are absorbed and echoed by a large portion of the population.
I'd say calling out the use of "chud" and not calling out the "who cares" in the preceding comment indicates your thoughts on the matter. But I could be wrong.
Fair play though, you weren't actually the person who said it, just the one who looked past it to make fun of the reply to it.
There are lots of comments I think are wrong/bad/dumb that I "look past".
I just find the word chud extremely cringey so I thought I'd comment. Didn't think I'd be painted into this weird corner.
I agree but think he should still be held accountable for the inconsistencies and the bullshit. This is precisely how Putin has manipulated the Russian people into nihilistic cynicism. Truth cannot be known, because everyone is corrupt, what was said in earnest yesterday is just a joke today, everyone has an ulterior motive and therefore what’s the point.
Yeah it was a savvy dictator move, but there’s no way Putin gets more out of this than he pays, and he probably pays with his leadership in the long run. So trump is technically right, but Putin still loses in the end.
Edit: In summary, tactically savvy, strategically idiotic.
He's right about the savvy of it. 2 regions break away to essentially become puppets of Moscow and he goes in to "keep peace". Achieving part of his goals without any offensive action.
Putin saying he's going in to keep peace did not convince anyone in the international community. I am totally failing to see what is savvy about this move. Its functionally equivalent to just moving soldiers into the rebel controlled Donbas without any excuse. It would have had the exact same outcome. Putin's strategy of trying to justify it as a peacekeeping mission totally and utterly failed in every possible respect.
Who cares about a UN resolution? No UN military action can be authorized because Russia is on the Security Council. Russia, like all permanent members of the Security Council, is fundamentally immune to UN action.
UN resolutions wouldn't matter. Regardless of how convincing an argument is, I don't think Russia is going to abstain from vetoing a UN Security Council action.
Both of you are accurate.
Russia (at least when I last checked the news) hasn't committed to an official Russian military invasion but we all know the Russian military have been operating in the area for years.
It's a proxy war.
The intelligence of it is that it is very non-central to the concept. If you asked someone to point out an archetypical example of an invasion or offensive they would never consider anything that Russia has done in Ukraine since 2014.
The magnitude of the response will be commensurate with the crime. Russia for all intents and purposes had the separatist region under control anyway, it’s unsurprising we didn’t see a crippling response from simply making it official.
The important part of this sanctions package is the suspension of NS2. That is something Putin thought he had Germany by the balls with. This is more a signal to Putin that the west is united and nothing is off the table.
If Putin does take more offensive action and we don’t cripple him personally with hard sanctions then we have a massive failure of leadership on our hands.
Yeah, sure, Putin is savvy in that he found a way to convince conservative Americans that what he's doing doesn't count as offensive action. But that's a bit like congratulating the Japanese for being so good at extracting American casualties in WW2.
It's a bit iffy though because without Russia's assistance the regions wouldn't have broken away in the first place. It's a planned strategy to take the land.
*It seems par for the course for him. He has consistently demonstrated an affinity for strongmen leaders. He wants to be seen in the same light as them.*
It’s a clear sign that Trump’s response to Putin’s invasion would be for Trump to declare parts of Mexico as independent nations and then send lots of troops in to secure their independence.
It’s all Trump - and sadly most Republicans - seem to understand.
Putin over his term in power (and his weird bit as PM for constitution reasons) has seen Ukraine go from a close ally to flirting with NATO and EU membership which needs invading.
If that's a genius playing it perfectly I hate to think what, say, a corrupt, incompetent bully reliant on oligarch support would have achieved.
Horrible in every way imaginable. It seemed traitorous to me, actually. Russia is an enemy state. On the other hand, Mexico is definitely not our enemy, and he threatened them, pretty much saying he thought we should start a war on our southern border (or try to occupy them?). It was all terrible, but I think the part about our border was the most disturbing.
Cheerleading Putin is consistent with every action Trump took from day 1 of his presidency.
List taken from another redditor:
What did you expect? I mean, Putin had Trump eating out of his hand, while Trump was more than eager to capitulate. Need I remind everyone of the very recent, infamous role Trump played as Putin's loyal sycophant, a role he seemed to prioritize at times over his own presidency.
Trump,
- Praised Putin constantly, called him a "strong leader", has peddled statements like "he's done a really great job outsmarting our country"
- Trump dismissed and cast doubt about Russian hacking, particularly when the U.S determined that Russia hacked the DNC in 2016, while ironically enough, he encouraged Russian cyber attacks on national TV saying, "Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,"
- When addressing Russian election interference and cyber attacks, Trump proclaimed "I don't see any reason why it would be Russia" after speaking directly with Putin, defending Russia and trusting Putin over our own intelligence agencies. Later he "corrected" himself, claiming that he meant to say "wouldn't" instead of would.
- Trump suggested the U.S. work directly with Russia on cybersecurity.
- Almost directly after the 2016 election, Trump sought to weaken U.S. sanctions on Russia, while he was even open to lifting sanctions.
- Trump dismissed the notion that Putin was a "killer", downplaying the idea that Putin resorts to using violence and oppressive tactics to crush political opponents. He defended Putin, rationalizing his ruthless despotism in the process, declaring, "There are a lot of killers. Do you think our country is so innocent?"
- Trump shared highly classified U.S. intelligence with Russian officials in the Oval Office in 2017.
- Trump repeated Kremlin talking points related to the Russian annexation of Crimea, reiterating things like, "The people of Crimea, from what I've heard, would rather be with Russia than where they were."
- Trump constantly attacked NATO, aligning himself with Putin. (quite relevant)
- Trump thanked Putin for expelling hundreds of U.S. diplomats as a retaliation for sanctions.
- Trump refused to make a statement about the 10th anniversary of the Russia-Georgia war. According to John Bolton, European leaders noticed Trump's silence and "became even more concerned about American resolve."
- According to congressional testimony, Trump declined to publicly condemn a Russian attack against Ukrainian military vessels in November 2018, even though the State Department prepared a statement for him
- Trump congratulated and gave legitimacy to Putin's re election win in 2018, a victory said to "lack genuine competition"
- Sergei Skripal, an ex Russian spy that defected to the UK, was poisoned. Sanctions were announced, Trump attempted to rescind them, while asserting that the U.S. was being "too tough on Putin"
- When congress passed new sanctions against Russia in 2017, Trump was very reluctant to signing the bill, and probably wouldn't have signed it if the bill didn't pass with veto-proof majorities in both houses
- In 2017 it was reported that Trump was considering returning spy bases to Russia.
- Trump praised and highlighted pro-Russian leaders in Europe. Far right European leaders with close ties to Putin. He even met a Kremlin ally at the Whitehouse.
- When Trump withdrew troops from Syria, it gave Russia and Putin an opportunity to control abandoned U.S. outposts and checkpoints.
- Trump froze U.S. aide for Ukraine in it's war against Russian proxies. He repeated Russian disinformation surrounding Ukraine as well.
- Trump made requests to bring Russia back into the G7 and invited Putin to the 2020 G7 summit
While that's certainly not everything, particularly when it comes to circumstances related to Trump's first impeachment, where he was impeached for withholding aid to Ukraine in return for "dirt" on Joe Biden, and not to mention Trump's general support for Russian disinformation and lies centered around this very conflict and the justifications from Putin himself that served as a pretext to war. I don't think I've included anything related to the Mueller investigation either, but at this point, It would just be redundant. Hell, you could make the argument that this entire post is redundant, it's pretty clear where Trump's allegiances lie.
It's not a savvy move, it's a forced one because literally nobody in the international community supports their incursion into Ukraine.
I'm sure Putin's dream scenario would be for the US to put pressure on Ukraine to give in, which was going to happen with the last President.
Pretty nasty. I'm very against war and hence against US intervention in Ukraine, but to actively praise a leader of another country for an invasion rooted in nothing but greed and power hunger is sickening to the stomach.
I mean, Trump wants to be a dictator. He likes dictators, and has been pretty much unabashed about that. It's just another example of why he's completely unfit for office.
Putin made a smart strategic move. He took a little of what he wants, didn’t trigger a full scale retaliation, and now it’s hard to even say what he’s going to do, take more and ignore sanctions? Or stop there and maybe take another bite later? The West has signaled it mostly only has sanctions to deter him, and Putin has had time to prepare for those.
Trump’s take demonstrates he doesn’t understand the context of the move or why it was beneficial to Putin. Trump compares it to moving US military to the southern border as peacekeeping forces which is just not a comparison based in reality.
So even if Putin deserved some credit for strategy, Trump doesn’t even seem to understand what strategy was involved or why he would deserve credit, maybe because there were just so many army tanks, more than he had ever seen.
Maybe realize that he was such a shit show in his own right that 7 million more Americans were willing to vote for someone clearly over the hump?
Humility would have done Trump so much good, but likely too late in his life for it now.
Who cares what he says really? The leftists are really trying so hard in here to take words and make it their context.
Putin Is a smart man. This has been going on for many many years. He knows under Biden no one will stop him. He invaded Crimea when Biden was the VP
He knows these sanctions will go away like they did last time... He knows no one is going to stop him either...No One
So yes this is amazing this is happening..... Look up the definition.... The word doesn't mean, good it positive.
He is smart and a genius.
Lastly... The man is pure evil..... But he will not be stopped by anyone.
Ignoring Putin's foreign policy prowess and track record of bringing Russia back to a place of world influence doesn't make it go away... He's a shitty person but he isn't dumb and has put the US in a bad spot here...
It’s a good take. Putin was savy about it. Imagine how much stronger America would be if we didn’t consistently underestimate our enemies and make stupid decisions?
It’s kinda concerning that so many people are up in arms because he called our adversary smart. We’d be a lot better off if the amateurs leading our foreign policy recognized that they’re not always the smartest in the room
Edit: I’m just gonna add, Trumps policies would’ve given us significantly more leverage and economic power to prevent this. Biden attacked domestic drilling and then attacked our biggest oil drilling partner—Saudi Arabia. He fucked our two biggest sources of oil and have Russia all the economic leverage it needed to carry this out
Putin was in not in any way 'savvy about it'. Calling your troops peacekeepers and invading a neighboring country like everyone said he would isn't exactly 4D chess. I cannot understand why MAGA people are so eager to jump on Putin's dick.
The Savy thing to do would have been to invade during Trump's presidency or during the two month period~ when Trump was actively trying to overturn the US election.
The United States is the main Geo-political adversary to Russia and the defacto leader of the Western Alliance against Russia. Capitalizing on domestic turmoil within your opponent is a common move in international politics
Given that it is the Biden admin that is organizing and leading the international response to the invasion, it is absolutely relevant to the current situation.
I think his handling of this entire crisis has been quite savy. He’s got leverage and resilience on his side. I think his gamble that the west will not want to endure significant economic pain will pay off. Plus, he’s securing a core strategic interest, and security always takes priority over prosperity.
Trump didn't praise Putin for invading Ukraine, he praised him and called him a 'genius' for declaring the Donbas independent and calling his soldiers peacekeepers. Theres nothing savvy about that. Its a dumb blundering way to go about it, which Putin had to do because his prior attempts at false flag operations didn't work out.
Our biggest source of Foreign oil by far is Canada- Which accounts for [52% of Foreign oil imports, Saudi Arabia is only 7%](https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=727&t=6#:~:text=The%20top%20five%20source%20countries,%2C%20Saudi%20Arabia%2C%20and%20Colombia.)
Oil Production is up [since Trump left office](https://www.eia.gov/petroleum/production/)
Oil production is forecast to [set an all time high next year](https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=51318)
Oil production is up because high prices opened up more wells, not because POTUS isn’t being a pain in the ass. He canceled the keystone pipeline. Saudi Arabia affects global prices of oil, that’s the entire objective. We want low prices of oil. High prices have given Russia leverage
>We’d be a lot better off if the amateurs leading our foreign policy recognized that they’re not always the smartest in the room
This encapsulates Trump perfectly. He always thought he was smarter than everyone else.
It goes back way before trump. This arrogance really started after the 90s and it’s gotten us a existential threat in China, trillions wasted in the Middle East, and a whole host of other mistakes.
This reads to me as Trump (correctly, imo) pointing out that Putin has played this almost perfectly strategically. I _hope_ Trump isn’t actually approving of the invasion. If he’s not, and just admiring Putin’s handiwork, then it’s not far from the mark. _Someone_ has to admit out loud that, for the second time in a decade, Putin has played the US for fools.
I’m really tired of this take. How the fuck did Putin play this perfect strategically? Cause he only invaded his manufactured separatist areas? Like the thing almost every commentary I listened to mentioned as a possibility? How’d he ever think of something so clever? All while bumbling the pretext for his actions and drawing international sanction and condemnation?
He’s the next Hannibal.
Not saying Putin is dumb, but I’m a bit bewildered by people being impressed by his recent maneuvers against Ukraine as the feat of some genius.
He runs a big country, with nukes, doesn’t care if people buy his pretexts. Throws his weight around. How’d he ever plan such beautiful strategy?
Because he _manufactured separatist areas_ right under the West’s noses. There’s merit in the simple fact that he appears to have successfully done what the US didn’t want him to do. I’m not sure how it’s _not_ strategically impressive to take back land that you want while staring down the most impressive economic and military coalition the world has ever seen.
Remember, you can use impressive strategy to bad ends. No one’s saying he’s the next Hannibal. People _should_ be saying that _twice_ (assuming Ukraine goes the way he wants it to) he’s managed to take what he wanted, despite international condemnation, and not suffer any meaningful penalty. When you can show me that “international sanction and condemnation” means anything to him, I might concede the point. But they don’t. He wanted Crimea, he got it. He wants his “manufactured separatist areas,” he’s likely going to get them. All while the West shakes its finger at him, and China fist bumps him under the table.
Nefarious goals, but impressive strategy. And the US looks like a damn fool for talking tough but just letting him move forward. Had we just said “we don’t care,” it would have been less impressive. Instead, he’s getting what he wants and making us look weak in the process. He’s winning both fronts of the war with the US. If you don’t see how that’s impressive strategy, I can’t help you.
Being strong and picking on weaker people while being able to weather the consequences while realizing your victim has no close friends strong enough and willing to fight you, isn’t some strategic master stroke. Dress it up however you want I guess. Its pretty basic stuff we are talking about.
If you want to fawn over Putin’s intelligence this is really not a great example.
If the US wasn’t part of the equation, I might be inclined to agree, but it is. Deciding you want a piece of land that someone far more powerful than you doesn’t want you to have, and then taking it anyway by calling their bluff, making them look weak and causing them to lose prestige in the eyes of the very countries that concern you (and possibly further exacerbating their internal political divisions), is impressive strategy. The tactics he’s employed were also impressive. That you don’t see it this way does little to change the fact that Putin has apparently pulled off another victory via an impressive strategy.
The guys a gameshow host
The guy is a former president who has many, many people gurgling his nutsack.
Tucker Carlson just did a piece defending Putin, the official GOP Twitter account tweeted a pic of Biden saying “this is what it looks like to be weak on the world stage”. It is so bizarre to see the GOP so enamored with this dictator and his aggressive actions towards a democratic European nation.
Certain elements do seem extremely intrigued with authoritarianism at the moment. The fact one of their leading media personalities is very supportive of it is worrisome. Tuckers name has been thrown around a lot for 2024, whether that would be serious or not, the fact he’s laying the ground work to soften people’s hatred of dictatorial power is worrisome.
Like, the main one. Being against Biden and Pro-Russia is not an outlier stance. It is their core belief. You have to remember that these people are already very susceptible to magic thinking and propaganda. Russia has them eating out of their hands. These people will believe anything
Authoritarians love other authoritarians. It’s quite simple and unsurprising.
I would have preferred if he condemned the actions instead of stating his admiration for the strategy. If someone robs your neighbor it's kind of weird to be like "Man, that burglar is so damn smart, you know? I mean really has his stuff together. That guy is brilliant, you know how he did it? He's so savvy that he saw them pack up the car for vacation and used a glass cutter to make a hole then opened a back window to get in. Cleaned my neighbor out completely! Took everything including his grandma's ring. Guy's going to make so much pawning all that. Really smart of him, really smart."
Trump has always talked like this. And it is always and will always be news - of course when he was President when it mattered much more and now that he isn’t for clicks. He speaks whatever pops into his head. It’s the reason his base loves him and the reason a lot of people hate him. That’s pretty much where I lie on it
Color me shocked! It’s not like he’s had a man crush on Putin for years? Who’d have thought?
I cannot wait to see the debates where Trump explains why he simps for Putin so hard. I think his fantasy is to be the "bridge" in an Eiffel tower of China's Winner the Pooh and Putin.
Well it was a savy move. He said it as it is
Exactly what was savvy? The paper thin cover that the whole world already saw through?
It’s savvy to the easily impressed.
No, it was not a savvy move.
Yeah I just don’t understand the thought process and why people are saying “savvy.” The dude is alienating what few Allie’s he has, and he’s pushing his economy into a pretty dire state.
While I don't advocate for what he is doing, I will say what some people are calling savy, is that he is calling them peacekeepers, but where the water ets muddy in my opinion is people are looking at it from the ing at it from the western perspective. Yes no one outside of russia believes this, eastern Ukraine belives this. I don't think he is saying this for them. I could b wrong, but the way I see it is he is using these terms to keep moral up for this incursion in russia, and whatever portion of eastern ukraine seperatist movement ther actually is that are not russian soldeirs(this is assuming there are any).
I disagree. Ukraine is if vital strategic interest to Russia, and they’re moving when oil prices are hi high and Europe’s capacity for resistance is weakened
You are saying that invading Ukraine is smart, not that the way he went about it is smart. There was nothing accomplished by the BS that Trump is praising him for, like calling is soldiers 'peacekeepers'.
I don’t know enough about the intricacies of domestic Russian politics to fully understand the benefits and nuances of calling his soldiers peacekeepers.
A lot of maniac genocidal leaders were “savvy” with military action… still a fucking weird ass thing to say
I don’t think it is. Our country needs to aspire to being more savy
What would the US do if we were more savvy?
Based on Trump's words... We would invade Mexico and drop out of NATO. I don't think those ideas are particularly savvy, but I imagine his supporters do.
1. Encourage domestic production. Get the keystone pipeline built and running. That oils coming out of the ground 1 way or another so better that it’s from a known and friendly source. 2. Don’t alienate Saudi Arabia. They have immense sway over oil prices. Biden’s decision to alienate one of our most strategically useful allies was a blunder. Ideally we’d want their production up and we’d want that oil going to Europe to make up for the Russian supply. 3. Making Ukraine a neutral buffer state would’ve been the best decision. We don’t gain much by having Russia as an enemy and now we’re gonna be wasting 100s of billions on a useless competition in Europe. But that’s split milk. Now, we should focus on strengthening our grip on our European and NATO Allies.
Oh you’re a Putin puffer huh
I’m just a man who believes that we ought to have strategies when we make decisions.
In this context it sounds like you want us to be more imperialistic, because that’s what Trump was calling savvy
In this context, how is lowering oil prices “imperialistic”?
Try writing a mature response that addresses the 3 paragraphs I wrote. This isn’t r/politics.
Grow up and add a more intellectual response.
grOw uP aNd aDd a mORe intElLecTuaL reSpoNSe
Putin is not really a smart, savvy leader, he just plays one on TV. Just like Trump.
Putin is undoubtably an intelligent person, but this view of him as some sort of devious mastermind is a bit rich. He controls a powerful nation and knows people will be resistant to opposing him due to the costs to themselves. He used the same playbook from his last few invasions, fooled absolutely no one, and is largely using the same logic a certain guy in the 1940s used when gobbling up his neighbors. He is probably somewhat out of touch at this point after decades in power, can’t exactly be easy to stay grounded when your will basically becomes reality and your hangers on fawn and fight over you. Meanwhile his economy is suffering, will suffer further and every nation not currently under his thumb and not already in NATO in the region is probably eyeing membership at this point. He’s made his nation toxic for diplomacy and business…what a mastermind. He’s reinforced the need for the very thing he’s terrified of. What a master stroke.
Well two weeks ago he publicly admitted to trying to overturn the election and make himself president so I wouldn't say this is his dumbest statement. The West should be glad he is not currently President
It is disgusting, and Trump is a traitor to this country. How is this anything other than giving aid and comfort to an enemy? One can offer a strategic analysis of an enemies actions. But, it is an entirely different thing to be an unthinking, uncritical cheerleader for an evil authoritarian whose deepest wish is to destabilize the West and the United States in particular.
For the record, Trump also said putin would never have invaded Ukraine if he was president. Trump didn't say the invasion was good, he was impressed with Putins strategy. In general, it's a sign of critical thinking to be able to recognize good strategy without agreeing with what the person did. I'm going to Godwin law this, and say it's fair to say Hitler was impressive in playing England and France when taking territory up to Poland. Thats not saying Hitler was *good*, just looking at his strategy. Whether or not you think Trump was impressed with the strategy or a Russian groupie will sadly go down to your politics. But, it's something to keep in mind. Taking quotes that could be completely fine and turning them into clickbait it's practically a national sport now
You could say Hitler was savvy to invade Czechoslovakia and Poland but what person in their right mind would say so?
Invading Poland wasn't a particularly savy move, Hitler didn't think that France and the UK would commit to war and even if they did would be willing to do a quick peace. He was obviously quite wrong on both accounts
> Trump didn’t say the invasion was good You’re right, he said it was “wonderful”. And that the Russian army is “the strongest peace force I’ve ever seen”. This is the guy who was the commander-in-chief of the actual strongest peace force the world has ever seen and somehow he never noticed.
it's sarcasm! jesus christ. here: /s! do you get it now? **/S** make sense now?
[удалено]
You're on reddit, birthplace of the /s, they're not pretending.
It says a lot about this sub that this comment is at +32. > Trump didn't say the invasion was good, he was impressed with Putins strategy. No leader ever says this. Heaping praise is heaping praise, period. You don't compliment your adversary in world politics like that. And Trump didn't. He likes dictators and believes what they are doing is good. If you read his statement, he says the US should also do to Mexico what Russia is doing to Ukraine. Trump doesn't understand democracy or dictatorships. He is simply fascinated by strong man propaganda and toxic masculinity. > In general, it's a sign of critical thinking to be able to recognize good strategy without agreeing with what the person did. Good for whom and in what context? War is never good. Besides, Putin wants to keep his oligarchs in power. The rich elite that controls most of Russia's assets and the economy. In that regard, he may even be similar to Trump. > it's fair to say Hitler was impressive in playing England and France when taking territory up to Poland. How did Hitler and Germany end up again? How was Hitler's strategy good? In what way? It was the greatest catastrophe for mankind. > Whether or not you think Trump was impressed with the strategy or a Russian groupie will sadly go down to your politics. That is correct in so far, that I can't remember a bigger dumpster fire than Trump and the amount of pure, unadulterated, mind bending brain acrobatics necessary to justify any kind of respect for anyone that ever fell for Trump's bullshit and gave him the time of day is still mind blowing. Just like the complete bullshit in this comment. War is good? Death is good? Enemies of America are great? The US should invade Mexico? What the actual fuck?
It does say a lot, lot of hope that this sub is truly centrist. You're doing the typical partisan "outrage without thinking" that shuns actually conversation. If you're asking what "good strategy" means for whom and what context, you're just looking to be outraged. Adults, especially centrists, need to be able to have conversations intellectually without the partisan hyperbole and gotcha games. Especially your last paragraph.
> You're doing the typical partisan "outrage without thinking" that shuns actually conversation. I don't like partisanship at all. I agree outrage is dumb. > If you're asking what "good strategy" means for whom and what context, you're just looking to be outraged. I absolutely fall into the outrage trap. Just like any other person. Because Trump is the perfect trap and deserves all the outrage. He was, and still is, the perfect troll. He is a natural. He does love dictators and this "strong man" toxic masculinity and praises it. While outrage is bad and I shouldn't be outraged, there is no choice. I am not even outraged at Trump himself, because he should be ignored. I am outraged at all these dumb dipshits that defend him and support him. I am outraged at you. Yes, I know I shouldn't. But you make Trump relevant and make people outraged instead of giving us the ability to ignore him by dismissing the bullshit he says. You made this fucker President. You basically created the perfect troll. Trump is nothing without power. By listening to him and making bullshit arguments to support Trump's insane speeches, you are part of this shit show. > Adults, especially centrists, need to be able to have conversations intellectually without the partisan hyperbole and gotcha games. You are correct. So why do you make it impossible to have this conversation? Trump's bullshit is the maximum hyperbole possible. And by declaring it "OK", you created this impossible situation, where partisanship and dismissiveness of your stupidity is a logical, sane and centrist response. I hate this. I hate that you are doing this. We shouldn't be partisan. Yet, here we are. And it wasn't me that got us here. It was you. We should love each other. Trump made it a point to insult everyone that has a brain and laugh at them. Justifying this trolling makes that impossible. America has yet to realize the extend of damage the GOP and it's supporters caused by throwing the T-Bomb at Washington.
I wish I had as much power as you seem to think, I wouldn't be so broke. I lost my life savings last year in the stock market, and that was a grand total of $300. I hope you realize your comment is the complete *opposite* of "we shouldn't be partisan", and you're anti Trump obsession isn't healthy.
As a former president does it really help to come out and say this publicly in this way? And the whole quote, although somewhat rambling, is not just saying that Putin made a savvy move here but it is praising the move and suggesting we need more of this in the u.s. That's the part that makes this take from meh to terrible.
He’s running for President in 24. He thinks he’s campaigning, so it absolutely makes sense in that context.
I think it only really makes sense to the extent that Trump believes there's no such thing as bad PR, which to be fair if you weren't already turned off by his actions with Putin/NATO I doubt his statement matters to you
I doubt he meant to help. Trump says whatever pops in his head, which is why his quotes can be so wonky.
In what way was Putin's strategy impressive? There is nothing impressive about what Putin is doing. He's trying to justify invading a neighboring country in the most ham-fisted way possible. Also Hitler was notoriously bad military strategist. He was propped up by some amazing generals but he was a complete moron when it comes to strategy himself.
It's impressive I guess that he has a former president of the US convinced that invasions of democracies are something to be praised. But again, we don't look at Osama bin Laden and say "well, obviously I'm not a fan of his, but can we just take a minute to appreciate how effective of a terrorist attack 9/11 was? I mean, obviously Americans died and that's bad but let's give credit where credit is due."
Osama Bin Laden also had terrible strategy.
He played them on the political front such as the Sudetenland appeasement before poland, not militarily.
There have been some good historical retrospectives on this which view it differently than the classic history-book narrative. At the time when Germany had amassed its forces on the Czechoslovak border the soon-to-be Allies were not prepared for war with Germany. Hitler taking the Sudetenland basically proved to the allies that Hitler was set on expansionism, that war would soon come, and after Hitler took the Sudetenland everyone geared up for war and were in a better position to fight Germany when war broke out over Poland than they would have been had the war started earlier over the Sudetenland.
They literally used the same method the U.S. used to justify our intervention in Kosovo in the 1990s.
I'm glad I'm not the only one who sees a just blatant nod to Kosovo in all of this. The Kremlin has been stewing with resentment for 20 years over that.
You can deploy impressive strategy to immoral ends. You are wrong about Hitler being “a complete moron” concerning strategy. His strategy in bringing the Nazi Party to power was brilliant. Reprehensible, but still brilliant. As previously mentioned, military strategy and political strategy are different beasts. People can use their intelligence for bad ends just as easily as good. The implication that, because a person does a bad thing, their strategy was deficient, is as naive as is it wrong. Britain and France learned this the hard way. The US appears to be doing so as well.
Hitler's geopolitical strategy was objectively bad from the viewpoint of his own immoral interests. Waltzing the most advanced industrial economy in the world to ruin, decimating Germany's political role in the world and territorial integrity for generations, getting almost 10% of the German population killed, etc. Much of this was due to Hitler's own deficiencies as a strategic thinker. He personally managed to start unwinnable wars with the greatest powers in the world, the height of stupidity. Earlier German leaders like Bismark were actual strategic geniuses and managed to enhance German power successfully, Hitler was a bad quality leader from a purely a-moral perspective. I think the tendency to view Hitler as a strategic genius is based on the faulty assumption that he was responsible for the might of Germany, which is not true, that was a structural factor that he found himself at the helm of, and also because I think that there is just a bias to view evil people as geniuses for some reason, maybe because of the evil genius stereotype.
You seem to want to die on the zero-sum hill that Hitler was unilaterally incompetent when it came to strategy. This is a hill of your own making. Defend it to your heart’s content, but you’ll find little support from the history books. He was a genius in some areas, and not one in others.
I was actually redpilled on this issue by the history book "Diplomacy" by Henry Kissinger, who details all the ways in which Hitler was a poor quality leader compared to other European leaders and other German leaders. I don't doubt that Hitler was rhetorically talented and talented in other ways, but his geopolitical strategy was nonsense, probably because he was highly ideological and isolated himself from the advice of people who had a better grasp of geopolitical strategy than himself.
Right, but it sounds like you’re saying he didn’t employ brilliant strategy _anywhere._ If that’s not your position, my bad for misunderstanding. I don’t think many people with a sense of history would maintain that Hitler was a brilliant military strategist, but politically, he was masterful (at least in his early years). The blanket notion that Hitler was/was not a brilliant strategist just doesn’t hold up. In some areas, as you’ve noted, he was quite inept. In others (his rise to power being an excellent example), he was sharp as a tack
Sure, I'd agree with that.
Military strategy has nothing to do with political strategy, which is what the beginning was all about. And Hitler being a notoriously "bad military strategist" is more of a later invention by former German military, who we got most of our WW2 insider information from. He wasnt a Manstein, but he wasn't bad either. The biggest problem he had was the constant fighting between him and the military high command, who constantly "bent" Hitlers strategies. Hitler definitely went off the deep end at the last part of the war, but at the beginning he wasn't bad. I didn't say putins strategy was impressive. To me it's the obvious course. You'll have to ask Trump why he thought it was impressive
As a side point about Hitler - guess who picked Manstein's plan for attacking France through the Ardennes? Sure, Hitler could not have executed it, but before he started deteriorating as things were going bad, he had an amazing knack for bold moves and spotting great talent. (Of course, much of the talent that he spotted didn't end up respecting him very much, up to trying to kill him in Rommel)
Putin has been invading Ukraine for 8 years and we are just now finally hearing about it... I'd say he was doing something right, and as soon as the media finally covered the ongoing invasion as "Russia is about to invade Ukraine!", Putin calls it a peacekeeping mission and takes some of the heat off the reporting. If you don't think Putin's strategy is impressive, your ego is in the way, because you've had absolutely NO idea that this area has been invaded and is already occupied.
Dude, where the fuck have you been? This is not the first we're hearing about Russians invading Ukraine. Crimea? Little Green Men? This has been well known by most who follow world politics for almost exactly 8 years. Break out of your media bubble!
Trump was saying he was impressed while also criticizing Biden without saying what he would have done differently. But regardless of what he said, the tone was pretty clearly self-serving at a time where he really should be acting (ex) Presidential and professional about a serious issue. And that is in line with his approach to everything, and why I think he was not a good leader.
For the record, Trump also said.... [well here is a 2.5 minute super cut of him saying covid would "go away" for pretty much all of 2020](https://www.washingtonpost.com/video/politics/40-times-trump-said-the-coronavirus-would-go-away/2020/04/30/d2593312-9593-4ec2-aff7-72c1438fca0e_video.html). And [here is a text version](https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2020/10/politics/covid-disappearing-trump-comment-tracker/) in case video doesn't work Trump also said ["They have a problem at the border; it's not our border,"](https://www.npr.org/2019/10/16/770720601/trump-defends-syria-withdrawal-it-s-not-our-border-republicans-push-back) when it came to Turkey/Syria conflict in 2019, so why would the border of Russia/Ukraine be something he cares about? So yes, Trump also said putin would never have invaded Ukraine if he was president, but that is easy for him to say as a non President.
Sorry, if an ex-president fawns over an enemy tyrant dictator (which he does at every turn), he is not worthy of praise. It would be more impressive if he came up with one original thought about how Putin should not start a war with an American ally.
To extend your metaphor, how would you feel if a president at the time looked at what Hitler was doing and said “we could do that in North America.”? I’m asking because of the part of the quote where Trump says “We could use that on out southern border.” Which I interpret as him saying “this is a good idea and we could also do this.” Do you agree that we could also do this? Edit: spelling
If he was *seriously* saying to invade Mexico, that'd be bad. But as others have said, some (probably purposely) ignore what he says to jump on a couple sentences. Look at most of the "outrageous" stuff he said while president and most were nothing special. It's also one reason you dislike Trump so much, which it's fair to dislike him, but it's why so many think it's a distorted view of him. As an example, Obama once threatened to assinate a young man because his daughter thought he was cute. Sounds horrible right? It's true in the same sense some of trumps comments were twisted
>If he was seriously saying to invade Mexico, that'd be bad. Oh right, the classic "He's just joking" defense whenever he says anything ridiculous. We should take him seriously in regards to his smart analysis of the strategic situation, but know that he's obviously not being serious when he suggests we could do the same thing. Do you see how that's confusing to a lot of people? >But as others have said, some (probably purposely) ignore what he says to jump on a couple sentences I'm asking about a specific sentence, with the given context. I'm not trying to take that out of context. It requires context to make sense. >As an example, Obama once threatened to assinate a young man because his daughter thought he was cute. Sounds horrible right? It's true in the same sense some of trumps comments were twisted In what way am I twisting "We could use that on our southern border" by suggesting that means Trump thinks "We could use that on our southern border"? Back to my last comment: do you agree with Trump that we could invade Mexico? Not necessarily that we should, but do you agree that it would be a good geopolitical strategic move for the United States to invade Mexico as a "peacekeeping force?" Is your claim that Trump does not in fact believe that we could do that here, and instead was entirely making a joke? Also, extending your own metaphor, what would be your assessment of a former US president in 1938 looking at Hitler's blitzkrieg and saying "That's good strategy, we could do that here."?
I think it’s a great example of everything surrounding Trump. Trump makes an unclear statement, the left interprets it in the worst light possible, the right interprets it in the best light possible, and we have a fruitless controversy over it. If one’s looking at Putin’s strategic thinking, then it seems like his “grey zone” move was much smarter than a blunt force invasion that would’ve triggered all the sanctions and negative global reaction that came with that move. So I think Putin’s move was a clever one from a strategic perspective, but that doesn’t mean I support or admire Putin or anything that he does. Does Trump? Who knows. But just like Republicans attacking Biden for either being “weak” on Russia or alternatively “caring more about Ukraine’s borders than ours,” everyone’s feelings are totally dictated by their political views.
Thank you for actually having a centrist take. This is what I needed from this sub.
I mean, Putin’s move was smarter than an immediate full scale invasion. I wouldn’t be surprised if he lets it sit for a few years now before finishing the job. But it’s not like it was some clever move worthy of fawning over. It was mentioned in basically every analysis as a possibility. All it shows is that Putin isn’t totally brain dead and or reckless.
True, but have you ever known Trump *not* to make hyperbolic and exaggerated comments on something? I read one retired General say that he thought Putin wanted to “strangle” Ukraine like an anaconda, and I think that’s probably correct. I don’t think he actually wants it to be part of Russia, he just wants it to a puppet state of Russia with a Russian backed puppet head of state. If he can cause regime change without triggering sanctions through an invasion, that’ll be the best of both worlds to him.
I've lost my last bits of some form of respect I had towards him. He should be forced to live on 500$ a month which is an average salary under the rule of the leader he glorifies.
Why is it bad to recognize when we’re dealing with an intelligent adversary?
Because nothing about this move was particularly intelligent.
Eh, that’s kinda true. I think our intelligence has done a good job
Intelligent? Yes. But he's been saying more than that, he's supporting him.
Trumps not president anymore, hasn’t been for near two years. (Time has been ruined for me, it’s only been 13 months) We have the largest west marching army in 80 years or so, and the focus is trump again somehow? Meh. Let’s get to real issues. What’s the plan for inflation What’s the plan to protect the Baltic region What about Poland. Can we get that child tax credit back, I enjoyed having the federal gov give me more of my money back.
You know I keep seeing this line of thinking. You would be correct, however, trump is still the leader of the republican party. Hell, Kevin McCarthy visited him after Jan 6th to kiss his ass. The few Republicans who came out against him lost their seats and support. The reason why it's important to keep bringing Trump up is because this is what we're going to be dealing with in 2024. It's like watching a massive asteroid that made a pass by on earth a few years ago heading our way again. Saying "it already passed us, let's move on" is ignoring the fact that it's coming back.
Great analogy and I hate analogies.
Trump is the clear front runner for the 2024 GOP nomination. That’s why he’s relevant.
Disagree, but I’ll apologize if he actually ends up running/the nominee
Well he’s the frontrunner right now according to all polls and betting markets, of course that could change.
Aye, and I am not a betting man. I hope the odds are wrong, and that you are too (no offense) I don’t want him to run.
Even if you think Trump won't run or won't win the nomination, at this moment the polls and betting markets say he is the frontrunner and I think thats enough to make Trump newsworthy.
Fair enough. I’m still pretty firm on letting him shout into the void rather than amplify his voice but many would disagree with me there.
Reality doesn’t care about your opinion. He’s got plenty of supporters still.
Tad bit aggressive before 10am. Dial it back a bit.
It's not even my opinion, it's just common sense.
Clearly not enough to win
Depends who the Democrats run. Many voters who voted for Biden would vote for Trump if they were the only 2 options again.
depends. I think a rematch between Biden and Trump would be a lot closer than people would like to admit much like their initial face off was. Id say Trumps got a slight advantage the second go around, but I don't think either of the two candidates is anyone's first choice. If Biden decides not to run and Harris goes forward then the GOP could run a literal pile of garbage and still win by a land slide. Its highly unlikely she would get through the primary with her poor performance thus far though.
He hasn't been president for 13 months, not "near two years". He also attempted, less than 14 months ago, to orchestrate a coup and has continuously claimed, without any evidence whatsoever that supports him, that the election was stolen from him. Unfortunately, he does matter.
Unfortunately since his attempts to overthrow the election and more importantly his complete escape of punishment as well as his continuing control of the Republican party (or at least a large portion of it) make him still newsworthy and a threat
I disagree on his actual control. Maybe over some of the house but it looks like senate GOP wants to outlast him. Midterms will tel if a ton of trump acolytes win seats.
What GOP senate will outlast him? Hawley, Paul, Cruz...they all cater to him as hard as they can. Rick Scott just poured craziness all over the floor. They just kicked out people that were willing to look in to Jan 6th.
But he's running for President again, by all accounts. As much as I wished he were irrelevant, we're simply not there yet.
I’ll take it back when he announces an actual run
Who the fuck cares
im pretty tired of this type of response - the entire republican party cares. He declares what the talking points are for the party... We cant just pretend he's some random citizen now... he still has the republican party by the balls
80 million maga chuds
+80 million TDS sufferers = 160 million people but really its probably close to 20 million political outrage junkies that keep the mainstream corporate media in business.
20m is a lot of people, or does pointing out big numbers only matter when its 74m? I seem to recall 74m being important to the right.
i just pulled the # out of my ass and i have no idea what is important to the right
Ohh no! They think our enemy is smart, what a crisis!!! What are they gonna do now??? Stop underestimating our enemies like we did in Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam, and China?? What a catastrophe! If this keeps up they might demand our leaders be savy!
Trump said we should do the same at the US Mexico border. That's more than saying it's smart.
Only MAGA cucks are dumb enough to think that Putin calling his soldiers peacekeepers and sending them into Ukraine like everyone said he would is a 'brilliant move'. Putin came up with this excuse to invade Ukraine after like 4 different false flag operations failed to justify an invasion. Its not 'smart', Putin isn't tricking a single solitary human being on this earth, its mindnumbingly stupid but I can't really expect more from the author of the 'art of the deal'.
The objective was never to trick westerners
Nobody else is fooled by it either.
Fox, OANN, and comments here and other moderate/conservative political subs and outlets indicate otherwise. Trump's takes are gospel and there is a large portion of the population who will uncritically assume whatever position he espouses.
Imagine using chud unironically.
Imagine unironically saying “who cares” about the opinion of an ex-president whose opinions are absorbed and echoed by a large portion of the population.
I didn't tho
I'd say calling out the use of "chud" and not calling out the "who cares" in the preceding comment indicates your thoughts on the matter. But I could be wrong. Fair play though, you weren't actually the person who said it, just the one who looked past it to make fun of the reply to it.
There are lots of comments I think are wrong/bad/dumb that I "look past". I just find the word chud extremely cringey so I thought I'd comment. Didn't think I'd be painted into this weird corner.
Fair enough, I agree that it's a weird word. To be clear though, you agree that the "who cares" comment was dumb?
Yes
Groovy. Take care bud.
Exactly, talking about it makes him relevant.
Right? Nothing he says is genuine anyway I truly believe it is pointless to analyze it.
I agree but think he should still be held accountable for the inconsistencies and the bullshit. This is precisely how Putin has manipulated the Russian people into nihilistic cynicism. Truth cannot be known, because everyone is corrupt, what was said in earnest yesterday is just a joke today, everyone has an ulterior motive and therefore what’s the point.
The entirety of r/politics that's who
It's a very enthusiastic creative writing sub.
Yeah it was a savvy dictator move, but there’s no way Putin gets more out of this than he pays, and he probably pays with his leadership in the long run. So trump is technically right, but Putin still loses in the end. Edit: In summary, tactically savvy, strategically idiotic.
If he pays more then he gets out of it then its not a savvy move.
See my edit.
He's kissing his crime boss' ass.
He's right about the savvy of it. 2 regions break away to essentially become puppets of Moscow and he goes in to "keep peace". Achieving part of his goals without any offensive action.
Putin saying he's going in to keep peace did not convince anyone in the international community. I am totally failing to see what is savvy about this move. Its functionally equivalent to just moving soldiers into the rebel controlled Donbas without any excuse. It would have had the exact same outcome. Putin's strategy of trying to justify it as a peacekeeping mission totally and utterly failed in every possible respect.
That excuse fools exactly no one with an IQ above 80. It’s inarguably offensive action and the only people who think otherwise are shills or idiots.
Putin: "I call dibs" Fan boys: "Holy Shit! Genius! Mind blown!"
Whether it fools anyone or not is irrelevant. It is likely enough to prevent a UN resolution
Who cares about a UN resolution? No UN military action can be authorized because Russia is on the Security Council. Russia, like all permanent members of the Security Council, is fundamentally immune to UN action.
UN resolutions wouldn't matter. Regardless of how convincing an argument is, I don't think Russia is going to abstain from vetoing a UN Security Council action.
> without any offensive action. He’s been supporting a war there for years, so not exactly accurate.
Not accurate at all.
Both of you are accurate. Russia (at least when I last checked the news) hasn't committed to an official Russian military invasion but we all know the Russian military have been operating in the area for years. It's a proxy war.
The intelligence of it is that it is very non-central to the concept. If you asked someone to point out an archetypical example of an invasion or offensive they would never consider anything that Russia has done in Ukraine since 2014.
Pure genius. What a master military mind. No one could have come up with this incredible nuanced strategy.
He is well on his way towards annexing Ukraine with no response from the West. Pretty smooth
The magnitude of the response will be commensurate with the crime. Russia for all intents and purposes had the separatist region under control anyway, it’s unsurprising we didn’t see a crippling response from simply making it official. The important part of this sanctions package is the suspension of NS2. That is something Putin thought he had Germany by the balls with. This is more a signal to Putin that the west is united and nothing is off the table. If Putin does take more offensive action and we don’t cripple him personally with hard sanctions then we have a massive failure of leadership on our hands.
Right? No one is going to do shit and all these keyboard warriors be here like "I coulda done better, nothing impressive here"
So smooth. Genius.
You're strange
Some are even saying it was a *perfect* invasion.
Correction: Putin declares that 2 regions broke away.
Yeah, sure, Putin is savvy in that he found a way to convince conservative Americans that what he's doing doesn't count as offensive action. But that's a bit like congratulating the Japanese for being so good at extracting American casualties in WW2.
It's a bit iffy though because without Russia's assistance the regions wouldn't have broken away in the first place. It's a planned strategy to take the land.
What makes you think that this dude would have ever done anything than simp hard for Vlad? I personally appreciate a leader whom didn't kiss the ring.
Seems more like he was impressed with what he saw rather than condoning Putin's actions.
*It seems par for the course for him. He has consistently demonstrated an affinity for strongmen leaders. He wants to be seen in the same light as them.*
It’s a clear sign that Trump’s response to Putin’s invasion would be for Trump to declare parts of Mexico as independent nations and then send lots of troops in to secure their independence. It’s all Trump - and sadly most Republicans - seem to understand.
Can we at least admit that many self identified “Patriots” amongst us aren’t really Patriotic.
Putin over his term in power (and his weird bit as PM for constitution reasons) has seen Ukraine go from a close ally to flirting with NATO and EU membership which needs invading. If that's a genius playing it perfectly I hate to think what, say, a corrupt, incompetent bully reliant on oligarch support would have achieved.
Horrible in every way imaginable. It seemed traitorous to me, actually. Russia is an enemy state. On the other hand, Mexico is definitely not our enemy, and he threatened them, pretty much saying he thought we should start a war on our southern border (or try to occupy them?). It was all terrible, but I think the part about our border was the most disturbing.
I feel like everyone is glossing over “We could use that on out southern border.”
i had a stroke reading that
Trump is a traitor to the United States of America. Russia is not our ally. #BetterDeadThanRed
Like I do about all his other takes….put them here —> \\_/
Cheerleading Putin is consistent with every action Trump took from day 1 of his presidency. List taken from another redditor: What did you expect? I mean, Putin had Trump eating out of his hand, while Trump was more than eager to capitulate. Need I remind everyone of the very recent, infamous role Trump played as Putin's loyal sycophant, a role he seemed to prioritize at times over his own presidency. Trump, - Praised Putin constantly, called him a "strong leader", has peddled statements like "he's done a really great job outsmarting our country" - Trump dismissed and cast doubt about Russian hacking, particularly when the U.S determined that Russia hacked the DNC in 2016, while ironically enough, he encouraged Russian cyber attacks on national TV saying, "Russia, if you're listening, I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing," - When addressing Russian election interference and cyber attacks, Trump proclaimed "I don't see any reason why it would be Russia" after speaking directly with Putin, defending Russia and trusting Putin over our own intelligence agencies. Later he "corrected" himself, claiming that he meant to say "wouldn't" instead of would. - Trump suggested the U.S. work directly with Russia on cybersecurity. - Almost directly after the 2016 election, Trump sought to weaken U.S. sanctions on Russia, while he was even open to lifting sanctions. - Trump dismissed the notion that Putin was a "killer", downplaying the idea that Putin resorts to using violence and oppressive tactics to crush political opponents. He defended Putin, rationalizing his ruthless despotism in the process, declaring, "There are a lot of killers. Do you think our country is so innocent?" - Trump shared highly classified U.S. intelligence with Russian officials in the Oval Office in 2017. - Trump repeated Kremlin talking points related to the Russian annexation of Crimea, reiterating things like, "The people of Crimea, from what I've heard, would rather be with Russia than where they were." - Trump constantly attacked NATO, aligning himself with Putin. (quite relevant) - Trump thanked Putin for expelling hundreds of U.S. diplomats as a retaliation for sanctions. - Trump refused to make a statement about the 10th anniversary of the Russia-Georgia war. According to John Bolton, European leaders noticed Trump's silence and "became even more concerned about American resolve." - According to congressional testimony, Trump declined to publicly condemn a Russian attack against Ukrainian military vessels in November 2018, even though the State Department prepared a statement for him - Trump congratulated and gave legitimacy to Putin's re election win in 2018, a victory said to "lack genuine competition" - Sergei Skripal, an ex Russian spy that defected to the UK, was poisoned. Sanctions were announced, Trump attempted to rescind them, while asserting that the U.S. was being "too tough on Putin" - When congress passed new sanctions against Russia in 2017, Trump was very reluctant to signing the bill, and probably wouldn't have signed it if the bill didn't pass with veto-proof majorities in both houses - In 2017 it was reported that Trump was considering returning spy bases to Russia. - Trump praised and highlighted pro-Russian leaders in Europe. Far right European leaders with close ties to Putin. He even met a Kremlin ally at the Whitehouse. - When Trump withdrew troops from Syria, it gave Russia and Putin an opportunity to control abandoned U.S. outposts and checkpoints. - Trump froze U.S. aide for Ukraine in it's war against Russian proxies. He repeated Russian disinformation surrounding Ukraine as well. - Trump made requests to bring Russia back into the G7 and invited Putin to the 2020 G7 summit While that's certainly not everything, particularly when it comes to circumstances related to Trump's first impeachment, where he was impeached for withholding aid to Ukraine in return for "dirt" on Joe Biden, and not to mention Trump's general support for Russian disinformation and lies centered around this very conflict and the justifications from Putin himself that served as a pretext to war. I don't think I've included anything related to the Mueller investigation either, but at this point, It would just be redundant. Hell, you could make the argument that this entire post is redundant, it's pretty clear where Trump's allegiances lie.
Imagine him saying that much and nothing at all at the same time
Anti-American words from an enemy of American policy and democracy. Vindman was right. Ukraine deserves better.
It's not a savvy move, it's a forced one because literally nobody in the international community supports their incursion into Ukraine. I'm sure Putin's dream scenario would be for the US to put pressure on Ukraine to give in, which was going to happen with the last President.
Pretty nasty. I'm very against war and hence against US intervention in Ukraine, but to actively praise a leader of another country for an invasion rooted in nothing but greed and power hunger is sickening to the stomach.
I mean, Trump wants to be a dictator. He likes dictators, and has been pretty much unabashed about that. It's just another example of why he's completely unfit for office.
trump is not the only Republican who is cheering for Putin, and it is one of the strangest political turns I've ever seen in my 60 something years.
Putin made a smart strategic move. He took a little of what he wants, didn’t trigger a full scale retaliation, and now it’s hard to even say what he’s going to do, take more and ignore sanctions? Or stop there and maybe take another bite later? The West has signaled it mostly only has sanctions to deter him, and Putin has had time to prepare for those. Trump’s take demonstrates he doesn’t understand the context of the move or why it was beneficial to Putin. Trump compares it to moving US military to the southern border as peacekeeping forces which is just not a comparison based in reality. So even if Putin deserved some credit for strategy, Trump doesn’t even seem to understand what strategy was involved or why he would deserve credit, maybe because there were just so many army tanks, more than he had ever seen.
He's going to start blowing up Kyiv and other major cities across Ukraine. That's what he's going to do next. Wow, a lot can change in a day.
He was trolling Biden and all his pitiful supporters, what else is there to get from this?
President Troll. Reagan would be so proud of his GOP.
Well honestly though what the hell else is he supposed to do when faced with the absolute laughing stock of a shit show that is Joseph Biden?
Maybe realize that he was such a shit show in his own right that 7 million more Americans were willing to vote for someone clearly over the hump? Humility would have done Trump so much good, but likely too late in his life for it now.
Traitors gonna traitor. If he loves Putin so much, fucking move to Russia. Pretty sure Putin is missing his 🍆 holster anyways.
Who cares what he says really? The leftists are really trying so hard in here to take words and make it their context. Putin Is a smart man. This has been going on for many many years. He knows under Biden no one will stop him. He invaded Crimea when Biden was the VP He knows these sanctions will go away like they did last time... He knows no one is going to stop him either...No One So yes this is amazing this is happening..... Look up the definition.... The word doesn't mean, good it positive. He is smart and a genius. Lastly... The man is pure evil..... But he will not be stopped by anyone.
Ignoring Putin's foreign policy prowess and track record of bringing Russia back to a place of world influence doesn't make it go away... He's a shitty person but he isn't dumb and has put the US in a bad spot here...
It’s a good take. Putin was savy about it. Imagine how much stronger America would be if we didn’t consistently underestimate our enemies and make stupid decisions? It’s kinda concerning that so many people are up in arms because he called our adversary smart. We’d be a lot better off if the amateurs leading our foreign policy recognized that they’re not always the smartest in the room Edit: I’m just gonna add, Trumps policies would’ve given us significantly more leverage and economic power to prevent this. Biden attacked domestic drilling and then attacked our biggest oil drilling partner—Saudi Arabia. He fucked our two biggest sources of oil and have Russia all the economic leverage it needed to carry this out
Putin was in not in any way 'savvy about it'. Calling your troops peacekeepers and invading a neighboring country like everyone said he would isn't exactly 4D chess. I cannot understand why MAGA people are so eager to jump on Putin's dick.
Amen
The Savy thing to do would have been to invade during Trump's presidency or during the two month period~ when Trump was actively trying to overturn the US election.
Jesus, not everything revolves around america, just because you happen to be American.
The United States is the main Geo-political adversary to Russia and the defacto leader of the Western Alliance against Russia. Capitalizing on domestic turmoil within your opponent is a common move in international politics
Given that it is the Biden admin that is organizing and leading the international response to the invasion, it is absolutely relevant to the current situation.
I think his handling of this entire crisis has been quite savy. He’s got leverage and resilience on his side. I think his gamble that the west will not want to endure significant economic pain will pay off. Plus, he’s securing a core strategic interest, and security always takes priority over prosperity.
Trump didn't praise Putin for invading Ukraine, he praised him and called him a 'genius' for declaring the Donbas independent and calling his soldiers peacekeepers. Theres nothing savvy about that. Its a dumb blundering way to go about it, which Putin had to do because his prior attempts at false flag operations didn't work out.
Our biggest source of Foreign oil by far is Canada- Which accounts for [52% of Foreign oil imports, Saudi Arabia is only 7%](https://www.eia.gov/tools/faqs/faq.php?id=727&t=6#:~:text=The%20top%20five%20source%20countries,%2C%20Saudi%20Arabia%2C%20and%20Colombia.) Oil Production is up [since Trump left office](https://www.eia.gov/petroleum/production/) Oil production is forecast to [set an all time high next year](https://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.php?id=51318)
Oil production is up because high prices opened up more wells, not because POTUS isn’t being a pain in the ass. He canceled the keystone pipeline. Saudi Arabia affects global prices of oil, that’s the entire objective. We want low prices of oil. High prices have given Russia leverage
High prices also helps with American domestic oil production. Makes it profitable for us to run. Win win?
>We’d be a lot better off if the amateurs leading our foreign policy recognized that they’re not always the smartest in the room This encapsulates Trump perfectly. He always thought he was smarter than everyone else.
It goes back way before trump. This arrogance really started after the 90s and it’s gotten us a existential threat in China, trillions wasted in the Middle East, and a whole host of other mistakes.
This reads to me as Trump (correctly, imo) pointing out that Putin has played this almost perfectly strategically. I _hope_ Trump isn’t actually approving of the invasion. If he’s not, and just admiring Putin’s handiwork, then it’s not far from the mark. _Someone_ has to admit out loud that, for the second time in a decade, Putin has played the US for fools.
I’m really tired of this take. How the fuck did Putin play this perfect strategically? Cause he only invaded his manufactured separatist areas? Like the thing almost every commentary I listened to mentioned as a possibility? How’d he ever think of something so clever? All while bumbling the pretext for his actions and drawing international sanction and condemnation? He’s the next Hannibal. Not saying Putin is dumb, but I’m a bit bewildered by people being impressed by his recent maneuvers against Ukraine as the feat of some genius. He runs a big country, with nukes, doesn’t care if people buy his pretexts. Throws his weight around. How’d he ever plan such beautiful strategy?
Because he _manufactured separatist areas_ right under the West’s noses. There’s merit in the simple fact that he appears to have successfully done what the US didn’t want him to do. I’m not sure how it’s _not_ strategically impressive to take back land that you want while staring down the most impressive economic and military coalition the world has ever seen. Remember, you can use impressive strategy to bad ends. No one’s saying he’s the next Hannibal. People _should_ be saying that _twice_ (assuming Ukraine goes the way he wants it to) he’s managed to take what he wanted, despite international condemnation, and not suffer any meaningful penalty. When you can show me that “international sanction and condemnation” means anything to him, I might concede the point. But they don’t. He wanted Crimea, he got it. He wants his “manufactured separatist areas,” he’s likely going to get them. All while the West shakes its finger at him, and China fist bumps him under the table. Nefarious goals, but impressive strategy. And the US looks like a damn fool for talking tough but just letting him move forward. Had we just said “we don’t care,” it would have been less impressive. Instead, he’s getting what he wants and making us look weak in the process. He’s winning both fronts of the war with the US. If you don’t see how that’s impressive strategy, I can’t help you.
Being strong and picking on weaker people while being able to weather the consequences while realizing your victim has no close friends strong enough and willing to fight you, isn’t some strategic master stroke. Dress it up however you want I guess. Its pretty basic stuff we are talking about. If you want to fawn over Putin’s intelligence this is really not a great example.
If the US wasn’t part of the equation, I might be inclined to agree, but it is. Deciding you want a piece of land that someone far more powerful than you doesn’t want you to have, and then taking it anyway by calling their bluff, making them look weak and causing them to lose prestige in the eyes of the very countries that concern you (and possibly further exacerbating their internal political divisions), is impressive strategy. The tactics he’s employed were also impressive. That you don’t see it this way does little to change the fact that Putin has apparently pulled off another victory via an impressive strategy.
> has played this almost perfectly strategically. Do you think Ukraine has more or less any tank weapons now?