Ultimately, what is moral matters very little in geopolitics. While decisions are often in the hands of leaders, the conditions that put leaders in their spots and put decisions in their laps are a monstrously large chain of cause and effect, material processes of matter working itself out. I think that’s more practical for analyzing why the war happened in the first place, so we can figure out how to end it in the best way possible.

NCD is basically a NATO fanclub, so that checks out.

That’s certainly the western viewpoint of Euromaidan, but it wipes away the real materialist analysis of the events to conform to a western-friendly narrative. The truth is that the West was dramatically and intimately involved, and the sepperatists in Donetsk and Luhansk existed before Russian aid.

Your goal overall seems to be divorcing Russia from any coherent and materially explainable goals, and as simply subject to the rule of a mad king’s whims. This isn’t the case, and is, frankly, an awful and idealist framing of history that suggests ideas drive history, and not material reality. It also whitewashes NATO imperialism and absolves them from any involvement, when NATO has been very clear about its interests and hasn’t strayed from its origins as a millitary pact of the worlds most powerful Imperialists.

You’re conveniently ignoring Euromaidan, the fallout of it, and the entire nearly 4 decades of incredibly complicated fallout from the dissolution of the USSR.

Putin has input, sure. However, his actions have popular support among Russians because the invasion has material reasons for happening, not just the whims of a leader.

Believing history to be driven by the egos of a few individuals and divorcing it entirely from materialist analysis is Great Man Theory, though. Ego may have played a small factor, but certainly not the driving force.

Certainly you can see how the statement that “Russia has lied about pretty much everything” can be seen as “Russia always lies,” right?

Either way, I still don’t see why NATO expansionism would not be the primary factor, given that that has been a huge part of Russian geopolitics since back when they were still Socialist. Mineral access could be a secondary factor, but that doesn’t explain minerals being absent from the peace deal proposed by Russia near the beginning of the war, which instead focused on NATO.

It seems more likely that as Ukraine and the US rejected the Russian-proposed peace deals, Russia has seen that as an additional opportunity to recoup some of the cost of the war through going for minerals as a secondary objective.

I don’t believe in “Great Man Theory” as a useful method of analysis of historical trends. Material conditions and political economic factors play a far greater role in historical events than the individual whims of leaders.

You do realize that you just contradicted yourself, right? Why do you believe Putin when he says he wants to profit from minerals in Ukraine? Wouldn’t your belief in Russia as only lying mean that he actually doesn’t want to sell Ukrainian minerals to the US?

Russia can and does lie. It also tells the truth. Analyzing historical trends and motivations is important for figuring out what is actually going on, rather than just assuming the opposite of whatever Russia says. That’s not Occam’s Razor, that’s analytical nihilism.

Sure, there are likely people in Russia that want access to Ukrainian minerals, but that certainly doesn’t seem to be the primary cause of the invasion to begin with.

I trust Occam’s Razor, this is consistent with what has happened in the past regarding Russia/NATO relations since NATO’s formation as an anticommunist millitary alliance against the USSR, a history continued into the modern Russian Federation even after the adoption of Capitalism.

She’s talking about reformism as though it is revolution, and is using revolution as a term for “system change.” I won’t say that’s linguistically wrong, but among Marxists that strategy is called reformism, and is generally seen as strategically futile by Marxists since Marx himself. Revolution, in the Marxian strain, looks like the Paris Commune, Russian Revolution, Cuban, Vietnamese, Chinese, etc. as all of the strategies she is espousing are seen as impossible to actually do with the present level of power workers have within the system.

If Marxists believed the system could be reformed, they would be first in line, but in the overwhelming majority of countries where Capitalists have power, this is impossible. A notable exception is countries under the thumb of Imperialism, who usually can band together against Imperialism and form a coalition, though usually revolution is seen as necessary following breaking free (as the CPC and the KMT in China aligned against Japanese colonialism and then fought a revolutionary war against each other).

Bluesky is corporate, Mastodon is closer to Lemmy in ownership.

NATO is a millitary alliance of Imperialist states formed directly to exert pressure on the USSR, and now retains that hostile history with the current Russian Federation. It was led by Nazis including Adolf Heusinger and has performed hostile, anticommunist terrorist operations such as Operation Gladio in order to combat Communism and exert power to maintain Imperialism.

Your analysis of the Russian invasion of Ukraine is purely a character analysis of Putin, and not the legitimate material interests of all countries involved. This form of “Great Man Theory” is genuinely a myopic form of geopolitical analysis that rarely gets at the truth behind why events happen, and instead decides to look at history as though it’s the whims of a few individuals and not the billions of regular people.

Do you have anything to back that up, or is it just vibes? You can dislike or hate Putin while also believing that Occam’s Razor applies, and having a hostile Millitary Alliance on Russia’s doorstep could be seen as aggression by NATO towards Russia from the Russian POV.

It’s more that you came in here, started concern trolling and slandering everyone, and refused to elaborate in any meaningful way. What’s your goal? To complain about the woke?

You could just make an account on an instance that defederates from porn to begin with, though

Can you give an example?

How is being more broadly federated “closing off?” What are you talking about?

Edit: ah, misread. I think you need to make the case that Lemmy.ml removes “dissenting opinions” that are worth keeping, ie aren’t racist or based on spreading misinfo.

In what way are leftists more closed off?

The driving force in the PRC is the public sector. An example I like to use is the rubber ball factory vs the rubber factory, the one who controls the rubber factory has power over the rubber ball factory. In the PRC, heavy industry and large firms are almost entirely under state control, the private sector is more for smaller firms and secondary industries.

As for being an Empire, Imperialism isn’t judged by size, but by relations with international countries.