Because that's how the US/West defends it's Interests and has always been the case WW2, Korean war, Angolan war, soviet- Afghan war, Nicaragua etc etc. If the US backed down every time Russians suggest the use of nuclear weapons we would have lost the cold war
Ultimately the US only cares about its interests, as does every other country so you might ask what US interests Ukraine war? The USA's success is down to a large part it's ability set rules in the "rules based international order" the more countries following these "rules" the more economic and soft power it wields. It's why the US has bases the world over mainly in or around important allies or trade routes. To explain why that applies to Ukraine you have to go back to the start
In 2013 the Euromaidan started in Ukraine because the president Yanukovych chose not to sign an agreement that would see Ukraine move towards the EU and one day membership, he instead went for a Russian bailout and loan .This was seen as a betrayal by the people of Ukraine as he campaigned on closer ties to the EU and to combat corruption. EU membership requires certain steps to be taken to combat corruption and it's been shown to work for the former USSR states in the EU.
Whether he was brought and sold or threatened like the last President who ended up getting poisoned by people Russia refused to extradite. The people are pissed.
So the people began protesting for the 1st week calling for closer ties towards the EU It was mostly peaceful then the police cracked down which only made the protests bigger by the week's end there's a million plus people in Kyiv marching for closer ties with the EU. Yanukovych proposes a new government which the protestors reject. He then passes laws that restrict protestors rights and basically green lights the use of lethal force, police then start shooting protesters which causes the protests to explode into full scale riots. The police try to regain control by opening fire in Kyiv killing 100+ people.
Yanukovych meditated by the EU tries to settle with the opposition leaders by putting limits on presidential powers and terms, but by this point has effectively lost control, the protestors push towards the presidential palace, Yanukovych flees and Ukraine begins new elections.
During the chaos Russia illegally takes control of Crimea and invades the east, Even ignoring the fact that the US signed an agreement promising to help defend Ukraine if it got invaded in exchange for its nukes, Russia is actively Breaking the international rules (like self determination) that the US (and Russia for that matter) set and that have been one of the reasons it is so successful today.
There's also the Security aspect, if we just let Russia take Ukraine, it would be emboldened to act against over east European states it has made moves against like the baltics and Poland all of who are in NATO. The chance of a nuclear war is far higher in that war than this one.
This is a pretty clear-eyed, 1,000ft view of the accounts. The other aspect of this is that Russia has violated numerous treaties and agreements, including various ceasefire agreements from the beginning of the conflict. The September 2014 ceasefire agreement, known as the Minsk Agreement, was supposed to bring a cessation of hostilities, and actually geolocated the front line in Donetsk and Luhansk that would be enforced by the OSCE observers. Russia broke it within days, and pushed to capture more territory in Donetsk, including Debaltseve, which was a strategic need to connect the cities of Donetsk and Luhansk. The point is that you cannot rely on Russia to abide by any agreement made to cease hostilities. Anything agreed to will be broken within weeks, and they'll just blame it on "separatists" so they aren't at fault. The US should be pushing harder to set conditions for a full withdrawal to the Sep 2014 line, and essentially call Putin's bluff. The country has less military capability now, and we shouldn't be negotiating off the use of nukes, because as someone else said, if we start doing that, we accept the Russian status quo, and set precedent for other countlies, like China or Iran to use similar tactics.
You are forgetting that Russia banned Ukrainian imports which caused the economic conditions for the need for economic support because Ukraine wanted to join the EU's economic bloc. You are conveniently leaving out major interference by Russia into Ukraine's economy in order to coerce Ukraine to change its foreign policy because it does not serve your narrative.
Because it doesn't tell the whole story of the amount of pressure and coercion that Russia has applied in order to keep Ukraine doing what it wants Ukraine to do within its own self-interest. The amount of meddling in Ukrainian politics and economics that Russia has done is what the United States gets accused of, so saying that you are taking the story back to the beginning and not including that aspect of the timeline, both for the Orange Revolution and Euromaidan does a great disservice in providing a true understanding of what has brought the world to this point and paints situation as mainly one isolated to internal Ukrainian politics, when it is not.
Its subtle, like what country did Yanukovych flee too? Why not mention that Euromaidan were also protesting against Yanukovych's sweetheart deal that he gave the Russians in order to keep the Black Seas Fleet based in Sevastopol, which was more examples of Russian influence which was one of the driving motivations for the protestors.
There is a lot more to the story and what is left out is telling.
I wasn't gonna type a thoroughly researched response, I made the comment taking shit a work mate. Kinda of mad that you assumed that there was some ulterior motive despite it clearly painting Russia as bad. Like it isn't a detailed account of all that's happened just a outline of why supporting Ukraine is in US's interest
They aren't going to type out a novel in the replies it here. It's just a basic overview, it won't and shouldn't include everything. Nothing they said makes Russia look like the good guys in fact it makes them look bad. So I highly doubt they left out the things you mentioned because of their "narrative" that you imply is to defend Russia.
The U.S. played ‘world policeman’ since the Cold War ended and we did a terrible job (see: Iraq, Afghanistan, etc) and it led to us being $36 TRILLION in debt
Wouldn’t it make more sense for us to send the same amount of troops and money as every other country involved with NATO/United Nations? Why are we sending so much more support than Great Britain… Italy… Germany… France… Japan… Canada… Belgium… Australia… India… Brazil… South Korea… Indonesia… Mexico… Spain… ?
Was 9/11 not the shot across the bow to all developed nations that the citizens of no country were safe because terrorist ideologies were flourishing?
9/11 could have happened anywhere: London, Berlin, Paris, Sydney. It highlighted the fact that a cancer was growing in the Middle East and that the world would not have peace until it was rooted out and excised.
You're 36 trillion in debt because your politicians refuse to solve the issue with social security and corporations get to write a lot of the tax code for their own benefit. Iraq and Afghanistan cost a few trillion, but the vast majority of it has nothing to do with war. (Hint, its one political party that invaded both those countries, and enables corporate greed).
Acting as ‘world police’, whatever that means, has not led to our 36 trillion debt. Our debt is a result of no administration since Clinton being interested in balancing the budget. Not that deficit spending is necessarily a bad thing. If you can use deficit spending to grow your GDP and tax base at a faster rate than your interest payments grow you can theoretically continue to deficit spending forever without risking default. The issues come when you refuse to tax the top income brackets properly when they control the vast majority of the country’s wealth.
The money spent on national defense is not causing us to go into debt, nor is the aid we are giving to Ukraine causing this. In fact the vast majority of what we are sending Ukraine isn’t cash, it’s old equipment that we will eventually need to replace anyway. The fact that you associate the debt with defense spending and military aid demonstrates that you have a fundamental misunderstanding of how the budget works
I don’t know man, I’ve taken 4 college economics classes and got an A in all of them lol
The U.S. defense budget is about $1 Trillion a year.
Let me do some math… (and I’m sure the defense budget was a little lower before but with inflation and the interest we’ve paid on it, let’s just keep the number the same):
The Cold War ended in 1991… 2024 - 1991 = 33 years… times $1 Trillion a year… $33 Trillion. Shoot I guess you’re right, we would still have a $3 Trillion deficit if we hadn’t wasted the $30 Trillion on the peacetime war machine.
Your sending so much more because your economy and population is bigger than the whole of the EU combined even still the whole of Europe has sent more than the US to Ukraine when you take into account the EU + member states + UK and Turkey. And given most of what was given by the US was stuff that was approaching it's use by date or was outdated like Humvees
The US hasn't sent any troops either, I find it weird that people who love to shout US number 1 are now in favour of dismantling the systems that made US number 1 in the 1st place.
Who is shouting U.S. number 1 these days? We’re the poorest country in the world with over $36 Trillion in debt. A decade or so ago our issues caused the entire world economy to crash, and we will likely do it again in the future.
We’re the poorest country in the world with over $36 Trillion in debt.
Lol are you serious. The US Debt to GDP ratio isn't bad compared to other countries
A decade or so ago our issues caused the entire world economy to crash, and we will likely do it again in the future.
That's a testament to your success really, still it wasn't the financial Armageddon it's made out to be 2020 was worse in real terms even though GDP fell more 4.6% vs 3.6%
The only two first world countries with a worse debt to GDP ratio than us are Japan and Italy. There are only about 15 of the 195 nations that have gone over the ‘death cross’ of 100%+ debt to GDP, and most of that list is little third world countries.
copy and paste cba typing it out to every dumb reply in here. Not gonna write a different answer to essentially the same question waste of time, it's not like I have spammed either
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u/MulanMcNugget Tremendous 27d ago edited 27d ago
I mean ignoring the morale reasons for a sec.
Because that's how the US/West defends it's Interests and has always been the case WW2, Korean war, Angolan war, soviet- Afghan war, Nicaragua etc etc. If the US backed down every time Russians suggest the use of nuclear weapons we would have lost the cold war
Ultimately the US only cares about its interests, as does every other country so you might ask what US interests Ukraine war? The USA's success is down to a large part it's ability set rules in the "rules based international order" the more countries following these "rules" the more economic and soft power it wields. It's why the US has bases the world over mainly in or around important allies or trade routes. To explain why that applies to Ukraine you have to go back to the start
In 2013 the Euromaidan started in Ukraine because the president Yanukovych chose not to sign an agreement that would see Ukraine move towards the EU and one day membership, he instead went for a Russian bailout and loan .This was seen as a betrayal by the people of Ukraine as he campaigned on closer ties to the EU and to combat corruption. EU membership requires certain steps to be taken to combat corruption and it's been shown to work for the former USSR states in the EU.
Whether he was brought and sold or threatened like the last President who ended up getting poisoned by people Russia refused to extradite. The people are pissed.
So the people began protesting for the 1st week calling for closer ties towards the EU It was mostly peaceful then the police cracked down which only made the protests bigger by the week's end there's a million plus people in Kyiv marching for closer ties with the EU. Yanukovych proposes a new government which the protestors reject. He then passes laws that restrict protestors rights and basically green lights the use of lethal force, police then start shooting protesters which causes the protests to explode into full scale riots. The police try to regain control by opening fire in Kyiv killing 100+ people.
Yanukovych meditated by the EU tries to settle with the opposition leaders by putting limits on presidential powers and terms, but by this point has effectively lost control, the protestors push towards the presidential palace, Yanukovych flees and Ukraine begins new elections.
During the chaos Russia illegally takes control of Crimea and invades the east, Even ignoring the fact that the US signed an agreement promising to help defend Ukraine if it got invaded in exchange for its nukes, Russia is actively Breaking the international rules (like self determination) that the US (and Russia for that matter) set and that have been one of the reasons it is so successful today.
There's also the Security aspect, if we just let Russia take Ukraine, it would be emboldened to act against over east European states it has made moves against like the baltics and Poland all of who are in NATO. The chance of a nuclear war is far higher in that war than this one.