Anytime you oppose war mongering, you are labeled as "pro" the enemy leader.

[BillZBubb]

Some things never change. Oppose the foolish invasion of Iraq, why you are pro-Saddam! Oppose foolish saber rattling over Ukraine, you are pro-Putin!

The good news is that President Obama is handling this situation as well as can be expected.

[MNBrewer]

1. Oppose the Russian invasion of Crimea, you are pro-What?

[BillZBubb]

5. You tell me?

You would certainly be anti-Russian policy in Crimea. You could be pro-Ukrainian rightists, pro-Ukrainian centrists, or pro-Ukrainian leftists--who knows. But hopefully you aren't pro a US use of force in this instance.

[MNBrewer]

7. well, anti-invasion, for one thing

[arikara]

13. Pro Peace

That's enough. War never solved anything.

[Lost_Count]

32. War has solved lots of things... Decisively...

Please refer to all of recorded history for examples.

That's like saying violence never solves anything. Of course it does...

[arikara]

34. I guess it all depends upon your version of solving things

War is waged for the sake of religion, profit or power, so possibly it solves things in the short term for the religious nuts, the profit hungry corporations pulling the strings, and the power mad despots. But it certainly doesn't solve things for the the ones most affected by the violence.

[Lost_Count]

35. Really? In the history of humanity...

... you can't think of an example of justified violence or war?

[Donald Ian Rankin]

38. Speaking as a European Jew: you're simply wrong. N.T

[Nanjing to Seoul]

30. Pro-ductively intelligent?

[Scootaloo]

2. Tell me about it

Apparently I've been an Obama-hating, America-blaming, unpatriotic, communist, islamofascist supporter of Putin ever since I refused to get on the Syria War bandwagon last year.

As Chrs Hedges writes, "War is a force that gives us meaning" - and it seems without war, some people are utterly meaningless

[BainsBane]

16. While I'm a redbaiting McCarthyite for not supporting invasion in Crimea

I guess the news that Russia is no longer communist takes twenty plus years to reach some quarters.

[Scootaloo]

28. Yeah, some posters seem to have halted their brains in 1984

[polly7]

40. Yep,

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=view_post&forum=1002&pid=4593883

"The only thing I can see that justifies your completely different responses to the two military situations is that you like Russia and Putin and do not like the US and Obama."

[Renew Deal]

3. Nice post Genghis Khan

[BillZBubb]

6. ?

I don't get the reference.

[Nanjing to Seoul]

31. Don't worry, neither does the poster.

[Renew Deal]

43. Dumb joke

[quinnox]

4. We have been seeing a lot of that here

Not joining in the blood thirsty hate of Putin, or not drawing parallels between him and Hitler? You must be a Putinista!

[BillZBubb]

8. Yeah, there have been several threads along that line.

I expect that sort of thing from the right, but on DU it should be non-existent.

[quinnox]

10. *nods*

I have seen that, not done to me, but to others. If someone asked me that, I would in turn ask them if they opposed the Iraq invasion, and if they did, did they appreciate being called a Saddam supporter for their opposition...

[RobertEarl]

9. What and how should we do this.....

See the soldiers and their wives, together, standing up for themselves? It is a great thing the people are doing. And doing it with no violence!!

We Americans know that with our military we can go anywhere and do anything we desire. We have had Presidents that lied to us, telling us that they needed to use our force to invade other countries, much as Hitler did. We can and have been fooled.

But we don't want war. We don't want violence. We elected President Obama mainly because he held out the promise of using the miltary only as a last resort. We, and he, Obama, don't see using our force against Russia as a good idea. But we do stand ready to do what we can short of violence.

I can not speak for Obama much beyond that, but as for the Russians wanting to stay and keep their Navy in the country, it seems as though that is something to negotiate. The example of standing up to the Russian soldiers without violence is a great example for us all to move forward in peace.

The US did invade, and occupy, with violence, two countries, Iraq and Afghanistan, in the last 10 years. No country would be all that safe depending on our military to solve their problems. But there are many other things the US can do to help. Rest assured, knowing that we Americans do support other countries in their quest to be free.

This will not be another world war. Putin, while not as bad as our Bush, is a dangerous man, but we think our President Obama, and Sec. of State Kerry, can deal with him and keep him from causing too many problems. Putin is no Hitler. Hitler was just flat out crazy. Putin has too much money to lose to go crazy.

[ZombieHorde]

11. It's a great way to change the subject from war to you. nt

[jsr]

12. We need to quit sticking our noses in other people's business.

[Renew Deal]

45. Nice post Jiminy Cricket

Nose

Get it? I'm so funny.

Hahahahahha

[Pretzel_Warrior]

14. Uh..not true in this case. 99% on DU have said

They are against any military involvement by the U.S.

There is just a contingent here that is determined to push Putin's version of events despite facts otherwise.

[TwilightGardener]

15. Strawman. Almost no one, left or right, really wants us involved in a shooting

war with Russia. Not even the most neoconish of neocons is advocating any real military action. Just sanctions, missile defense, strengthening NATO presence. All things that Russia would hate, but aren't direct military engagement.

[BainsBane]

17. Not only that, it's not an option.

Even McCain says its untenable, and that guy never met a war he didn't like. The US does not want war with Russia. It only likes wars with countries with far weaker militaries.

Unless Putin starts rolling tanks all over Eastern Europe, there is not going to be US military intervention. Period.

[TwilightGardener]

18. If tanks roll across all of Ukraine, NATO will have to react. I doubt we'd see

a complete takeover of another country like that, but that's the only way I can see a real war breaking out.

[BainsBane]

19. The Ukraine isn't in NATO

They don't have to react, and I seriously doubt Nato wants to go to war over the Ukraine. I think it likely Putin will take all of the Ukraine. I think it gets dangerous if he moves beyond that. That's my uninformed opinion.

[TwilightGardener]

21. No, but Poland is, and it probably doesn't want to be neighbors with Russia.

Taking all of Ukraine, a free and sovereign country, would be insanely ambitious and would have to be stopped.

[Donald Ian Rankin]

39. Stopped how?

I think it not unlikely that Russia will try it.

I think that it would be a catastrophe if it succeeded.

I think that war with Russia will be a catastrophe.

I'm not sure anything short of war would stop it.

I'm not sure what that leaves, beyond "cross your fingers".

[TwilightGardener]

44. I don't know--I think the best way is to not cede any ground initially, but

impose financial and diplomatic costs at each advance of Russia's military. In other words, make each move Russia makes into Ukraine costlier than the last move, which is why it's good to start slow with things like cancelling the G8 and shaking up their currency, and then ratchet up things like sanctions and pulling visas and freezing assets if he won't quit--and keep negotiating, and slowly increase military presence nearby as a signal. This is actually how it's all being done, between the EU, NATO, and the US, so we'll see if it works--but if we go straight for the toughest sanctions and they don't work or backfire, we have nowhere to go but war, and that would be failure.

[ReRe]

20. (Also, throwing him out of the G8) n/t

[TwilightGardener]

22. Yep, and stuff with visas, banking, etc.

[ReRe]

25. He's cornered.

Done. Kaputski. Stick a fork in him.

[ReRe]

23. Oh, I think he's doing better than...

... "as well as can be expected." And then Putin hung himself with that "press chat" conference yesterday. I think this whole curfuffle is done with. File it.

[joshcryer]

24. It depends on which war you're opposing.

If you oppose the US war mongering you are the 99.99% of DUers except for two (I count two, literally two DUers).

If you oppose Putin's war mongering and don't see any legitimate reason for him to be doing so, you are, from my experience, about 75% DUer.

There's the other, very loud, very wrong, 25% of DUers who believe Putin has a legitimate reason and cause to be in Crimea.

A number of DUers believe the view that a diverse group of people protesting and being killed where their President, after fearing impeachment fled to Russia, leaving his administrative buildings completely empty, with no buildings only to be impeached and a transitional government was formed in his place (no doubt with undesirable elements).

While a very loud, and again very very wrong number of DUers think that said President was an anti-oligarch fighting for the people of Ukraine while fascist nazi elements dared protest against him and his use of force against those protesters (the dead of whom can be seen from all walks of life and many different nationalities) was justified. He fled for his life and his impeachment was violent overthrow only for the facists to take power.

[cprise]

33. "people protesting and being killed"

Is that an honest description?

The BBC timeline puts rioter casualties as starting on Jan. 22nd.

That means the police endured (perhaps to save face for the Olympics across the border) rioters who set them on fire, threw hundreds of bricks (not stones--bricks), and tried to run them over with bulldozers for over SIX WEEKS before using deadly force. That is, as far I can tell...

This one has to be clicked-on to appear b/c of the time reference...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=O_Zrd9965EY#t=132

These all appear to be posted before January 22nd.

The question that keeps coming back to me is: Whose standards of policing and protesting are we using here? Is it possible to even imagine the above being tolerated in the USA?

[Democracyinkind]

26. Every.single.time!

[Warpy]

27. Oldest trick in the book

for shutting up sensible people who don't want war.

Then they start pulling out pictures of supposedly gutted infants and dismembered children and how can you possibly be ON THAT SIDE. they MUST BE STOPPED!

And they just never remember all the bullshit around the last war, bullshit they fell for then, too.

I suppose there will always be war because stupid people love war as long as nobody expects them to put on a uniform and go fight it.

[sarcasmo]

36. +1

[delrem]

29. Just remember that "enemy Saddam" wasn't always "enemy Saddam".

For most of his career, esp. during his war on Iran, he was "friend Saddam".

And it was neither "friend" or "enemy" Saddam that did Falluja. If you want to look for the guy/country/admin that did Falluja, forget it because that was the past and the country that did Falluja is looking forward, not back. And that's a bipartisan decision - totally democratic, totally defining of the country that did Falluja. Dig it.

Have you read "1984" and thought it through in context of actual events? We live in a post-1984 world, and in this golden age the good citizens are spun through loops upon loops.

[Puzzledtraveller]

37. What's the difference between Neoliberals and Neoconservatives?

The person sitting in the White House.

[alarimer]

41. But you are opposing something that is not happening here.

No one is going to war over Ukraine. No one (except some lunatic Republicans) has even suggested a military response.

I think the appropriate response is to pull diplomats or freeze Russian oligarchs' assets in the US or Europe. That should get their attention. Cancel the G8, that sort of thing.

[Doctor_J]

42. any time you oppose WAR