> In addition to boosting defense spending, countries need to ramp up internal security, including police, domestic intelligence services and information sharing between allied governments, said Kohv, of the International Centre for Defence and Security.
Impossible to tell just from this article what this guy's true intentions are, but it's pretty funny that the proposed solution to all this is just "let's do the cold war again". His bio also doesn't exactly scream "not at all personally invested in the proliferation of the military industrial complex":
>Marek Kohv has also served in the Defense Forces in various positions, including in the Military Intelligence Centre and Joint Headquarters of the Estonian Defence Forces. He has participated in several foreign operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Marek Kohv is an alumnus of the United States Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School as a Psychological Operations officer.: https://icds.ee/en/autor/marek-kohv/
As an American, I would be much more inclined to appreciate the advice of someone that had no prior connection to our military.
>Western intelligence officials believe the attack, which took place in July, was a trial run by Russian agents who planned to place similar bombs on flights to the United States.
It's only a matter of time before they bring down a US Cargo/passenger plane. Perhaps Americans will finally wake up and come around to the fact that Putin and Russia are not their friends like Tulsi, Trump, Hegsseth, et al have said.
For what it's worth, I don't know a single Republican who thinks Putin is their friend. They just think that there might be a better way to contain your enemy than outright war. For the first time in my life, the Republicans around me are the ones who are championing non-war-like conflict resolution.
30% or so of Republicans are the extreme right who have been fully taken by propaganda. Those people are pro-russia, anti-america, as in, dismantle and burn the federal government to the ground. This is what they mean when they talk about "draining the swamp." It's born from the intersection of willful ignorance, resentment over their poverty, and targeted propaganda via algorithms that stokes radical belief.
Just because your friends aren't in that 30% doesn't mean they don't exist.
Feel like naming an actual source for that 30% and their views, or did you just pull it out of a hat?
Also, if you'll remember through the partisan haze of polarized thinking, it used to be considered a good and reasonable thing to not want war or unmeasured foreign intervention, and it was a widely held belief by the progressive side of U.S politics. Now however, the Republicans get derided for holding more to that view, or just accused of automatically being friends of Putin, which, as the other comment states, is a gross bit of mendacity.
Just because Trump and his supporters take a certain posture doesn't mean that it automatically becomes bad or that one needs to take all possible opposite positions.
I'd be willing to bet money, to anyone who offered, that during the Trump presidency, the U.S will emphatically not cease support to Ukraine, because, certain posturing and a small few fringe nuts aside, the Republicans do know that Russia is the real aggressor and has to be shown a strong hand for the sake of keeping American reliability credible on the world stage. Even Trump knows this perfectly well.
> Also, if you'll remember through the partisan haze of polarized thinking, it used to be considered a good and reasonable thing to not want war or unmeasured foreign intervention, and it was a widely held belief by the progressive side of U.S politics. Now however, the Republicans get derided for holding more to that view, or just accused of automatically being friends of Putin, which, as the other comment states, is a gross bit of mendacity.
Trump's "bromance" with Putin during his last term, coupled with extensive evidence of corruption, makes it reasonable to question whether he might prioritize Putin's interests over U.S. strategic goals. Historically, ties to foreign powers would disqualify a candidate from public office, yet the Republican Party seems largely willing to overlook these concerns. Even Joseph McCarthy, notorious for his paranoia about foreign influence, would likely see Trump as a textbook case — and for once, he wouldn’t be wrong.
> I'd be willing to bet money, to anyone who offered, that during the Trump presidency, the U.S will emphatically not cease support to Ukraine, because, certain posturing and a small few fringe nuts aside, the Republicans do know that Russia is the real aggressor and has to be shown a strong hand for the sake of keeping American reliability credible on the world stage. Even Trump knows this perfectly well.
As for the claim that Trump understands the importance of standing firm against Russia: his past behavior doesn't inspire confidence. I'd estimate at least a 30% chance that, under another Trump presidency, the U.S. could abruptly cut off support for Ukraine. Why? Because decisions wouldn't hinge on strategic considerations — they’d depend on Trump’s whims. Possible scenarios include:
• He feels like it.
• Putin flatters or bribes him.
• Ukraine refuses to pay him off when asked.
This pattern of impulsiveness defined his previous term, so why assume it would be any different now?
If conflict resolution means giving Ukraine to Russia, then I can agree with you. Vance says he doesn't care about what happens in Ukraine and Trump said he has a very good relationship with Putin and could stop the war in the first 24 hours after the election. Tulsi believes there are USA BioLabs in Ukraine and Putin was right for invading his peaceful neighbor. Hegseth believes Ukraine doesn't deserve US support and is unworthy of helping.
There is the old guard that understands very well that Russia is the greatest threat the US faces but they no longer have much of a voice. MAGA is in charge and they are fine with America's strategic defeat and the downfall of Western democracy.
This is a silly statement, for all of MAGA and the modern right's pitiful shortcomings.
Ukraine is profoundly low on the priority list of strategic American positions. Arguably even Crimea was more strategically important, and the US let that get annexed pretty comfortably when that happened. If Ukraine was seized it would set a terrible precedent for Europe - but the West doesn't have any strategic stakes there outside potential NATO candidates.
this is very short-sighted… you think US strategically cared about Vietnam?! it doesn’t matter whether ukraine is on the US strategic priority list - it matters what ukraine represents. if US is cool with russia invading european sovereign states - fantastic. surely putin being a fair and cool guy and all will stop there, right?
I'm not exactly a scholar on the Vietnam war, but I don't think it was about what Vietnam "represented". Communism had already been spreading with incredible ease, helped by the USSR's investments, and we were afraid of it spreading more, as it's a detriment to capitalism's global profit extraction scheme. There was a very real and very big risk to our bottom line with the whole communism fight. If Ukraine falls, Russia gets a whole bunch of agriculture exports, but other than that what do we lose? Sure it sets a bad precedent for global tensions and all, but the US isn't at risk of losing as much as we (thought) we would with the Vietnam fight.
You're equating the physical (Ukraine, Crimea) with what this war is about. Putins goal wasn't to take Ukraine, his goal was to show the world that Western law and rules mean nothing. That the West is weak and lacks resolve. That NATO is a failure along with the USA/EU belief in Global Law and Independent states.
This is about destroying the principles of Democracy. That others should not look to America or the EU for salvation. He is creating a new world order with the help of China, Iran, and North Korea and succeeding. Look at the elections in the USA and EU. Parties that are sympathetic to Russia just like MAGA is sympathetic to Putin and Russia are gaining power. The West is on the cusp of a complete strategic defeat that will define the next century at a minimum.
> “They’re worried about escalation, a back-and-forth cycle that will make things worse.”
Russia is clearly not an actual military threat to Europe. Ukraine made sure of that both by showing how toothless Russian military would be in a bigger war and by reducing it strength further. Have a bit of a back and forth with weak bully for crying out, show spine
Just be extra vigilant to putler's covert ops. They did initially succeed with separatist movements in eastern Ukraine and his propaganda is steadily getting to some europeans (mostly irrelevant old men shouting at clouds but still).
Impossible to tell just from this article what this guy's true intentions are, but it's pretty funny that the proposed solution to all this is just "let's do the cold war again". His bio also doesn't exactly scream "not at all personally invested in the proliferation of the military industrial complex":
>Marek Kohv has also served in the Defense Forces in various positions, including in the Military Intelligence Centre and Joint Headquarters of the Estonian Defence Forces. He has participated in several foreign operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. Marek Kohv is an alumnus of the United States Army John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School as a Psychological Operations officer.: https://icds.ee/en/autor/marek-kohv/
As an American, I would be much more inclined to appreciate the advice of someone that had no prior connection to our military.
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