WN: Kerry warns Russia that military action in Ukraine could lead to

[EnochBethany]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Because russia has thousands of active nuclear weapons. If there's even a hint of a nuclear attack from ukraine russia will hit them with everything they have. They certainly couldn't reconstitute their program in the time they would have. Also, the european conference is irrelevant, nobody is going to war over this. The eu and the us would both oppose ukraine putting nukes together as well.

 

LoL   You seem to have a lot more confidence in global governments than I do....    I certainly do hope you are correct.

 

 

I don't necessarily have confidence in their ability or willingness to make proper decisions. I've looked into this a bit and it would seem that there are definitive threats of a new nuclear program from the ukranians. However, 3 to 6 months before they could make any sort of nuclear device (and even then just a dirty bomb) is the estimate. Ironically they get the majority of their nuclear fuel from Russia according to what I've read. It's capable of being refined into the sort that would be needed for legitimate nuclear weapons, but it would take them years to get centrifuge farms up and running, etc. I think that even the possibility of this being put into play, even a rumor with some tacit legitimacy behind it, would see ukraine conquered in totality by russia. This would not be a wise move from ukraine.

 

Didn't the Ukr's give up their concentrated nuke material to the Ruskies a couple of years ago?

One thing I find disturbing about Putin is him threatening to use nukes.  I guess the question now is how much resistance the Ukr's will put up vs Russia? 

 

But IMHO, it is only a matter of time before there is nuclear war in the world, what with all the proliferation, countries like N Korea & Iran.  Even Pakistan could be taken over by Islamists.

 

Now this is just my guess; I am no prophet:

My guess is that eventually the USA will get nuked reducing it to inconsequential power in the world, accounting for its lack of mention in Bible prophecy.  A nuclear war would provide a reason to not notice the Rapture, not that the Bible says it won't be noticed or that it will be secret.

 

But as to the Ukraine, I doubt that Russia will swallow it up totally. I think that the fragmentation of both legs of the Roman empire will continue, no one able to unify it again to any long, serious extent until the land Beast arise.

 

 

Well, it may be nuked, it may not be. It could be that it's simply involved but not mentioned, as well. I have a hard time believing that any country that nukes the US doesn't also get obliterated. Also, the only country with enough nukes and the proper type right now would be russia. That could change in the future though, as you've said.

 

Insofar as the rapture I lean more pretrib, so i think it will be very open and noticeable when it does happen lol.

 

"insofar as the rapture I lean more pretrib, so i think it will be very open and noticeable when it does happen"

 

But I don't know how many times I have read on the internet an attack on Pre-tribism for the supposed reason that it teaches a secret rapture.  I don't know of any scripture to prove how open or how secret the rapture will be.

 

 

Yeah, that was my mistake, lol, i mean i lean more post-trib. Though, i have seen pretrib argued in a variety of ways, from public to secret. I do know that in light of:

 

2Th 2:9  Even him, whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, 

2Th 2:10  And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. 

2Th 2:11  And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: 

2Th 2:12  That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. 

 

I don't think it will much matter if it's full knowledge that people were raptured or not.

 

Well, I have not been convinced that this delusion is specifically about the Rapture -- it could include that.  BTW, I think a case might be made for most mental illness being delusional.  The truth sets free.  Even now there is plenty of delusion.

 

As I think of the Ukraine, I sure don't know what will happen.  I expect Russia to put the ousted president back in office.  But I did not anticipate an invasion of the Crimea.

 

 

I don't necessarily think that it's about the rapture specifically, more about following the man of sin (anti-Christ), paul speaks of, which would effectively blind people to that. As to ukraine, russia has stated that the only way they would be willing to back down is if yanokovich was placed back into power in ukraine under the terms of the previous agreement, i.e. he gets to be president of a coalition government until december at the earliest. I strongly doubt those in kiev will ever agree to that.

 

Boy, Steve, I have no idea how it will pan out, but the more I think about it, the more Putin's actions  resembles Hitler's policy on German populations outside Deutschland or separated from the main country.  I doubt that the west has the guts to land troops in Ukraine nor go to war over this.  The USA also has troops tied up in Afghanistan (insanely).   I won't be surprised to see the Ukraine divided into East w/ Crimea, vs West.  The mobbers didn't anticipate the next move of the Chess game when they ousted Yanokovich.  If there were not nukes involved, perhaps the West would go to war.  In the last days, perilous times shall come.

[Steve_S]

Boy, Steve, I have no idea how it will pan out, but the more I think about it, the more Putin's actions  resembles Hitler's policy on German populations outside Deutschland or separated from the main country.  I doubt that the west has the guts to land troops in Ukraine nor go to war over this.  The USA also has troops tied up in Afghanistan (insanely).   I won't be surprised to see the Ukraine divided into East w/ Crimea, vs West.  The mobbers didn't anticipate the next move of the Chess game when they ousted Yanokovich.  If there were not nukes involved, perhaps the West would go to war.  In the last days, perilous times shall come.

 

 

 

Yes, I agree that a troop employment would be far more likely if it weren't for the several thousand nukes (supposedly 3500 according to the latest treaties) that russia is sitting on. At this juncture I don't see a way that nuclear war could be avoided if there was a direct confrontation between the US and Russia (i.e. russian troops v american troops). At the end of the day russia isn't quite ready to face the US military, especially technologically. It would be brutal, though, russians are warriors and it's always tough against them, no matter who you are. My general fear in that scenario would be russia having to fall back and feeling that the only resort they had to defend their homeland would be resorting to tactical nukes, which would then almost certainly lead to strategic retaliation. I see no benefit whatsoever to us even involving ourselves here in the first place, even speaking about it.

 

It seems that the facts of the matter are that the US and EU backed a popular coup in the western half of the country and Russia unilaterally interdicting after putin accused the US of not going to the UN security council over syria (see the new york times op ed written by putin himself on September 11th of last year). Both sides are being hypocritical here in a lot of ways, the US by backing a prime minister and president in Ukraine who was not democratically elected, simply because the old one was pro russian (the main barometer the US always uses when dealing with foreign governments as far as their legitimacy goes is whether or not they are democratically elected, supposedly), and russia unilaterally taking action.

 

Hypocrisy aside, the US and EU significantly misread what russia would do and russia seemed to know exactly what the US and EU would do and clearly had ideas about escalation levels and response initiatives, even being able to fool US spies on the ground in western russia into thinking that they had no plans to invade, WHILE they were invading (this sort of efficiency is striking, to the point of insanity). That gives russia a significant strategic advantage in any situation such as this. I have to believe that this is because putin is simply a better overall strategist and conflict tactician than is obama, as even though they both have a ton of aides, they are the ones calling the shots.

 

Really, we have no dog in this hunt as far as i can see. We just wanted to make russia look bad. Ukraine, crimea in particular, is incredibly important to russia, they certainly seem to be willing to shed more than a little blood over it. We do not have this sort of resolve in that part of the world, nor should we, because we don't benefit one way or the other, and us getting involved in situations seems to only increase the number of people getting killed. The US and EU simply expressing support for the uprising in kiev probably emboldened them to go farther than they would have otherwise, just as france and england giving poland support convinced them to do the same prior to world war II (referencing your comment on hitler using protecting ethnic germans as a pretense for invasion). Why give russia any pretense at all. They may not need it, but putin also wouldn't blindly invade a country without his citizens believing it was necessary. You've got the new government in ukraine right now talking about how they are going to reconstitute their nuclear weapons program and bashing the russian speaking ukranians there, and russia is looping this stuff on every television channel they have. So now, putin has his population firmly behind him and has no real need to worry about backlash at home. If there's one thing that history has shown us, russians stick together in times of conflict against outsiders, any hopes that "sanctions" are going to erode his popularity at home may as well be thrown out the window and shot, in my opinion, due to this. If anything they will be more resolved than they were before.

[EnochBethany]

 

Boy, Steve, I have no idea how it will pan out, but the more I think about it, the more Putin's actions  resembles Hitler's policy on German populations outside Deutschland or separated from the main country.  I doubt that the west has the guts to land troops in Ukraine nor go to war over this.  The USA also has troops tied up in Afghanistan (insanely).   I won't be surprised to see the Ukraine divided into East w/ Crimea, vs West.  The mobbers didn't anticipate the next move of the Chess game when they ousted Yanokovich.  If there were not nukes involved, perhaps the West would go to war.  In the last days, perilous times shall come.

 

 

 

Yes, I agree that a troop employment would be far more likely if it weren't for the several thousand nukes (supposedly 3500 according to the latest treaties) that russia is sitting on. At this juncture I don't see a way that nuclear war could be avoided if there was a direct confrontation between the US and Russia (i.e. russian troops v american troops). At the end of the day russia isn't quite ready to face the US military, especially technologically. It would be brutal, though, russians are warriors and it's always tough against them, no matter who you are. My general fear in that scenario would be russia having to fall back and feeling that the only resort they had to defend their homeland would be resorting to tactical nukes, which would then almost certainly lead to strategic retaliation. I see no benefit whatsoever to us even involving ourselves here in the first place, even speaking about it.

 

It seems that the facts of the matter are that the US and EU backed a popular coup in the western half of the country and Russia unilaterally interdicting after putin accused the US of not going to the UN security council over syria (see the new york times op ed written by putin himself on September 11th of last year). Both sides are being hypocritical here in a lot of ways, the US by backing a prime minister and president in Ukraine who was not democratically elected, simply because the old one was pro russian (the main barometer the US always uses when dealing with foreign governments as far as their legitimacy goes is whether or not they are democratically elected, supposedly), and russia unilaterally taking action.

 

Hypocrisy aside, the US and EU significantly misread what russia would do and russia seemed to know exactly what the US and EU would do and clearly had ideas about escalation levels and response initiatives, even being able to fool US spies on the ground in western russia into thinking that they had no plans to invade, WHILE they were invading (this sort of efficiency is striking, to the point of insanity). That gives russia a significant strategic advantage in any situation such as this. I have to believe that this is because putin is simply a better overall strategist and conflict tactician than is obama, as even though they both have a ton of aides, they are the ones calling the shots.

 

Really, we have no dog in this hunt as far as i can see. We just wanted to make russia look bad. Ukraine, crimea in particular, is incredibly important to russia, they certainly seem to be willing to shed more than a little blood over it. We do not have this sort of resolve in that part of the world, nor should we, because we don't benefit one way or the other, and us getting involved in situations seems to only increase the number of people getting killed. The US and EU simply expressing support for the uprising in kiev probably emboldened them to go farther than they would have otherwise, just as france and england giving poland support convinced them to do the same prior to world war II (referencing your comment on hitler using protecting ethnic germans as a pretense for invasion). Why give russia any pretense at all. They may not need it, but putin also wouldn't blindly invade a country without his citizens believing it was necessary. You've got the new government in ukraine right now talking about how they are going to reconstitute their nuclear weapons program and bashing the russian speaking ukranians there, and russia is looping this stuff on every television channel they have. So now, putin has his population firmly behind him and has no real need to worry about backlash at home. If there's one thing that history has shown us, russians stick together in times of conflict against outsiders, any hopes that "sanctions" are going to erode his popularity at home may as well be thrown out the window and shot, in my opinion, due to this. If anything they will be more resolved than they were before.

 

Thanks for your insights; you seem to know more about this than I do.

 

(the main barometer the US always uses when dealing with foreign governments as far as their legitimacy goes is whether or not they are democratically elected, supposedly), and russia unilaterally taking action.

 

Unless it is Saudi Arabia?  IMHO, it is an error to suppose that a multi-party republic govt is feasible for all nations.  And the idea that the USA should crusade (like Wilson) for such everywhere is a bad idea.

I really don't know how much shot-calling Ob does in between playing golf.

 

As to Hitler, I don't know that it was a pretense, but a first step.   I see Hitler's attempt to unify the Germans into one state as the continuation of the consolidation of Germany, which began as something like 300 little states in the middle ages.  Also, Germany would logically feel mistreated by having parts of Germany given to Poland, where the people were Germans.  Yes, he probably did envision grabbing all the Slav territory (Lebensraum) after he consolidated all Germans into a greater Germany.  Of course I also think that Hitler was demon-possessed.

 

I guess if the West is not willing to go to war now, we will see Russia continue to expand, swallowing up areas that have Russians in it and turning the left over into a weak spheres of influence.

 

As to events in the Ukraine, do you think that they were driven by Western subversion, or by a native uprising out of the West's control?

 

I agree that sanctions are ineffective & knucklehead.

[Steve_S]

 

 

Boy, Steve, I have no idea how it will pan out, but the more I think about it, the more Putin's actions  resembles Hitler's policy on German populations outside Deutschland or separated from the main country.  I doubt that the west has the guts to land troops in Ukraine nor go to war over this.  The USA also has troops tied up in Afghanistan (insanely).   I won't be surprised to see the Ukraine divided into East w/ Crimea, vs West.  The mobbers didn't anticipate the next move of the Chess game when they ousted Yanokovich.  If there were not nukes involved, perhaps the West would go to war.  In the last days, perilous times shall come.

 

 

 

Yes, I agree that a troop employment would be far more likely if it weren't for the several thousand nukes (supposedly 3500 according to the latest treaties) that russia is sitting on. At this juncture I don't see a way that nuclear war could be avoided if there was a direct confrontation between the US and Russia (i.e. russian troops v american troops). At the end of the day russia isn't quite ready to face the US military, especially technologically. It would be brutal, though, russians are warriors and it's always tough against them, no matter who you are. My general fear in that scenario would be russia having to fall back and feeling that the only resort they had to defend their homeland would be resorting to tactical nukes, which would then almost certainly lead to strategic retaliation. I see no benefit whatsoever to us even involving ourselves here in the first place, even speaking about it.

 

It seems that the facts of the matter are that the US and EU backed a popular coup in the western half of the country and Russia unilaterally interdicting after putin accused the US of not going to the UN security council over syria (see the new york times op ed written by putin himself on September 11th of last year). Both sides are being hypocritical here in a lot of ways, the US by backing a prime minister and president in Ukraine who was not democratically elected, simply because the old one was pro russian (the main barometer the US always uses when dealing with foreign governments as far as their legitimacy goes is whether or not they are democratically elected, supposedly), and russia unilaterally taking action.

 

Hypocrisy aside, the US and EU significantly misread what russia would do and russia seemed to know exactly what the US and EU would do and clearly had ideas about escalation levels and response initiatives, even being able to fool US spies on the ground in western russia into thinking that they had no plans to invade, WHILE they were invading (this sort of efficiency is striking, to the point of insanity). That gives russia a significant strategic advantage in any situation such as this. I have to believe that this is because putin is simply a better overall strategist and conflict tactician than is obama, as even though they both have a ton of aides, they are the ones calling the shots.

 

Really, we have no dog in this hunt as far as i can see. We just wanted to make russia look bad. Ukraine, crimea in particular, is incredibly important to russia, they certainly seem to be willing to shed more than a little blood over it. We do not have this sort of resolve in that part of the world, nor should we, because we don't benefit one way or the other, and us getting involved in situations seems to only increase the number of people getting killed. The US and EU simply expressing support for the uprising in kiev probably emboldened them to go farther than they would have otherwise, just as france and england giving poland support convinced them to do the same prior to world war II (referencing your comment on hitler using protecting ethnic germans as a pretense for invasion). Why give russia any pretense at all. They may not need it, but putin also wouldn't blindly invade a country without his citizens believing it was necessary. You've got the new government in ukraine right now talking about how they are going to reconstitute their nuclear weapons program and bashing the russian speaking ukranians there, and russia is looping this stuff on every television channel they have. So now, putin has his population firmly behind him and has no real need to worry about backlash at home. If there's one thing that history has shown us, russians stick together in times of conflict against outsiders, any hopes that "sanctions" are going to erode his popularity at home may as well be thrown out the window and shot, in my opinion, due to this. If anything they will be more resolved than they were before.

 

Thanks for your insights; you seem to know more about this than I do.

 

(the main barometer the US always uses when dealing with foreign governments as far as their legitimacy goes is whether or not they are democratically elected, supposedly), and russia unilaterally taking action.

 

Unless it is Saudi Arabia?  IMHO, it is an error to suppose that a multi-party republic govt is feasible for all nations.  And the idea that the USA should crusade (like Wilson) for such everywhere is a bad idea.

I really don't know how much shot-calling Ob does in between playing golf.

 

As to Hitler, I don't know that it was a pretense, but a first step.   I see Hitler's attempt to unify the Germans into one state as the continuation of the consolidation of Germany, which began as something like 300 little states in the middle ages.  Also, Germany would logically feel mistreated by having parts of Germany given to Poland, where the people were Germans.  Yes, he probably did envision grabbing all the Slav territory (Lebensraum) after he consolidated all Germans into a greater Germany.  Of course I also think that Hitler was demon-possessed.

 

I guess if the West is not willing to go to war now, we will see Russia continue to expand, swallowing up areas that have Russians in it and turning the left over into a weak spheres of influence.

 

As to events in the Ukraine, do you think that they were driven by Western subversion, or by a native uprising out of the West's control?

 

I agree that sanctions are ineffective & knucklehead.

 

 

I tend to think that they weren't driven by the west, so much as they were bolstered by the west, if that makes sense. I have doubts that the overthrow of ukraine's president would have happened without the west vocally supporting the popular uprising there (and who knows what guarantees may have been made off record). This was all kicked off because ukraine pulled out of a trade deal with the EU at the 11th hour after russia promised to give it 15 billion in aid and cut its natural gas prices by 30 percent. This is uncharacteristic of the russia that existed under soviet control, they clearly offered a carrot. Now, we are seeing the stick. The difference is that the soviets always went straight to the stick.  I get the general impression that ukraine was never going to be allowed to sign a treaty with the EU as ukraine existed at that point, perhaps putin would be willing to allow western ukraine to. I believe that this is over black sea ports and industrial centers in eastern ukraine (ukraine was a major arms producer for the soviets, still 9th in the world in producing arms today, a lot of this in eastern russian speaking ukraine). There are just a myriad of reasons for russia to want to keep at least the eastern half of ukraine under its wing for an indefinite period of time.

 

I was saddened that the ukranians didn't just take the cash and cheap gas in an exchange for keeping total sovereignty and stability. Honestly, it's unfair when powerful nations force these sorts of decisions on other countries, but we live in a fallen world, very little is fair. There was an unwillingness on the part of the protesters in ukraine and the EU and US to face the reality of the situation and we are now where we are at due to this (all in my opinion, of course). If you're ukraine would you rather have a stable government bolstered in 15 billion in aid from russia which is guaranteed while paying much less for your fuel, or would you rather be facing a russian army on your border? Those, in the long run, were the choices.

[nebula]

I have to believe that this is because putin is simply a better overall strategist and conflict tactician than is obama,

You think?

[nebula]

I tend to think that they weren't driven by the west, so much as they were bolstered by the west, if that makes sense. I have doubts that the overthrow of ukraine's president would have happened without the west vocally supporting the popular uprising there (and who knows what guarantees may have been made off record). This was all kicked off because ukraine pulled out of a trade deal with the EU at the 11th hour after russia promised to give it 15 billion in aid and cut its natural gas prices by 30 percent. This is uncharacteristic of the russia that existed under soviet control, they clearly offered a carrot. Now, we are seeing the stick. The difference is that the soviets always went straight to the stick.  I get the general impression that ukraine was never going to be allowed to sign a treaty with the EU as ukraine existed at that point, perhaps putin would be willing to allow western ukraine to. I believe that this is over black sea ports and industrial centers in eastern ukraine (ukraine was a major arms producer for the soviets, still 9th in the world in producing arms today, a lot of this in eastern russian speaking ukraine). There are just a myriad of reasons for russia to want to keep at least the eastern half of ukraine under its wing for an indefinite period of time.

 

That got me thinking. What we really need to worry about is Putin setting his sights on the Mid East. After what happened with Syria and what is happening now with Ukraine, his power and influence are growing while ours is getting wimpier and wimpier. We could see some interesting shifts in the next few years in the Mid-East.

[EnochBethany]

Well Steve, my intro to this subject was film on the internet showing anti-govt rioters (even with smirk on the face) throwing gasoline (Molitov cocktails) at the police/ security force who were apparently unarmed.  I saw the cops being burned alive with gasoline!  I was appalled. 

 

We shall see.  One thing I have neglected is praying for our govt.  Could all the mess we have seen & all the govt blunders have happened had Christians by & large been praying?  I have no idea what the percent of Biblicist Christians there are in the Ukraine either.