The
Institute for the Study of War (ISW) is putting out daily battle updates. Apparently Russia has been bringing in a lot of tanks, and ISW predicts that they will do a major, much more destructive attack on Kyiv tomorrow.
What I know, that during president election in 2018, 3/4 of all votes were for him. In addition there were those who did not vote. I count that 1/4 of Russian population is suffering from sanctions and etc. Some people made wrong decisions, and now "all those Russians" turned bad immediately. I bet there are places right now where you are got punched in the face for being Russian, even though you did nothing wrong.
I am sick and tired from all that crap from TV. "Stop Russia", "Russians are bad". The people who made decisions are bad. Why blame whole nation when mistakes were done by few people. For example if I in the US I got robbed by a black person and start a picket "Black people are criminals", "Black lives matter" community will disassemble me into molecules next minute.
I dont know who I am really is. Born in USSR, speak Russian, have non-Russian nationality and live in European country. I dont have any connections to Russia. I was only there several times on excursion or passing by. But when I speak Russian on public people look at me like I was that person who bombed Kiev or fired an automatic burst on civilians hour ago.
I haven't seen much attacking of the Russian
people, and in fact I've seen several government officials and media sources specifically saying that the Russian people aren't at fault here. (That's just from where I'm sitting in the US, of course - it might be different where you are.)
Certainly, nobody
should blame the Russian people for this. When ancient Romans invaded some innocent place, could you blame the Roman's slaves for making the soldiers' weapons? To a greater or lesser degree, it's the same sort of thing for every government, including the US. If you are compelled by fate to be a citizen of some country, compelled by force to pay taxes to support your country, etc., then you bear no responsibility for what you are compelled to do, and you do not have a responsibility to put yourself at personal risk to make your country less evil. In my view, even "perfect" democracy would not change this. The average Russian bears zero responsibility for this invasion, just as I disclaim any responsibility whatsoever for the various atrocities committed by the US in the middle east and elsewhere.
But that doesn't mean that Russians should blame
the West for their suffering. Putin and other top Russian-government officials bear primary responsibility: they started this aggressive war, accepting that it might cause various forms of suffering for the Russian people. In war, it's always the ordinary people who suffer most rather than the ones who are chiefly responsible for the war, tragically. If Russia had attacked eg. Turkey, then NATO would respond with actual boots on the ground instead of sanctions, and yet the people dying would be ordinary (probably lower-class) NATO-citizens and Russians. Putin, Biden, and the rest of the ruling class wouldn't be out there getting shot.
I live in Russia and I have a ticket to Georgia on my hands. [...]
The borders are closed and those who did not have time to leave become hostages of the regime. People will simply work and continue to deduct a huge percentage from wages in the form of taxes to the state, thereby supporting the regime against which sanctions are directed. For example with each of my purchases in any store, I have a tax deducted that will support this state. Thus, some the sanctions will work to maintain the regime. [...]
I have constantly heard before about the struggle for human rights, about independence and other wonderful values that are just as close to me, but sanctions in the form of closing borders and lack of support for ordinary citizens seem to say "Russians are not worthy of this, we are absolutely indifferent to their fate." The few remaining oppositionists and human rights defenders in Russia who are close in spirit to European values also turned out to be just Russian garbage. That's how equality works.
I hope you're able to get out of Russia! Everyone deserves freedom, no matter where they were born, or to whom.
I think it'd be a great idea for the West to welcome Russian immigrants/refugees in with open arms. Russia already has a very low birth rate, so depleting their population even more would essentially be an additional type of economic warfare, and helping ordinary people escape the sanctions would make them a little less cruel. Unfortunately, I don't think that the West will actually do this, since a lot of people have the
incorrect view that the economy is a zero-sum game where immigrants are stealing resources from the destination country's existing citizens. And although I don't think that most Western leaders are actively hostile to the Russian people overall, they probably are too indifferent to the incredible suffering that their sanctions will cause to their fellow man.
Dont think taking Europe hostage is a good idea
