China may have stopped Putin from using nuclear weapons, Blinken says
China may have stopped Putin from using nuclear weapons, Blinken says
"We have reason to believe that China engaged Russia and said: 'Don't go there,'" outgoing U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told the Financial Times on Jan. 3.
cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/51645406
The only people not scared of nuclear weapons seem to be Ukrainians. They do not give a fuck what Putin thinks and just keep fighting on.
@along_the_road Their existence is threatened anyway, so they are rightfully so. Plus, I do think their intelligence services know a thing or two about their arsenal, especially if it works or not.
Putin has effectively vowed (and for the better part of three years also attempted) to slaughter them anyway. To them the threat of nukes just translates to "if you don't stop fighting back while I try to kill you, I will try to kill you even harder!" That certainly wouldn't stop me, that's for sure.
Atomics isn't the worst way to go.
There's no broken body or bleeding out. No threat of torture, rape or mutilation.
More than likely the pressure wave will kill you before you even realize what that really bright light is.
So in other words you are saying. Any nation with nukes has a right to walk in and take over any non nuke nation. And those nations have no right or duty to defend their borders.
Unless there's something I'm missing, your response doesn't seem related to the original comment
I am way less scared of piss baby Putin than I am of micro plastic lymphoma. Fuck it light me up at least it will be quick.
@schizoidman highly likely imo. Nuclear weapons are generally a sensitive thing for all the countries that have them. Perhaps they did not want to set a precedent or something, or maybe China's businesses in Europe would have been affected if a nuclear explosion occurred anywhere on the continent.
Who knows...
I think China is just in full facepalm mode about how shockingly incompetent the Russians are and assume that they will fuck up such a delicate situation like strategic dick waving.
I'm very glad that nothing important depends on my opinion on this and I can freely theoretize and rant, but I doubt Putin would use nukes so easily. At his core he's still a coward, and he has to know that the 'West' couldn't afford to not react to Russia nuking a European country.
Having said that, even if the threat of Russia using nukes were very real, it shouldn't weaken our resolve to support Ukraine and put a stop to Russia's aggression. Because no matter the circumstances, people like Putin cannot be allowed to have any way of forcing the world to stand back and let them commit crimes at will.
Throughout history, appeasement has never worked in anybody's favour except the aggressor's. If it turns out that a nuclear retaliatory strike in response to a Russian nuclear attack on another country really is what it takes to stop Putin, then so be it. It can't be worse in the long term than letting him just take whatever he wants. In that case I just wish we could get this over with already.During the Cuban missile crisis Kennedy asked about using a tactical nuke against Cuba.
Kennedy's generals explained that the only possible options would be enormous first strike against the USSR, or nothing. Because if the US used a tactical nuke Khrushchev would be forced to respond. Then you'd have a nuclear exchange between superpowers anyway, but would also be giving the enemy time to react.
Yes, I'm aware of that. I just hope Vladimir is, too. At any rate he cannot be allowed to hold the whole world* hostage by playing chicken with unsubstantiated threats. The sooner he is stopped the better.
(* Except for China and his other buddies he's scared of, of course. Which is somewhat ironic, considering how young Communist China used to be such a fan of the USSR, which in turn treated its poor and underdeveloped neighbour with so thinly veiled contempt. How the tables have turned...)