Quote:
Originally Posted by Oerets
Russia fought because they were invaded period! If they were a real partner the would of helped out in the Pacific sooner.
With ISIS Russia's objective and ours are different once defeated. We want Assad gone they do not.
Russia is wanting to divide and conquer the west. Weaken NATO then do a move similar to Ukraine and Crimea somewhere new. Like Poland or Baltic States.
Barney
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They had just lost, what, 20 million people? And the bulk of their army was in European Russia or eastern Europe. The strategic position was far different from our own since we had been in the Pacfic Theater for almost 4 years. Still they were able to mount an invasion of Manchuria in early August of 1945.
Both Russia and the US now favor letting the Syrian people decide Assad's fate after the terrorist threat is dealt with. Both recognize that his removal prior to the defeat of ISIS and al Nusra would create a power vacuum which ISIS and al Nusra would quickly occupy. The Syrian army would fracture with some carrying on and some joining the insurgency.
It ie we who are trying to weaken Russia. Russia's actions of late have been in reaction to that reality. The annexing of Crimea and the support for the resistance in the Donbass are a predictable response to Western sponsorship of the coup which removed Yanukovych and installed a right wing regime.
Crimea, of course is where the Russian Black Sea Fleet is based and is of extreme importance to Russia, both strategically and historically. It's also important to recall that Crimea was Khrushchev's gift to the land of his birth, illegally, I might add. From 1783, when Russia annexed it from the Ottoman Empire, until 1954, it was a Russian Oblast (province). The Donbass is intended a rather half-assed buffer between Russia and NATO since they've lust the rest of Ukraine.