Why Russia is Invading Ukraine

RealLifeLore has an excellent analysis of the reasons for Russia's invasion [1], including the military motivations. I highly recommend watching it. In particular the reasoning around gas and oil reserves in the Black Sea have not been given the due attention in the media IMO. He doesn't talk about Finland, but I would imagine the fact that it would broaden the front for a land-based invasion is what motivates Russia's opposition. That and generally having gotten away with being a bully and getting what you want for so long. [1] ▶ this video

This YouTube video titled "Why Russia is invading Ukraine"? [1] is an excellent overview of the history that lead to this moment. tl;dr oil and security [1] ▶ this video

People take the guilt question far too personal. Consider it this way: if you stick your finger into a nest of hornets, whom is to blame if you get hurt? You can say the hornet (Russia) is always too blame. Or, you can acknowledge that hornets are dangerous and best not provoked. Willingly provoking them if there is the alternative of not doing that, can be considered irresponsible. As to why Ukraine turning western is considered a provocation, there's a lot of simplistic "fatalistic madman" narratives. I found this video to be very insightful: ▶ this video It sums up a few very rational reasons that when combined, add up to a serious existential threat to Russia as a country, as a concept. Mind you, I'm no Russia apologist, I'm just trying to understand the hornet. So far the video holds up. Putin openly expressing to Macron that he will flip Ukraine entirely. Remarks like "There is no world without Russia in it", emphasizing that this campaign is existential, not a random aggression.

RealLifeLore published a very well documented, and propaganda-free, video about why Russia is invading Ukraine ▶ this video

Great video - thank you for posting. This video as well from Feb 26 2022 - Why Russia is Invading Ukraine(30mins explanation): ▶ this video

I never knew until recently how tied up Russia's oil strategy was to their military / political thinking. If others are interested, this video has a great overview: ▶ this video

I don't expect you to watch this full video but will leave it here for anyone who is curious about the broader context for this conflict. TL;DR: The war didn't start last week. It has been ongoing since 2014 and involves horrible acts from both sides. No, they don't average out and unfortunately we may never know what the 'truth' is here. I won't pretend to have all the answers, but I will say after watching the video, the situation appears to be much more complicated than it is being depicted on western media. Curiosity Stream: Why Russia is invading Ukraine ▶ this video

> Deep link to explanation: ▶ this video This video is fascinating and explains a lot. Many thanks for this!!

I found this to be a compelling take on Russia's motivations for invading Ukraine: ▶ this video The narrator argues that it's largely about fossil fuels.

> But these sanctions are so severe that they'll probably even prevent him from rebuilding his army following this due to sanctions blocking imports to fuel his war industry. So, since he is still fighting, what is he fighting _for_? Still trying to expand Russia? I don't know if this is 100% accurate, but it seemed to help my understanding: ▶ this video tldw - oil, a better border where Belarus cannot be surrounded by NATO, and better access to shipping ports.

There is a pretty decent amount of information out there as to why Russia wants Crimea (and Ukraine) ▶ this video There is a lot of propaganda out there, but a hard and fast truth is that no country, not Russia nor the US nor China nor India nor anyone actually cares at all about normal citizens. People can care about other people, but countries do not and cannot. Its why Putin's claims of protecting Russians are BS. (US Claims of protecting Ukrainians too, its in the US/Europe interest to do so, its not to protect Tibetans or Afghans for example, so it does not)

He’s right about 9/11 and the “World-domination advocates” exploiting the event to expand the scope of the US response from self-defense (neutralizing Al Quaeda) to hegemony-expansion (invading Iraq, and subsequent regime-change efforts). It’s unpleasant at best to see them again crawling out of the woodwork, after causing so much damage to the US, Iraq, and the world, not to mention fomenting both Putin and the CCP's current aggressive expansionary posture. They defined the "New World Order" for the next half-century at least, as less about order and more about power. And now US appeals to a "rules-based international order" is falling on deaf ears because of the neocons. And the media propaganda machine ramping up war justification, where have I seen this before. On the other hand, Ukraine is, unlike Iraq, already a democracy, being invaded by an autocracy. Russia’s real objective is most likely to control Ukraine’s newly discovered natural gas reserves and maintain Russia’s energy leverage over the democratic EU [1]. Allowing an autocracy to do both of those things is equally distasteful. Kinzinger isn’t entirely wrong in his assessment that allowing Russian nuclear saber rattling to deter the West may encourage every other 2-bit autocracy to pursue nukes, but unfortunately that cat’s already out of the bag. When Gadhafi gave up his nuke program and later was regime-changed and assassinated anyway, and when Trump unilaterally backed out of the Iran nuclear deal, that showe