All those Democrat twitter account with Ukrainian flags will be Ukrainian flag-free by September 15.
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Shot in the Dark
Cranking Open The Big Brass Nozzle Of Truth Since 2002
Zelinsky and his wife are both frauds. He was a comedian before he was installed by Obama and Biden back in 2014. I find it funny that their country is supposedly at war, yet they had time to do a photo shoot for the cover of Vogue? Further, I believe that he’s blackmailing Biden to make himself rich, because every time either he or his wife go on TV and ask for money, the Biden clown show throws a few hundred more million his way. Of course, we all know about Hunter, Burisma and making sure that the “Big Guy” his cut.
^ Biden’s daughter has written that she showered with him (who knows what else); Hunter has, well, a lot of disgusting but profitable baggage involving his dad… what exactly would anyone else have that could possibly make the Big Guy a blackmail target? Rome in it’s (multiple) end-times has got nothing on our society.
Ukraine will be Ukrainian flag free by October.
It was unwise for the US & the West to get so deeply involved in this.
Our only legitimate interest is in supporting the post WW2 order that forbids one nation from annexing the territory of another nation.
This is all Slow Joe’s fault, not Afghan disaster, no Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Everything that guy touches turns to shit.
Putin delenda est.
Honestly, guys, we have clear evidence that Russia aims to control not only Ukraine, but also Georgia and Moldova. Putin is trying to reassemble the Soviet Union. By attacking almost exclusively civilian sites, he’s showing himself to be the political equivalent of an abusive ex-husband; “If I cannot have you, no one will.”
Hopefully wiser heads will realize what is going on, and remember the horrors of what happened the last time there was a Soviet Union. Yes, Zelensky isn’t perfect, but that doesn’t mean that his nation deserves to be ruled by the murderer from Moscow. Same thing for Moldova, Georgia, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, and the like.
Maybe Chamberlain was correct to let Hitler annex the Sudetenland in 1938, after all didn’t the leadership there suck big time?
Not . . . Georgia and Moldova! Please, not that!
What’s the Moldovan flag look like, anyhow?
Seriously, how much blood and treasure are you willing to spend to preserve the independence of corrupt Eastern European nations?
The Germans are already rationing electrical power. It’s going to be a hard winter over there.
bike, Greg, what’s YOUR solution? Nuke Russia NOW? Let’s hear it. What…. should… be… done???
It is time for Europe’s leaders to spell out the tangible benefits of staying tough — not just the costs of crumbling now to Russian energy blackmail. Bringing a county the size and economic potential like Ukraine into the European single market will have large economic benefits in the medium to long term to the EU. It will also reinvigorate European integration and values. The main benefit would be, however, that a Ukrainian victory on the battlefield enabled by Western military aid and sanctions will break the back of a neoimperialist and chauvinistic Russia under its elderly ruling class. It opens the opportunity for Russian elites learning a bitter lesson that the countries security does not come from buffer zones, coercion and ‘defensive expansionism’ but from having friendly relations with neighbors. A democratic Russia that gets rid of Putinism is the great strategic prize of Western unity. This won’t come over night but that exactly what strategic patience is for.
JPA, ratchet up the pain in Russia until a quorum of leaders decide Vlad needs to go. We are counting on the fact that Putin wants an empire, not a moonscape, and he knows he gets the latter if conflict with the U.S. and NATO gets to a certain point. The oligarchs in Russia are learning now that their theoretical million man army is at best about a quarter that size in terms of actual battlefield units, and much less in terms of actual capability. My best guess is that when Russia loses about a division more soldiers–they’ve got 3-4 dead and another like number injured–something moves.
The end goal is an end to the post-Soviet system whereby the quiet heirs of the KGB pull the reins in ostensibly “free” nations to control outcomes to a degree. Lots of possibilities there for not only Ukrainians (Georgians, Moldovans), but also Russians.
This is a bit like asking someone to spell out the tangible benefits of not being hit by a car or a Russian rocket. If Ukraine falls, the EU will have Russian forces on the Polish border. Germany knows what that distance is. It would also concentrate EU minds.
bikebubba on August 3, 2022 at 10:40 am said:
JPA, ratchet up the pain in Russia until a quorum of leaders decide Vlad needs to go.
This strategy has not worked out very well in the past.
UMMP; it’s exactly what happened to take Mihail Gorbachev out of power. It also has a lot to do with how Boris Yeltsin was shown the door when his corruption became too obvious. Now granted, Putin has gone metastatic, but the successors to metastatic dictators tend to be less capable and ruthless. This would be a huge gain for Russia.
Sergei Lavrov said Russia’s goals were more ambitious than Moscow had declared at the start of the war in February, when it claimed its goal was to “liberate” the eastern Donbas border region.
I thought Moscow’s declared goals at that time were the demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine?
1. Neutrality
Remember when the whole reason given by Putin was that all he wanted was for Ukraine to be “neutral”. Remember when the whole reason was “NATO moving east”. Well it is pretty clear that these positions were just for the naive people in the West. Putin wants to expand Russia geographically……like Peter the Great (Putin the Great).
2. Donbas = Sudetenland
Remember when Hitler said that the Sudetenland was his last demand.
Remember when Putin said that his last demand was the Donbas.
Well, now it is Zaporizhia and Kherson. And tomorrow it will be more. Does he want the Baltics? Count on it.
Putin must be defeated. No off ramps. Just defeat.
bikebubba on August 3, 2022 at 11:48 am said:
UMMP; it’s exactly what happened to take Mihail Gorbachev out of power.
It took 40 years for the US to crush the Soviet economy.
And for those 40 years, Europe was not dependent on Russian grain, fertilizer, and oil.
I am not pro-Putin or pro-Ukraine. That area has a very complicated history.
As I wrote in a comment a few weeks ago, “If you for a walk in Eastern Europe, you are going to get blood on your boots.”
UMMP, we could say it took 40 years, or 70, or really about ten. It was, after all, only with Reagan that people started to think “this regime does not need to exist forever.” Given that Putinism depends on a septuagenarian of dubious abilities these days, and given that Russia needs western technology to operate (an advantage we didn’t have in 1991, really), I don’t think toppling Putin will take even a decade. It will be quick, like Yeltsin’s fall.
And really, if we ended ethanol mandates and grain subsidies while opening up drilling, I dare suggest Europe doesn’t need Russian grain, fuel, or fertilizer.
And really, if we ended ethanol mandates and grain subsidies while opening up drilling, I dare suggest Europe doesn’t need Russian grain, fuel, or fertilizer.
bike, you are so naive. MP had my back – it took decades for cold war to get results. Now you are saying maybe not even 10 years, maybe just a couple years. Let’s see, that is ONLY if US continues to pump money and weapons into Ukraine. How much more can YOU afford to give to Ukraine, because that is YOUR money and YOUR security that is flowing into Ukraine. And why is every naive warmonger thinks that drilling, creating infrastructure of the facilities to produce enough grain and fertilizer to share is like throwing a switch? It is very easy to shut things down and dismantle the capability. To rebuild it, 18 months minimum – a lot of things can happen in 18 months, one of them EU will be on their knees begging Russia for btus and paying rubles for it, destroying the petrodollar.
JPA, ratchet up the pain in Russia until a quorum of leaders decide Vlad needs to go.
You don’t know much about history nor what makes russians tick, do you bike? Whoever replaces Vlad will be much worse. West dodged the bullet with Lithuania playing cutesy with Kaliningrad. How’s that pain working out? War over yet? Should we impose more sanctions on top of sanctions? Double secret probation?
–they’ve got 3-4 dead and another like number injured–something moves.
No matter how you look at the numbers, Russia wins the war of attrition.
And before you go accusing me of being a Putin lover, I will sate again, for the umpteenth time, I am not a fan and wish he would have never invaded. And he would not have if WH did not greenlight this adventure. But now that he has, I see no way out. I have not seen a single shred of diplomatic action from any side to do anything to resolve this, other than ratcheting up the heat and bating the bear with MORE NATO memberships. I do not have a solution, and nothing that you proposed have worked so far nor will work. Time is not on the Ukraine side and Zelensky don’t care – he is taken care of, for life.
In ten years Putin will be 80 years old.
I am not a rock-ribbed isolationist, bikebubba, but I fail to see what vital US interests are at stake in Ukraine.
Something seems off here, as though we are doing something for purely emotional reasons. In 1994 we signed the Budapest Accord that guaranteed Ukraine territorial integrity. Then we did nothing when Russia annexed Crimea in 2014. But now we are willing to risk nuclear war over Donbas?
There are times that I think that Russia will not be happy until it has a czar.
Ukraine has been courted by the EU for 30 years — not as a potential member, but as a foil against Russia. Aid to Ukraine seems to go down a black hole. Ukraine has certainly been “Little Russia” in the sense that it was and is ruled by corrupt oligarchs. Poroshenko, whom we & the Europeans installed in 2014, is the Ukraine’s “King of Chocolate.”
You know you have a corrupt state when it has an “anti-corruption minister.”
to MP’s 12:49: Wag the d0g and follow the Biden Cartel money. That’s all. If only there was an institution of curious individuals who would be interested in bringing truth to the masses. Let’s call these individuals “journalists” for lack of a better word. If only…
JPA, regarding not knowing what makes Russians tick, as an engineer, a lot of the best guys I’ve worked with over the years are Jewish emigrees from the Soviet Union like yourself. A family in my church are also Russian emigrants.
Do I understand the culture completely? No. But I think I’ve got a hint, and I think that as the truth becomes known over there–that Putin’s claim that he was going to somehow “De-Nazify” a nation with a Jewish President was pure horse manure, and their sons’ lives were thrown away in his attempt at empire building–that the kickback is going to be fierce, just as it was when Yeltsin’s corruption (etc. ) became known, and just as it was when the failure of Glasnost and Perestroika became evident. Really, just as it was when the veil was lifted in Ukraine and everybody realized that Yanukovich was a Russian tool.
In an ordinary war begun under real reasons, yes, I would agree with you that Russia has a huge advantage simply from the manpower and industry perspective. In this war, due to the BS coming out of the mouths of Lavrov, Putin, and Medvedev, not so much.
There are times that I think that Russia will not be happy until it has a czar.
Ding, ding, ding… we have a winner! The ship of making Russia a true democracy (or a republic) had sailed when Clintooons stuffed peace dividends into their pockets instead of doing Marshall Act 2.0. Now we are living with consequences – Putin is a direct outcome of that “missed” opportunity. Just like Communist China is a direct outcome of Roosevelt not supporting Chiang Kai-shek over Mao; just like Johnson not supporting Ho Chi Minh in his bid for independence from France led latter to seek alignment with communists; Carter and Shah. Clintooon, Roosevelt, Johnson, if only there was a connection, a trend… If only…
Bubba is going to need lots of compassion when Ukraine falls, Zelensky buggers off with $100 billion US dollars and $800 billion of US military hardware starts showing up on the black market.
When the Taliban, ISIS and All Queda start deploying stinger. missiles and javelin antitank weapons, in addition to all the munitions Pedo Joe gifted them, he’s gonna feel pretty bad.
He’ll need your sympathy, because it will be in short supply.
hen Yeltsin’s corruption (etc. ) became known, and just as it was when the failure of Glasnost and Perestroika became evident.
So riddle me this bike, if Yeltsin was gone because of BS, who came to power? Oh, I get it, there are different levels of BS, gotcha. But the people are still the same. Who do you think russian rank and file are angry at because their lives suck right now? Nope, you are dead wrong, it is the West. There is still access to internet in Russia and they can and do watch CNN/MSNBC/FOX and the rest of the alphabet soup. But guess what, not only are they seeing the propaganda but also the warmongering and demonization of everything russian. Do you think forbidding a russian pianist from playing a concert is blamed on Vlad or the animosity of the West towards ANYTHING russian? The optics of everything West is doing with their propaganda is pushing rank and file russians to close ranks behind Vlad, no matter what he does. Like I said, you poke the bear, you gonna get your face ripped off.
JPA, no doubt that it’s tightly controlled, all that. That noted, one of the first things I read about the war is that tens of thousands of IT workers left Russia when the war started. That seems to indicate to me that there is at least a substantial minority that’s gotten wise to mad Vlad. Same thing with the thousands who’ve protested, same thing with Alexei Navalny. Let’s be blunt; did Putin poison Navalny because Putin’s support is rock solid and monolithic? Shades of Potemkin, friend.
To use a U.S. comparison, it was a vocal minority that got the Vietnam War ended. Yes, we were (and are) far more free than Russia, but there are glimmers of hope.
Side note; Dullee, if Zelensky can multiply the amount of military aid to Ukraine by about 50, as your numbers suggest, Russia’s got a LOT to fear. Maybe…..consider some reputable news sources before spouting off nonsense?
Well…. Let’s look at the positives that have come out of the Russian invasion of the Ukraine.
– It proved Russia’s stuff don’t work that well.
– It proved our stuff works pretty well.
– Note to arms buyers around the world: check out the two previous points.
– Trump was right about NordStream I.
– Trump was right about NordStream II.
– Trump was right about the EU not meeting its military spending agreements.
– The best and brightest of the world were wrong and a narcissistic real estate developer from New York with the temperament of a ten year old was right about a whole lot of stuff.
– It turned green dreams into nightmares, not than anyone is bothered to do anything about that.
– It dissuaded Finland, Sweden, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Hungary from turning their militaries into rainbow flag waving transgenderittes.
– It made Putin and maybe a few others think about thinking twice.
Bikebubba, I think that Putin’s idea of “nazi influence” is different than what you & I think of as “nazi influence.” To Putin, “nazi influence” probably means something like “European influence.” And the Germans, and to a lesser extent the French, run the EU.
I think that the present conflict in Ukraine is a European conflict. We are the cowboy who thinks that it is all black and white.
The US needs to be more “prudent” about supporting Ukraine against the Russians.
To make matters more complicated, the educated and wealthier classes In Ukraine have sought greater integration with Europe, while the poorer and more working class people of Ukraine have felt closer to Russia. There are historical reasons for this. It is a frikkin’ mine field we Americans should avoid.
I think that I have commented on this before.
Putin’s favorite movie is said to be “Seventeen Moments of Spring.” “Seventeen Moments of Spring” is a 1970s, CCCP produced historical drama about the end of the Second World War as seen through the eyes of a KGB agent. You can watch it on Youtube.
In the movie, in early 1945, American agents approach the German Nazi government about the possibility of joining forces and marching together to conquer the Russians. The plot is foiled by a KGB agent.
Putin does not think like an American or a European political leader. Their will be no kumbaya moment with Putin.
That noted, one of the first things I read about the war is that tens of thousands of IT workers left Russia when the war started.
Out of how many million? Attrition numbers are not in your favor. No doubt there are dissidents, but you are missing the point that the more hopeless the situation looks for russians, the more they will harden against the west. They know that if Vlad kicks the bucket tomorrrow either on his own or by someone’s hand, NOTHING will change in regard to sanctions. The ONLY thing West is talking about is restitution due Ukraine. YOU do not have to live with it and by your writings will be happy to see sustenance taken from the mouths of the same dissidents you hope will revolt – because they are damn bad russians. Do you not see that this is Treaty of Versailles redux? I am obviously not reaching behind the iron curtain of a closed mind.
To Putin, “nazi influence” probably means something like “European influence.” And the Germans, and to a lesser extent the French, run the EU.
I would add fervent nationalism. Have you ever talked to nationalist ukranians, bike? The ones who think, and say, that russians are not slavs and that they are worse than stray dogs? ALL russians? That was BEFORE the war, and these Ukranians are not in the minority.
pulled from moderation, sorry for a double post.
To Putin, “nazi influence” probably means something like “European influence.” And the Germans, and to a lesser extent the French, run the EU.
I would add fervent nationalism. Have you ever talked to nationalist ukranians, bike? The ones who think, and say, that russians are not slavs and that they nothing but mongrel d0gs? ALL russians? That was BEFORE the war, and these Ukranians are not in the minority.
In 2015 a UK academic named Karen Dawisha published a book in the US called “Putin’s Kleptocracy: Who Owns Russia?” Dawisha did not publish in the UK because no UK publisher would touch her book.
Dawisha says that Putin’s job, as a KGB agent in the 1980s, was to spy on the East Germans. When the wall fell the Russian embassy to East Germany began to burn documents. But the furnaces broke under the load, so the remaining documents were loaded onto a convoy of trucks and sent back towards Russia.
The convoy was stopped by East German police. The officer in charge of the convoy, sometimes said to be Putin, told the East German police that his convoy would continue its journey to Russia, “regardless of casualties.”
And the convoy was allowed to proceed.
I really do not want the US to become involved in this craziness.
Do you not see…
No, jpa, he doesn’t.
The cheapest outcome for the West is to give Ukraine all the advanced weapons it needs now.
Regarding the Russian embassy claims, embassy documents are protected, and the West Germans were not going to provoke a huge conflict by going into the Soviet embassy. If Putin was involved in something, he would have been involved in trying to preserve KGB related documents held by the Stasi. I don’t doubt that the KGB was willing to kill to preserve their secrecy, but it wasn’t embassy documents. Those were already privileged.
Regarding the claim that “Naziism” equals “fervent nationalism” or being like a western European, nonsense. There are reports out there that a lot of Russian soldiers were pretty much expecting to liberate Auschwitz again. They knew, and Putin knew, what was being said. And as injured soldiers from Russia go back to their hometowns, they are going to start telling their families and neighbors in the hinterlands that what Putin was saying was BS. The veil is going to lift, just as it did in 1989, and just as it did in Ukraine in 2014.
Regarding the claim that “Naziism” equals “fervent nationalism” or being like a western European, nonsense.
You know an awful lot for someone who claims Peeve’s style of expertise because you slept at a Holiday Inn Express and drinking propaganda from a firehose. Burning people alive in Odessa was just a prank, had nothing to do with fervent nationalism, nosireebob. Azov appropriation of a WWII Nazi collaborator symbol and brandishing Nazi flags is just a coincidence and has nothing to do with Nazism… no way Jose!
JPA, no doubt there are some white supremacists in Ukraine that have done horrible things, just like there are the same (as a much greater percentage) in Russia. One of my emigree friends noted that she left in part because her Jewish identity was listed on her internal passport, making her and her loved ones targets of Russia’s bigoted minorities. (and yes, Russian–she had great stories about St. Petersburg/Petrograd and Finns coming there because the liquor stores were closed on Sunday)
That noted, I don’t think the presence of a small minority of bigots justifies putting a whole nation through war, using long range artillery to attack almost exclusively civilian targets like housing, hospitals, and schools. I don’t think it justifies a war/PR effort that is built almost entirely about lies.
Put bluntly, if Putin wants to prove he wants to excise “Naziism” from somewhere, he can start by firing Sergei Lavrov, who is pretty much a modern Joseph Goebbels. Or really, he can start by firing himself, all of his artillery officers, and a good portion of the leadership of the Russian Air Force.
targets of Russia’s bigoted minorities
Huh? I am sure that is not what you wanted to say, or did you? And as far as (as a much greater percentage) – that is very, VERY debatable and disputable. Just ask your friends.
There is a huge difference between a “presence” of bigots and bigots being sanctioned by the government, like Azov batallion for example. BTW, we cannot prove it, but if brave Ukranians were not using hospitals, schools, old folks homes and malls as human shields, maybe there would be less civilian casualties, no?
As for fantasies about Vlad firing himself, do you have any other solutions? What you said earlier are not solutions but ToV redux which will lead to annihilation. Or maybe you subscribe to Soros/Schwab/Gates/Fauxchi malthusian vision of the future, then your fantasy of unilateral russian surrender is understandable.
Told you, jpa.
No doubt.
However, let’s keep in mind that the Russians starved 2 million Ukrainians to death and forced many of the survivors to resort to cannibalism. That was after a brutal conquest of the Ukraine by the Red Army and “collectivization.”
That sort of thing can certainly elicit a grudge.
But that was just for openers.
How do you think all those “Russians” found their way into eastern Ukraine after WWII?
Happenstance or as a program of ethnic cleansing?
Google “Russification policies” in Ukraine and the Baltic states.
Now none of this justifies nastiness, however explaining something and justifying something are two very different things.
What should the world do about it?
Arm the hell out of the Ukraine and anyone else the Russians threaten.
What Greg says, more or less, except the Holodomor probably killed a lot more people than 2 million–5 million is most likely. Praying for a “Miracle on Wheat” since this February.
Plus, I’ve looked at a certain portion of the arguments about groups like Azov, and I’m just not convinced. Outside of Israel, there’s no country harder on anti-Semitism than Germany, and a bunch of local governments have the WolfsAngel on their coats of arms. At least some sources argue that it’s not necessarily a Nazi symbol in Ukraine.
And why did Kyiv tolerate whatever degree of “ultra-nationalism” or anti-semitism in Azov? Um, they were being invaded by a superpower whose leader consistently expressed admiration for the Soviet Union and Stalin?
There is nothing better that could happen for Russia than to be decisively defeated by Ukraine. Putin delenda est.
bikebubba,
Our realtor, Raisa, (long since passed away) was from the Ukraine and fled to Germany during the war as a teenager. What was said between the words was that her family were nationalists who sided with the Germans/Nazis.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend.
While I certainly don’t excuse alliance with Nazis, I could see that the deep historical hatred of all things Russian could certainly manifest themselves as modern day Nazi-ism, if not for any other reason than to simply piss the Russians off.
Having said that, given history, there is a lot of baggage in the area.
Wonder how the Ukrainians feel about the Crimean Tatars who sold millions of their relatives in the slave markets of Istanbul.
Does the Ukraine have their own version of the 1619 project? Say for instance the 1519 Project?
Greg, thank you for the history lesson. But it is superfluous. You are rationalizing bad behavior today for something that no living person perpetuated. I guess you are all in for slavery reparations as well.
There is nothing better that could happen for Russia than to be decisively defeated by Ukraine. Bike, what are you smoking? It is messing with your logic and sense of reality. There will be no winning in this war. There is no magic wand. Again, other than your fantastical proclamations that Russia will suddenly keel over, that US will continue to print money and send it to Ukraine, that there is a bottomless pit of resources to make arms to be shipped to Ukraine, what can be done?
It is a mistake to think of Russia & Ukraine as a kind “Europe gone wrong.” The history is very different. If you look at literature, in Europe you see secular, vernacular literature begin around 1200 AD. In Russia, before Peter the Great in the 17th Century, literature as we know it did not exist. It was Church and dynastic records, with maybe some epic lays about battles, written in a language called “Old Church Slavonic.”
You aren’t going to “fix” Russia or Ukraine by electing a popular democratic reformer.
JPA, the examples I’m going on are Germany and Japan for starters. I sure hope Moscow doesn’t need to be like Berlin or Tokyo in 1945 to get peoples’ attention, but a decisive defeat did realign their thinking. Closer to Kyiv, there’s been great progress in the former Yugoslavia after their wars of a couple of decades back, and there’s been a wonderful pause in aggression from Turkey (Ottoman Empire) and Vienna since 1918.
Again, my thought is that as wounded veterans go home and report they were fighting on farmland and shelling churches and hospitals instead of liberating new concentration camps, public opinion is going to go very harshly against Putin. For that matter, as technology goes backwards from IBM and Dell to God knows what and from Volkswagen and Toyota to Lada and Moskva, there’s going to be a reckoning as well. “Wait, we used to have nice things, and then we invaded Ukraine under false pretenses….”
Do not mistake explanation for rationalization.
Golly gee, Pollyanna, it would be so peachy keen if everyone could just set aside their ancestorial grudges and sway lovingly as they lock arms and sing Kumbaya.
greg, that’s the way it sounded to me as I read it – rationalization. If that is not what you meant, I stand corrected.
I hope your Pollyanna comment was not directed at me, because I certainly do not subscribe to the kumbaya solution as preached by bike. If you have read any of my comments you would see that indeed, I do not see a rational way out of this precisely because of the ancestral grudges and nature of the people in the region. I have not heard ANYONE offer a rational and effective solution for the resolution of the conflict – ANYWHERE.
The best solution to any crisis is when both parties are unhappy with the result. In the Ukraine this can be achieved by a plebiscite that divides the east oblast by oblast (county). Russian majority areas would then be ceded to Russia.
The Ukrainians would not like it because they would lose territory. Much of it rich in coal, oil, gas and industry.
The west would not like it because it would be perceived as a victory for Putin.
Putin would not like it because his objective is to reestablish the Russian empire, not to acquire Russian majority territory.
However the Ukrainian and the Russian people would probably accept it because the Ukrainians would be done with a long nasty war (since 2014) and the Russians would see it as the reunification of Russian speaking people.
Hopefully, this would not be an echo of the Indian-Pakistan split and would have to be overseen by blue helmeted do-nothings, but something is better than nothing.
The big challenge would be to curb Putin’s future adventures, like in the Baltic.
Perhaps making the Russians bleed a little longer and harder might be the answer to that.
Greg, I am in violent agreement with you on the outcome, but as long as we have war mongers like bike who want more blood spilled (not their own) and to destabilize the region further, it may not come in time. And more importantly, unless there are men huddled in smoke filled back rooms, I do not see any diplomatic work being done, only stoking the war fires and poking the bear.