News Forum - Russian invasion spreads to Thailand’s paradise islands

[Soidog]

7 hours ago, JamesR said:

In the same way you have justified the actions of the West from your point of view, the Russians or any other country in the world will of course do the same from their point of view.

 

No. It’s not about a point of view, it’s a matter of international law. Russia invaded Ukraine while America supported the South Vietnamese government. 100% totally different. 

 

7 hours ago, JamesR said:

Don't get me wrong, I support democracy and I am happy I am from the West but I do not pretend we are angels policing the world to keep it safe, we do whatever is in our interest just like all other countries of the world.

I agree. The West are not angels and we do act in self interest. What’s wrong with that?  Acting in the interests of your country is what all governments should be doing. That doesn’t mean you can simply invade another country in a style reminiscent of colonialism or the Second World War. 

[Soidog]

7 hours ago, JamesR said:

It was obvious, they were all drinking Vodka and beating up their wives as all Russians do.

(Sarcasm). 

Fair enough. Obviously Russian then

[Soidog]

4 hours ago, TheDirtyDurian said:

And Iraq did so much better once the good Americans got rid of Saddam didn't it. 

Somewhat off topic so I won’t answer other than to say that’s not all Americas fault the new Iraqi government couldn’t do their job. Could the US have done more to support the new government? Yes they could and should have. Not just the US but many other western governments. 
 

4 hours ago, TheDirtyDurian said:

As unappealing to the west as Saddam was, he was far preferable to what came after.

Same answer as above. 

[Manu]

12 hours ago, francoa said:

Do you also see americans collectively responsible for 40 wars in past 70 years and millions of death caused be it? or is it only the russians? 

Well as far as we know, the only country that has slaughtered kids, women and ederlies the most abominable way human kind has seen so far, naming nuclear bombs, is not Russia (conveniently, nuclear weapons were made illegal after that). According to some here, "some mistakes" I guess. That amongst so many other atrocities the Americans (governments and the elites driving them of course, American people are not responsible, they do as they are told, pretty much like everywhere else, including Russia) have been responsible the last 100 years. All that of course, to preserve Democraty... naming the American way of Democraty, driven by the Dollar and capitalism (driven by American corporations, American banks and the huge war weapon industry of the USA).

[Manu]

8 hours ago, JamesR said:

In the same way you have justified the actions of the West from your point of view, the Russians or any other country in the world will of course do the same from their point of view.

Absolutely right. Local propaganda helps staying that way too...

Quote

I suppose the rich Russian civilians have a choice if they do not support the actions of their politicians, they could demonstrate and be killed or do a runner to Thailand where they will be safe,  they will then be free like us to say what they please hidden behind a keyboard.

Why "rich"? Many middle class too, I know a few myself. "Demonstrate" in Russia? Many have and ended up in Jail... As for demonstrating altogther, it does nothing, even in the Western World where it is supposed to be Democraty..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/15_February_2003_anti-war_protests

[Soidog]

16 minutes ago, Manu said:

As for demonstrating altogther, it does nothing, even in the Western World where it is supposed to be Democraty.

Sadly this is true though only due to apathy by many. In most situations, perhaps only 10% of people holding a particular political point of view will be prepared to demonstrate. If that was 90% then demonstrations can work. 

[Pinetree]

10 hours ago, JamesR said:

Don't get me wrong, I support democracy and I am happy I am from the Wes

You don't sound like it.  You seem to see things as black or white and seek to equate action's taken for the sake of that freedom, with repressive actions taken for the sake of dominance and subjugation. You have the luxury of democracy and freedom, but you then go on to criticize  the way it was obtained and is now  defended. Whatever your arguments, you can never win this debate. 

[Pinetree]

1 hour ago, Manu said:

Well as far as we know, the only country that has slaughtered kids, women and ederlies the most abominable way human kind has seen so far, naming nuclear bombs, is not Russia (conveniently, nuclear weapons were made illegal after that). According to some here, "some mistakes" I guess. That amongst so many other atrocities the Americans (governments and the elites driving them of course, American people are not responsible, they do as they are told, pretty much like everywhere else, including Russia) have been responsible the last 100 years. All that of course, to preserve Democraty... naming the American way of Democraty, driven by the Dollar and capitalism (driven by American corporations, American banks and the huge war weapon industry of the USA).

Utter nonsense

[JamesR]

12 hours ago, Soidog said:

Who said all 40 were mistakes? In my view, the only mistake the US has made in the past 40 years is to not stop China from being the pariah state it is rapidly becoming today.  

You are delusional about the power the USA has, they could not have stopped China from doing anything it wanted to do.

A few hundred million divided Americans at war with themselves over their own identity and opposing cultures against 1.3 billion united Chinese, both countries with nukes.

[Soidog]

46 minutes ago, JamesR said:

You are delusional about the power the USA has, they could not have stopped China from doing anything it wanted to do.

A few hundred million divided Americans at war with themselves over their own identity and opposing cultures against 1.3 billion united Chinese, both countries with nukes.

None of that described the US 40 years ago. If the US and its western allies hadn’t shipped most manufacturing jobs to China for one thing they wouldn’t have been so economically successful. A similar mistake was made with Russia after World War Two. The allies should have kept on going all the way to Moscow. The West stupidly believed these pariah states would actually follow the standards of liberal democracies. How wrong they were. 

[Vigo]

20 hours ago, JamesR said:

I agree.

Invasion?

I have been in Phuket since November last year and when I drive around the same is true as it always has been and that is 99% of the people I see in the street and shops are Thai, not much of an invasion as far as I can see. 

I have not checked out the tourist areas like Soi Bangla in Patong etc but those sorts of areas only make up a tiny fraction of the total area of Phuket.

I will have a drive around and walk around later this afternoon and check those places out, when I was celebrating there on New Year's eve the tourists were of many different nationalities. 

If you go to the expensive shopping areas Like the massive Central shopping center near Kathu there are many Russians, I saw a long queue of them waiting to buy the $1000 to $2000 handbags, etc in Louis Vuitton  (spelling?)

All the ones I have seen look clean and smart and decent just like everyone else, couples and families too.

If they are rich and buying up the expensive condos I wonder why they are stealing all the taxi driving jobs?

Some people have mentioned the responsibility Russian civilians have regarding the war in Ukraine. 

As an example of the responsibility of civilians in a war situation did anyone criticize the Americans who holidayed in Thailand while their military was killing three million men, women and children in Vietnam?

That is just one example of all of the wars we in the West have been involved in, were we civilians supposed to stay at home during the various wars?

 

In response to your questions;  

if they are rich and buying up the expensive condos I wonder why they are stealing all the taxi driving jobs? 

I don't believe anyone said they were, but Russian organized crime bosses have always imported their own crews and general staff to ensure that they have loyal minions to carry out their nefarious tasks. it is no secret that the Russians have an infrastructure set up to take care of their own.

Some people have mentioned the responsibility Russian civilians have regarding the war in Ukraine. As an example of the responsibility of civilians in a war situation did anyone criticize the Americans who holidayed in Thailand while their military was killing three million men, women and children in Vietnam?

There was very vocal criticism of US Vietnam war activity. You are oblivious to American history, because the most vocal opponents were Americans themselves. At its apex, the disagreement threatened to rip the US apart. Obviously you are blind to historical facts that President Johnson could not run for re-election because of his role in the war, and that every large US city had large anti war protests. Where are the protesting Russians? Ovechkin praises Putin, Cassius Clay/Muhammed Ali went to jail rather than accept to be drafted and he criticized the US government. Millions of US citizens voiced their opinions and no one was sent to a gulag or suffered a mysterious death at the hands of the government because of it. Even Nixon went to speak to protesting students. What does Putin do? He poses with actors pretending to be patriotic Russian war supporters.

That is just one example of all of the wars we in the West have been involved in, were we civilians supposed to stay at home during the various wars?

Your attempt to compare  western "wars" with the  Russian war crimes in the Ukraine doesn't work. The west did not initiate wars with peaceful non belligerent nations. When the Swedish, Dutch and Canadian troops intervened in Bosnia to liberate the concentration camp prisoners and to stop the Russian supported genocide, it was not comparable to what the Russians are doing in Ukraine. When Canada and France intervened in Rwanda to stop the genocide, it was not comparable to the  savagery the Russians are inflicting in the Ukraine. When the coalition of the free led by the USA liberated Kuwait from the occupying Iraqis it was not comparable to the criminal invasion of the Ukraine by the Russians. Do not try and use such  western interventions to excuse the horrors of the Russians in the Ukraine. Any Russian who remains silent now, is complicit in the ongoing war crimes.

 

[Vigo]

4 hours ago, Pinetree said:

Utter nonsense

Not just nonsense but ignorant too. 

[JamesR]

17 minutes ago, Vigo said:

In response to your questions;  

if they are rich and buying up the expensive condos I wonder why they are stealing all the taxi driving jobs? 

I don't believe anyone said they were, but Russian organized crime bosses have always imported their own crews and general staff to ensure that they have loyal minions to carry out their nefarious tasks. it is no secret that the Russians have an infrastructure set up to take care of their own.

Some people have mentioned the responsibility Russian civilians have regarding the war in Ukraine. As an example of the responsibility of civilians in a war situation did anyone criticize the Americans who holidayed in Thailand while their military was killing three million men, women and children in Vietnam?

There was very vocal criticism of US Vietnam war activity. You are oblivious to American history, because the most vocal opponents were Americans themselves. At its apex, the disagreement threatened to rip the US apart. Obviously you are blind to historical facts that President Johnson could not run for re-election because of his role in the war, and that every large US city had large anti war protests. Where are the protesting Russians? Ovechkin praises Putin, Cassius Clay/Muhammed Ali went to jail rather than accept to be drafted and he criticized the US government. Millions of US citizens voiced their opinions and no one was sent to a gulag or suffered a mysterious death at the hands of the government because of it. Even Nixon went to speak to protesting students. What does Putin do? He poses with actors pretending to be patriotic Russian war supporters.

That is just one example of all of the wars we in the West have been involved in, were we civilians supposed to stay at home during the various wars?

Your attempt to compare  western "wars" with the  Russian war crimes in the Ukraine doesn't work. The west did not initiate wars with peaceful non belligerent nations. When the Swedish, Dutch and Canadian troops intervened in Bosnia to liberate the concentration camp prisoners and to stop the Russian supported genocide, it was not comparable to what the Russians are doing in Ukraine. When Canada and France intervened in Rwanda to stop the genocide, it was not comparable to the  savagery the Russians are inflicting in the Ukraine. When the coalition of the free led by the USA liberated Kuwait from the occupying Iraqis it was not comparable to the criminal invasion of the Ukraine by the Russians. Do not try and use such  western interventions to excuse the horrors of the Russians in the Ukraine. Any Russian who remains silent now, is complicit in the ongoing war crimes.

"There was very vocal criticism of US Vietnam war activity. You are oblivious to American history, because the most vocal opponents were Americans themselves."

Well in a democracy anyone can go about waving protest banners around, try doing that in Russia, you will not be just jailed, you will be killed.

But walking in the streets and shouting a bit must have really pleased the three million Vietnamese who died, you must have touched their hearts.

"You are oblivious to American history,......."

Erm, maybe you are as a few people were opposed to the war but the majority of Americans supported it as was seen by the election of numerous presidents who supported and even increased the death rate in Vietnam, but still, a few of you shouted a little bit which if you know your history did not help much.

The rest of your comments are just pure Western propaganda and are justified by claimed righteousness, I support the West and its actions as I and the rest of us benefit from it but I have not been brainwashed into thinking we are godlike creatures whose aim is to save the world.

I am reminded of the hymn, "Onward Christan soldiers marching as to war...."

Every country has such a view. 

 

 

[JamesR]

1 hour ago, Soidog said:

None of that described the US 40 years ago. If the US and its western allies hadn’t shipped most manufacturing jobs to China for one thing they wouldn’t have been so economically successful. A similar mistake was made with Russia after World War Two. The allies should have kept on going all the way to Moscow. The West stupidly believed these pariah states would actually follow the standards of liberal democracies. How wrong they were. 

".....China for one thing they wouldn’t have been so economically successful.."

Neither would the West by increasing their businesses by selling cheap imports and selling them for ten times more, it is called free enterprise and capitalism, the basis of our economies.

"The allies should have kept on going all the way to Moscow. "

That makes me laugh, we had a few hundred thousand soldiers who did a bit of mopping up as we went East where we met up with the millions of Russian soldiers, tens of thousands of tanks and aeroplanes in Berlin who had done 90% of the work of defeating the Germans, we are lucky the Russians did not decide to march all the way to Paris.

The Americans did 90% of the fighting in Asia, the Brits did a lot of talking through Winston Churchill while the Russians were fighting and losing millions of soldiers.

I am happy the Russians allowed Western Europe to keep their land, while we agreed with them for them to keep the Eastern European countries they had taken over causing conflict for many decades. 

Oh yes and then the Brits with the Americans decided that part of the Middle East should be handed over to Jewish people so we stole Arab land and created Israel which today is killing many Arabs who are trying to get their land back.

 

 

[JamesR]

4 hours ago, Pinetree said:

You don't sound like it.  You seem to see things as black or white and seek to equate action's taken for the sake of that freedom, with repressive actions taken for the sake of dominance and subjugation. You have the luxury of democracy and freedom, but you then go on to criticize  the way it was obtained and is now  defended. Whatever your arguments, you can never win this debate. 

Nonsense. 

[JamesR]

5 hours ago, Soidog said:

Sadly this is true though only due to apathy by many. In most situations, perhaps only 10% of people holding a particular political point of view will be prepared to demonstrate. If that was 90% then demonstrations can work. 

And the 10% of people who are willing to 'demonstrate' do so on sites like this which is a complete waste of time if they think it makes any difference at all.

[JamesR]

6 hours ago, Manu said:

Well as far as we know, the only country that has slaughtered kids, women and ederlies the most abominable way human kind has seen so far, naming nuclear bombs, is not Russia (conveniently, nuclear weapons were made illegal after that). According to some here, "some mistakes" I guess. That amongst so many other atrocities the Americans (governments and the elites driving them of course, American people are not responsible, they do as they are told, pretty much like everywhere else, including Russia) have been responsible the last 100 years. All that of course, to preserve Democraty... naming the American way of Democraty, driven by the Dollar and capitalism (driven by American corporations, American banks and the huge war weapon industry of the USA).

I agree but I would extend it to the West as a whole.

I and all the other Westerners have benefited from such a system and support it in most parts. 

 

[Khunmark]

16 hours ago, Soidog said:

Totally different situation. The Vietnam war had been taking place since 1958 and long before the South Vietnamese government requested support. America didn’t just decide to invade Vietnam as Russia did in Ukraine. In the gulf wars we had a situation where an evil unelected  tyrant in Saddam had gassed his own people, invaded Kuwait and later continued to pose a threat to its neighbours, his own people and the wider stability of the Middle East. Again, this is nothing like the situation in Ukraine that is a democracy with an elected leader by the Ukrainian people.
 

Simply staggering that people can equate what Putin has done to the US. Equate him to Saddam by all means. He did the same to Kuwait as Putin is doing to Ukraine. This is why Russians should not be allowed to relax and go on holiday.  

Well maybe in Soidogland, however as far as Thailand is concerned the accommodation  of Russian tourists  is completely consistent with the Thai government’s policy of neutrality in the Russian/Ukraine conflict. And that is all that matters.

[Soidog]

18 minutes ago, Khunmark said:

Well maybe in Soidogland, however as far as Thailand is concerned the accommodation  of Russian tourists  is completely consistent with the Thai government’s policy of neutrality in the Russian/Ukraine conflict. And that is all that matters.

Stating the obvious in terms of Thailands policy in the Ukraine war. Point is, they shouldn’t be neutral. 

[TheDirtyDurian]

7 minutes ago, Soidog said:

Stating the obvious in terms of Thailands policy in the Ukraine war. Point is, they shouldn’t be neutral. 

And if it bothers you so much..... 

Anyways, I see in another thread, Thailand voted for Russian withdrawal in UN vote. You should be happy. 

[Soidog]

1 hour ago, JamesR said:

Neither would the West by increasing their businesses by selling cheap imports and selling them for ten times more, it is called free enterprise and capitalism, the basis of our economies.

But the West was in a far better economic position 40 years ago than China was. So I’d have been happy keeping it that way and keeping the Chinese in China.

1 hour ago, JamesR said:

That makes me laugh, we had a few hundred thousand soldiers who did a bit of mopping up as we went East where we met up with the millions of Russian soldiers, tens of thousands of tanks and aeroplanes in Berlin who had done 90% of the work of defeating the Germans, we are lucky the Russians did not decide to march all the way to Paris.

Not sure where you get your numbers from, but conservative estimates say there were 2 million US troops alone in Western Europe in 1945 and by then the US was a nuclear power. 

[Soidog]

8 minutes ago, TheDirtyDurian said:

And if it bothers you so much..... 

Anyways, I see in another thread, Thailand voted for Russian withdrawal in UN vote. You should be happy. 

Bothers me? It’s an opinion. I don’t lie awake at night thinking about it

Why did Thailand vote for a withdrawal? That suggests the think Russia is in the wrong to be invading Ukraine but still happy to take their money while on holiday. Typical two faced Thai government policy right there. 

[Manu]

1 hour ago, JamesR said:

I agree but I would extend it to the West as a whole.

I and all the other Westerners have benefited from such a system and support it in most parts. 

I agree with the first sentence but the second...

...you, maybe, I, certainly, but the vast majority do not benefit from capitalism, they just work and are given food, shelter and a couple of useless toys in exchange so to give them the impression of life and freedom, all the benefits of capitalism are only going to a few - this is the essence of capitalism: not sharing, keeping it all with as much control on population as possible in order to do so.

... and such system has been imposed to European Empires in declin and then eventually taken over or simply replaced by the US Empire, who after second World war were completely and conveniently ready for it and indeed did exactly so. Now it is the US Empire that is declin. Who's next? China? (well certainly not this poor Europe...). Or most likely, with all the new technologies and nuclear power more ready to be used than ever, a big global clash and the end of it. This science fiction scenario has never felt so real than now... And us, people of general populations, wether we are from the so called democraty of the "free" Western world, animated robots of the CCP, imprisoned opposition and nationalists alike from Russia and everybody else, as usual we will suffer the same consequences with no other option than comptemplating the end of it, created by the same who told us separtely that they do all this for our own good, wether we "freely" voted for them or had no choice than to watch them taken the power by other means.

[TheDirtyDurian]

9 minutes ago, Soidog said:

Bothers me? It’s an opinion. I don’t lie awake at night thinking about it

Why did Thailand vote for a withdrawal? That suggests the think Russia is in the wrong to be invading Ukraine but still happy to take their money while on holiday. Typical two faced Thai government policy right there. 

Dunno, but seems like some people here have a great proclivity to complain about Thai this and Thai that. Maybe better they look for somewhere more suited to their moral compass....if it's that bad! 

[Manu]

6 hours ago, Pinetree said:

Utter nonsense

Best argument ever!! As an army guy (i believe?), you have been very well trained.