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started it. But Biden could have avoided it. Instead he further provoked. How many times do you want me to post same link to respond to your same post? What's the deal?
Link: https://youtu.be/JrMiSQAGOS4
Do you really believe that war was his only option?
I actually agree that expanding NATO was a major blunder. An idiotic policy begun by Clinton, put into hyperdrive by Bush. Without that, this war might not have happened.
But it is still Putin’s fault.
9/11 made this country crazy…but it didn’t make the war in Iraq inevitable. It was Bush’s fault.
Expanding NATO made Russia crazy…but it didn’t make the invasion of Ukraine inevitable. It was Putin’s fault.
The neocon/neolib knew it would happen too. The difference is neocon/neolib want this war to happen. Putin's 2 separate letters to Biden and NATO on 12/14/2021 is his last effort to avoid the war. But Biden admin believe economic and financial means will defeat Russia, weaken Russia and therefore lead to regime change in Russia. Regime change is neocon's core strategy of our foreign policy even we have had very poor track record in regime change.
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without oil imports, we burn through our Proven Reserves of oil in 5 years...not my calculation, but the EIA's...and British Petroleum's.
Link: https://www.worldometers.info/oil/us-oil/
The US can produce enough crude to keep up with and even outpace consumption. For a variety of reasons, even after shipping, it's cheaper to produce crude overseas than it is to produce it in the US. It's that simple.
If you insist on complicating things, we can also talk about the quid pro quo in place to ensure that the US dollar continues to be the de facto currency used in the oil trade.
using external oil supplies, like from Saudi Arabia or Venezuela?
Let's see if you can figure it out on your own before I tell you just how stupid this response is.
Proven Oil Reserves at our current consumption rate (i.e. ~7.3 BBls/yr)...what evidence do you have that refutes this prediction?...assuming you don't, doesn't it make sense for the U.S. to 'weather the storm' brought on by Putin with oil and gas from sources like Saudi Arabia and Venezuela?
Tell me how much estimated reserves exist in Alaska alone? We could trade with Canada, couldn't We? We can find oil reserves, it's cheaper to get it abroad and it's also more advantageous for our place in the world order.
ANWR field…that’s ~1-1/2 years more…make you feel any better?...oh, and you bet i'm focused on "Proven" reserves...going beyond them takes us into "Should Be...Could be...Hope so" land...not the sort of solid foundation you make national security plans on.
Face facts…our best and safest option is to get SA and Venezuela to pitch in.
You are focused on proven, conventional reserves. Fine, but it's not nearly the entire story. The US in total has at least 264 billion barrels of recoverable oil.
This is another example of you glomming on to a single idea and not taking the next two or three steps to actually understand something.
try getting a loan with "Yet Undiscovered Income Sources" ;-)...
Link: https://www.aogr.com/web-exclusives/exclusive-story/u.s.-holds-most-recoverable-oil-reserves
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I recall seeing something where it was discussed that when it came to that the US had an amount that rivaled the middle east, but the cost was prohibitive so it wasn't being tapped. This was a long time ago so I don't have a link or anything like that, and I'm not sure how much we've been processing in that department lately. Just interesting to me to see the numbers.
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frankly, that's not cause for celebration at our rate of consumption...I"ve said it before on this board...you could TRIPLE our proven reserves and it wouldn't affect the urgency and need to husband our resources and shift to new energy sources...heck, even Saudi Arabia is doing it (see link).
Before we totally forget the OP...let's agree that we need to help see Ukraine through this very difficult winter...and the EU as well...that means helping fill all the newly formed 'gaps' that Putin has created...food, power, etc...you agree, right?
Link: https://www.energyintel.com/00000183-45f9-dcbb-a1b7-4dfbc9ad0000
I could be convinced that we should do more, but I don't have opinion on helping beyond humanitarian support.
I could be convinced that we should do more, but I don't have opinion on helping beyond humanitarian support.
He is making an argument that is so simplistic and easy to refute, that a second grader would blush when it was pointed out how stupid it was.
have to say...but your discomfort doesn't solve anything.
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job to provide a compelling argument in opposition...just complaining doesn't cut it...do some work if you think you're right.
Don't you realize yet that this stupid ploy of yours is believed by nobody? Everybody recognizes it as an absurdity.
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Look back at multiple threads addressing this idiocy in the recent past.
did...what's more is that the global estimate, given current consumption rates, is just 47 years of Proven Reserves remaining...even if you were to double that, it would be prudent to get moving on alternative sources of energy...but that's a slightly different topic.
The U.S. NEEDS outside help...it would be advisable for you to step out of 'dreamland' and face facts.
Link: https://www.worldometers.info/oil/
If you are correct, we should put Sleepy Joe against the wall for treasonously draining our SPR for political purposes.
But, happily you are not correct. You are full of shit.
The 'SPR' was designed for exactly this circumstance...Google it...we haven't exhausted it and it will be refilled. The SPR capacity is on the order of 700 Mbls (see link), which is ~2% of our Proven Oil Reserves...it's a risk we can take given the existential threat posed by Putin.
Adults deal with facts...not pure emotion...get back to us when you're ready to face them.
Link: https://www.energy.gov/ceser/spr-quick-facts
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[William B. Taylor is vice president for Russia and Europe at the United States Institute of Peace and a former U.S. ambassador to Ukraine. David J. Kramer is executive director of the George W. Bush Institute and a former assistant secretary of state for democracy, human rights and Labor in the George W. Bush administration].
The Russian military is losing on the battlefields of Ukraine, so Moscow is trying to freeze Ukrainians into submission. We cannot let them.
Over the past nine months the Ukrainian military has defeated the Russian army in the battles of Kyiv, Kharkiv, and Kherson. Ukrainian forces continue to drive the Russians back toward their own borders. Russian morale is dropping as soldiers — including many of the several hundreds of thousands recently mobilized — refuse to fight, potential draftees flee the country, and others simply surrender. The Kremlin is desperately seeking negotiations out of weakness (and some in the West are unhelpfully pushing for compromise at Ukraine’s expense). The Ukrainians will negotiate when the Russians are out of their country.
The only Russian weapons that work for them are cruise missiles, imported Iranian drones, artillery, ballistic missiles and bombs dropped by aircraft. Moscow is aiming at civilian targets, intentionally concentrating on energy infrastructure — the pipes and wires that bring heat, electricity, internet and water to the Ukrainian people. These attacks threaten to bring brutal cold and thirst as winter ushers in months of subzero temperatures. This further enrages the Ukrainians and deepens their determination to defeat the Russians, but the attacks will put millions at risk and could cause thousands of deaths.
These actions, intended to freeze a civilian population to death until they surrender, are the definition of a terrorist, genocidal regime: amoral, criminal, barbaric. Last week’s NATO meeting committed to respond, and the United States should lead a humanitarian operation to help Ukrainians survive. In addition to providing Ukraine with missile defense, anti-drone, and antiaircraft systems, the United States should organize and lead a major public and private, international humanitarian effort to help the Ukrainian people make it through the winter. We should send massive numbers of portable generators, fuel, repair parts for electricity generation and distribution nodes, blankets, winter clothes, camp stoves, plastic sheeting, building repair supplies, internet connection devices, other communication networks, and food. We should send these supplies by rail, road, sea and air.
We have done this before. In 1948 the Soviets blocked roads, railways and canals into West Berlin, cutting off food, coal and electricity. The United States and Britain mounted a massive humanitarian airlift that lasted 18 months. At the peak, one plane landed every 45 seconds at West Berlin’s Tempelhof Airport. When the Soviets finally concluded that we were determined to save the West Berliners, they backed down and lifted the blockade.
When the Soviet Union broke up in 1991, the United States organized military humanitarian airlifts to all 15 components of the dissolving U.S.S.R., including Russia. In 2008, we sent humanitarian supplies to Georgia on military aircraft in the face of the Russian invasion of that country. We also flew Georgian troops who had been stationed in Iraq back to Georgia on U.S. military planes to help with their country’s defense. The Russians did not interfere.
While the United States and its allies must continue to provide Ukraine with the military assistance it needs to win the war, the assistance being proposed here is civilian in nature, and literally lifesaving in many cases. The Ukrainians are facing a dire situation, and time is of the essence. We should contract with airlines, shipping companies and trucking firms. We could publish the flight and shipping schedules to provide full transparency.
As the United States has done by warning of “catastrophic consequences” if the Russians should use weapons of mass destruction in Ukraine, we should make it clear to the Russians that they would pay a steep price for any attacks on humanitarian deliveries to Ukraine. U.S. military escorts may be necessary to open the path for civilian humanitarian assistance. To be clear, this is not a call for direct confrontation between Russia and the United States. Instead, it is a desperate plea to save the lives of countless Ukrainians who, without this aid, will otherwise die while we stand by.
President Biden, NATO and the Group of Seven nations have said that we will stand with Ukraine for “as long as it takes.” This should include as much as it takes to allow Ukrainians to live though the winter.
This is not the first time Ukraine has suffered an attempted genocide at the hands of Moscow. Joseph Stalin engineered a famine that killed some 4 million Ukrainians in 1932-33 in what the Ukrainians call the Holodomor — death by starvation. The world did nothing. The West did little to stop the Holocaust in World War II, little to stop the genocide in Rwanda in 1994 and virtually nothing as hundreds of thousands of Syrians were killed — with Vladimir Putin’s assistance. We cannot look away again. Never again must mean never again. We must act. Now.
I don't know what to think about Ukraine. My instinct is to keep Americans off the battlefield and try to broker peace, but I don't understand the implications of any of the possible options.
That's a good trick. You tricked me.
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