• US officials are considering letting Ukraine strike Russia with US weapons, The New York Times reports.
  • Ukraine says it’s necessary to fight cross-border attacks.
  • But fears of crossing Russia’s red lines have long made the US hesitate.

The US has barred Ukraine from striking targets in Russian territory with its arsenal of US weapons.

But that may be about to change. The New York Times on Thursday reported that US officials were debating rolling back the rule, which Ukraine has argued severely hampers its ability to defend itself.

The proposed U-turn came after Russia placed weapons across the border from northeastern Ukraine and directed them at Kharkiv, the Times reported, noting that Ukraine would be able to use only non-American drones to hit back.

The Times reported that the proposal was still being debated and had yet to be formally proposed to President Joe Biden.

  • Gsus4@mander.xyz
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    5 months ago

    Nah, it’s part of the game, he’s just sending a healthy message that western governments also have their share of deluded drunken idiot medvedev equivalents, so only start nuking if you’re sure you have absolutely nothing to lose, because that’s what you’re going to end up with.

    • OBJECTION!@lemmy.ml
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      5 months ago

      Robert Frost’s Fire and Ice but it’s about whether chuds will end the world through overt jingoism and aggression or libs though a lack of self-awareness of how jingoistic they are combined with intentionally deluding themselves about the state of the world.

      Fucking Americans. Fucking post-communist Russia too (which is also America’s fault). We coulda had an enemy properly terrified of a nuclear exchange and committed to peaceful coexistence but noooo, we gotta open up those markets and now the omnicidal liberals want to risk destroying the world rather than give up a bit of land none of them could find on a map three years ago. Liberals are functionally indistinguishable from someone screaming “Blood for the blood god! Skulls for his skull throne!” except they know how to be all polite about it. A kinder, gentler global thermonuclear war.

      Thank God the capitalists who rule this country don’t give a shit what their supporters think or all humanity would be dead in a week. Sure they’re bringing about the climate change apocalypse but at least that’s more delayed than a nuclear apocalypse and I guess that’s where the bar is these days.

      Sorry I’m low-key drunkposting rn so I’m telling the truth more directly than usual.

      • trafficnab@lemmy.ca
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        5 months ago

        If authoritarian dictators can do whatever they want via nuclear blackmail, we’re already all doomed anyway

        The world will be split into two camps: countries with nukes or otherwise under some sort of nuclear umbrella, and countries who are desperately rapidly developing a nuclear program, the third group who doesn’t have nukes and isn’t rushing to develop them will have already been annexed by the first group

        • OBJECTION!@lemmy.ml
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          5 months ago

          What we have here are people convincing themselves that nuclear war is either not a possibility at all, or a tolerable outcome. That’s a incredibly dangerous and delusional perspective.

          There is a middle ground between “letting nuclear armed countries do whatever they want” and “completely disregarding any and all risks of escalation.” The entire postwar order of the past 70 years has been grounded on that. If those lunatics ever get anywhere near the levers of power, then they will provoke nuclear war, maybe not with this specifically (maybe), but if they’re taking that kind of cavalier and deluded approach in general, then it’s only a matter of time.

          If you go all-in every hand, you will eventually bust.

          • trafficnab@lemmy.ca
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            5 months ago

            And if every country on earth suddenly starts playing a hand, someone is going to bust, so pick your poison I guess

            Appease thugs with nukes and proliferate nuclear weapons around the world adding dozens more dice to be cast every conflict, or call their bluff and risk them actually using them

            • OBJECTION!@lemmy.ml
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              5 months ago

              And if every country on earth suddenly starts playing a hand, someone is going to bust, so pick your poison I guess

              That’s not even remotely how poker works, at all (or geopolitics).

              • trafficnab@lemmy.ca
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                5 months ago

                It’s okay if you don’t understand the analogy

                When everyone has nukes, all it takes is one country busting for us all to lose

                • OBJECTION!@lemmy.ml
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                  5 months ago

                  It’s okay if you don’t understand the analogy

                  Lmao. Let me just clear this up so you can stop pretending to know what you’re talking about about.

                  In poker, you don’t bust (that is, lose all your chips) unless you go all-in and lose. “If every country on earth suddenly starts playing a hand, someone is going to bust” is not true at all, because plenty of hands don’t end in someone busting. Just because you lose a hand doesn’t mean you’re out of the game.

                  It’s pretty clear that you were confused about the meaning of “bust” in this context which is fine but being both wrong and condescending makes you less sympathetic. Although, not nearly as much as being in favor of recklessly risking global thermonuclear war does.

                  • trafficnab@lemmy.ca
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                    5 months ago

                    Man this is your own analogy, do I really gotta explain it

                    If everyone is suddenly playing at the nuclear poker table, the chances of SOMEONE going all in each hand drastically increases, and if any one singular player goes bust, we ALL lose because the damn table explodes

                    Appeasement just kicks the can down the road (and makes things much worse in the future), it’s vital that we not make playing nuclear poker appealing by letting countries get away with shit even if they do have nukes