Diplomacy anyone?

The US could always try this, you know, actual overt foreign diplomacy..

If they spent a fraction of what they spend on their intelligence agencies, covert operations, and covert interference, on actual upfront dialogue and diplomacy seeking to find acceptable compromises with other countries, then most major fuck ups post WWII, which they caused, would never have happened.

Had they have actually tried real diplomacy with Russia a decade ago, instead of getting into a 'how big is my willy' competition with Putin, both the people of Russia, the US, Ukraine, and now the rest of the world, might not be playing this propaganda and proxy war game.

Putin is, undoubtedly, a Soviet era dinosaur, but, and it's only a 'maybe' but, he may have responded to some signs of inclusivity into the world order on Russia's terms had that have been tried - but we'll never know, because it never was.

We forget our history (or never knew it) all too easily. A passing familiarity with the past 200 years of history for both Russia and China is instructive in having empathy for their outlook. Empathy with your enemy (as both Kissinger and Robert McNamara are on record as saying played a role in the US's failure in multiple 'foreign adventures') is something the US just can't seem to learn.. Empathy is not agreement, or sympathy. It's understanding, it's an ability to 'get inside your enemies head', or to 'walk in her shoes', invaluable if you really want to find a negotiated settlement to any disagreement.

But we keep doing the same "banging our head against a brick wall" thing, which in the final analysis ends up being the same old story, over and over again - lots of dead young men and tons of wasted effort and money..

Homo stupiditous..

buggered if I know 😛