Yeah, I'm thinking Ivan's back

>Quick, switch the topic!
You're pathetic.

>economic situation has only been worsened by sanctions in recent years
Except they begin to recover. Slowly, but still recover.

How many rubles do you get per post? 500,000? Is that enough for a stick of gum?

>poor as fuck country trying to build a nuclear warship

this can only end well

>10 years ago
no shit, the early 2000s and late 90s were rough. That's like saying the economy in 2011 was better than 2009 and pointing to that to say the economy is doing great. Russia is nowhere near as relevant as the Soviet Union was and won't be in the next century due to demographics

Eh, not in a big enough way. Their biggest industry is hydrocarbon exports, which has been severely hurt by the US shale boom. Meanwhile, the only time Russia was truly a major power was during a period where they were spending an unsustainable percentage of their GDP on defense. Combine that with the coming demographic issues that will eventually affect the Russian labor force and the fact that a potential superpower is rising on their southern border, and it’s pretty clear that things won’t be getting much better for Russia anytime soon.

>10 years ago
>early 2000s and late 90s were rough
10 years ago it was 2009, not 2000 or 1995. Point is Russia is increasingly relevant in the international politics.
>nowhere near as relevant as the Soviet Union
Warmongering amis want another cold war, who would've thought.

Sheer size. Sheer manpower.

>Meanwhile, the only time Russia was truly a major power was during a period where they were spending an unsustainable percentage of their GDP on defense
Learn history.

As the other user said. I'll believe it when it's commissioned and operating. I'd bet it won't get laid down for at least a couple years, won't be completed for at least half a decade, and possibly will get halfway built and then abandoned.

This. Ivan and Putin need to stop living in the past. ONE aircraft carrier is just going to cost them money they dont have just so they can pretend to be big fish when no matter what they do the US and China are the real world powers and even then the US is far ahead in terms of a Navy and probably everything else.

>halfway
Better than most projects they commission so they deserve a round of applause for that at least.

The USSR consistently spent a higher percentage of their GDP on defense than the US throughout the Cold War, and considering one of the biggest contributors to the dissolution of the Soviet Union was financial problems, it seems pretty clear that the spending was unsustainable.

If you’re referring to pre-Soviet Russia, I’m not sure how that’s relevant. They were considered a great regional power, but were never able to globally influence events due to their higher rates of poverty and less-developed social order (i.e maintaining serfdom through the mid 19th century) compared to their European rivals.

They were one of the first powers to challenge Imperial Japan so I would hardly call that zero global influence.

>They were one of the first powers to challenge Imperial Japan so I would hardly call that zero global influence.

Because they are right there. Meanwhile the US defeated and occupied the Nips while being separated by the largest ocean in the world.

Honestly, if China maintains its momentum and the world shifts from a US-dominated order to a bipolar scenario like the Cold War, I wouldn’t be surprised if Russia eventually warms up to the west. Having 1 of the 2 superpowers on your border has a tendency to make you a bit anxious, regardless of ideological differences. It happened with the Sino-Soviet split.

Easy to do when they're you're neighbor. Siberia notwithstanding.

> hydrocarbon exports
Petroleum didn't even make up a 1 percentage point of GDP growth back in early 2000s when Russia was still getting ~7-10% GDP growth

>What is the congress of Vienna
>What was the Great Game with the British

They seemed to have done better in syria than the US has despite spending far less money

>It happened with the Sino-Soviet split.
Not relevant, neither Russia or China are meaningfully Marxist anymore

I’d argue that their poor performance in the Russo-Japanese war highlights the many issues Russia had that historically prevented it from becoming an expansionist global power. Even on their border, they were unable to expand their influence into Japan’s growing sphere.

>they broke their last ship
>somehow this ship is gonna be treated better

Nuclear weapons and a sizable army.

While disastrous, the Russo-Japanese war, did lead to the Stolypin reforms which actually made Russia the fastest growing industrial economy in Europe before the war.

>Great game
That’s kind of illustrating the difference between a global power like Britain and a continental one like Russia, though.

Britain’s whole fear was Russia hurting its interests in a territory held thousands of miles away from the British homeland, while Russia was attempting to counter British influence in territory that approached their borders in Central Asia. At the end of the day, Russia’s interests never extended beyond her immediate region, while Britain fought wars all over the planet. The only time that Russia was globally influential was during the post-WWII USSR, and that level of wealth and influence will never come back in the near term.

Sure, but it’s an example of why Russia has generally focused on border regions as opposed to involving itself in areas far beyond its borders. An aircraft carrier isn’t particularly useful when your only wars will be fought near your territory.

Nukes. If nothing else, Russia could throw a temper tantrum and GG Earth if its minimal demands aren't met.

>the only time Russia was truly a major power
>Cold War
Learn history.

Russian borders in Central Asia were thousands miles away from their homeland. Don't forget that they were in America too, opposing British influence on the continent and supporting American Revolution and the USA in the Civil War.

It was only able to extend its influence beyond its immediate region, which is admittedly quite big, during its time as the USSR, yes. They had a colony in Alaska which they sold to the US when it became clear they couldn’t defend it from the British, and they defeated Napoleon in their own territory, but generally speaking, Russia has kept its expansion and influence to the eastern and southern parts of Eurasia. During the Cold War, they were involving themselves in conflicts as far as Cuba, Congo, and Vietnam.

> global power like Britain and a continental one like Russia, though.
Well that's largely a fiction of geography, Britian's historically large navy was a strategic necessity even before steamships. Just because Imperial Russia wasn't able to power project at every point on the globe dosen't mean it wasn't a great power. It would be like arguing China isn't going a superpower because the PLAN is confined to the pacific

While I do agree that the Navy is the least important aspect of Russia's armed forces, 1 aircraft carrier isn't going to be that onerous. Frankly I wish they'd look into this again en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lun-class_ekranoplan

And now they were able to swing the Syrian war in Assad's favor and are telling DC not to fuck with Venezuela

>They had a colony in Alaska
It was quite a bit more than "a colony".
>they defeated Napoleon in their own territory
And then took Paris and led Vienna Congress that pretty much established modern day international politic standards. Russia has been a great power for centuries, long before the Cold War. Learn history.

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I didn’t mean to insinuate that Imperial Russia was never considered a great power, just that they never colonized and expanded their influence nearly as widespread as their British and French contemporaries. My point is that the USSR’s truly global influence was an abnormal period in Russian history, caused by a set a circumstances that are no longer the case, and that Russian planners would be better served accepting the fact that their focus will have to remain decidedly more local than it was in the 80s.

>they never colonized and expanded their influence nearly as widespread as their British and French contemporaries
Define "widespread". Russia was the second largest empire of the modern world.

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>USSR’s truly global influence was an abnormal period in Russian history
No, it was not. You are overstating the USSR influence and understating the historical Russian influence around the globe. Russia has traditionally been a great power at the very least ever since the Great Northern War, and arguably well before that.

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But it’s almost entirely contiguous. The only time Russia was ever able to effectively project power a significant distance away from its borders was during the Cold War, and even then, the only military conflict that they sent troops beyond advisors and spec ops into was in Afghanistan, a country that bordered the USSR. As Russia no longer has the economy or interests to push itself far beyond Syria, I don’t really understand why they’d be interested in an aircraft carrier for any purpose besides keeping up the appearance of Soviet-era military capabilities.

>point is that the USSR’s truly global influence was an abnormal period in Russian history
I would argue otherwise, Russia was poised to have a global presence in the 20th century, and probably would have been very influential anyway. It already had the largest number of University students in Europe before ww1 and was nearing to universal schooling, it already had a great diversity and quantity of natural resources for a large industrial economy, and a growing presence in various scientific and technical fields ( Tsiolkovsky, Sikorsky, Zworykin, Dobzhansky, ect). Late Imperial Russia already had the human capital and everything you would need for a global power, all that was needed was time to converge with the west economically, which looked like it was going to happen since Russian per capita GDP has already passed 1/3 of that of the US in the early 1910s and that was only derailed by in the longterm by the bolsheviks.

If anything, had the Empire or the Republic survived the Civil War, Russia would have been even more powerful by mid century than the USSR ever was.

>opinion poll
Means absolutely nothing.

>I wouldn’t be surprised if Russia eventually warms up to the west.
That's not going to happen as long as our own capitalists control the agenda

They have too much at stake to do anything but continue pretending Russia is the #1 big bad that's going to hurt us, and china remains our best friend (since china makes our capitalists lots of $$$ while bleeding our workers dry)

If the Imperial, or more likely the February Revolution government survived, I could see that. Still, I’m not sure how they would’ve fared through the 20th century. Honestly, a 20th century without the USSR changes so many things there’s not really any way to accurately predict the outcome. The bigger issue now is Russia continuing to have seemingly greater ambitions than what their economy and global standing can provide for.

I think China will shift into the “evil empire” role in American politics quite nicely as they begin to throw their weight around. Meanwhile, if Russia is willing to give up on their (perceived, not necessarily true) ambitions of reestablishing USSR-levels of influence in Eastern Europe, there would definitely be mutual common ground to be found in the form of preventing Chinese meddling in Russia’s traditional sphere of influence in Central Asia. Not saying it will happen, but if I were a US planner, that would be on my radar as a potential alliance.

This again? They were at this three years ago and standing around three foot models. Russia is full of shit

>And the only reason that they didn't was that the SU dissolved.
Because the soviet union was an economic failure and people in warsaw pact countries like Poland were on meat rationing? Because the soviet union was an inept dystopian police state that could not even supply a reliable consumer car to the vast majority of its prisoners who were shot for trying to escape it over the berlin wall? Because the soviet union fucking banned orwells 1984 because it hurt the feelings of the kgb/nkvd/gulag operators? Because the soviet union was shit run by tyrants?

>I think China will shift into the “evil empire” role

I think maos 60 million dead, the one child policy including forced abortion, its relentless police state and censorship already put it on that category for any thinking person

I mean, if they can find the money for one, the propaganda value of literally anything that isn’t the Kuznetsov being Russia’s only carrier would likely be worth it. At the end of the day, they’re a land power, not a sea power, so it’s actual usefulness would be questionable, but it’d look good for them.

Certainly, but I’m talking about how they’re portrayed by the government to voters. The US government largely ignored China’s many atrocities after the Sino-Soviet split because the Russians were seen as the greater evil. As China becomes America’s main rival instead of Russia, that view will shift.

>flattop
>ramp

Apparently it’ll be half-ramp, half-cat to accommodate Russia’s current carrier aircraft, which would be incompatible with a catapult system.

>seemingly greater ambitions than what their economy and global standing can provide for.
I don't think Russia is over reaching like the USSR did in the 80s, the Kremlin isn't spending double digit percentages of GDP on the military like it used and dose plan too and its not employing 1 out of every 6 people in defense or related industries either.

Given the hysterics among western elites, Russia prostrating before the west doesn't really net them anything.
Its not that Washington wants Russia to be another compliant vassal state like the rest of Europe and Russia wants NATO bases off its border.
Concerns with China can be worked out given that the two countries are already on pretty good terms and are strengthening their military and economic ties. Westerners talk a lot about the sino-soviet split, influence in central asia, or about revanchism over manchuria but those are issues are either tiny or irrelevant. Both Russian and China understand that those things are not worth ruining their geopolitical relations over, given how much they've invested in eachother.

The sino-soviet split is non-issue because neither Russia or China are meaningfully communist anymore.

China doesn't need to contemplate the shitshow that would be annexing Siberia/Outer Manchuria when Russia could just sell them some of the resources.

Russia doesn't need to bother fighting China over Central Asia when Russia dosen't really have much soft power their to begin with, ect, ect ...

they still need to make soviet iowa.

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>Both Russian and China understand that those things are not worth ruining their geopolitical relations over, given how much they've invested in eachother.

China has invested infinitely more in the US dollar and US treasuries than it ever will in Russia.
>Russia wants NATO bases off its border.
Not happening. Doubling down on invading neighbours was the worst thing Putin could have done. Funny he never stopped to ponder why former warsaw pact nations like hungary, Poland, Czech, Estonia etc rushed to join NATO when they should have had such happy memories of Russification and having orc like rusian colonists transplanted into them while their own people were shipped to gulags. Russia has completely failed to come to terms with what stalin and the post stalin politbureau did. As long as Russia is a militarist state threatening apocalypse it should be surrounded by NATO

>neither Russia or China are meaningfully communist anymore
All communism was - an authoritarian, totalitarian, police state, censoring, militarist anti-democratic kleptocracy No real change

shit. They paid the French to build to mistral helicopter carriers for them and ended up loosing them because muh donesk

>it’s almost entirely contiguous
Which has worked out in a much better way for them in a historical perspective.

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>Russia continuing to have seemingly greater ambitions than what their economy and global standing can provide for
You think that because you are confused by all the Cold War 2 propaganda in the western media. Russia is concerned with its immediate backyard in Europe and Middle East and the US intervention there.

That’s the one thing I don’t get about Russia. Clearly, they must know that being aggressive in Eastern Europe will only serve to increase American military influence in the region, which is presumably the opposite of what Russia wants. And if they’re just trying to overstretch America’s commitments by stirring shit up, they have to know that the US can and will continue to outspend them for the foreseeable future. Why not just give up on Eastern Europe for now and focus on throwing weight around in Central Asia to secure their southern border against potential Chinese encroachment into the region? They’re much more well-liked in many of those countries than they are in places like Poland.

No need to be so upset.

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I’m not sure if sending troops to Venezuela and invading Ukraine is really indicative of wanting to maintain a more limited foreign policy. Syria makes sense, given their need to ensure Russian control over European oil imports, but I really can’t work out why antagonizing the west in Eastern Europe and South America would be in their best interests.

>paid the French to build to mistral helicopter carriers for them
You realize half of each hull was built in Russia, right?

literally cucked themselves

Because Europe is even worse off and America can't be everywhere.

>I’m not sure if sending troops to Venezuela and invading Ukraine is really indicative of wanting to maintain a more limited foreign policy.
That's the problem, the wants to limit their foreign policy back to where it was in 1998. This is simply not happening. They aren't going to go full Cold War on you, but they will defend their interests like any country should.

>Russia is concerned with its immediate backyard

So that''s why it went to war to preserve a naval base in Syria? Russia is far more eccentric than that. Russians are on 500 dollars a month. The only thing the Russia government can offer them is endless bullshit about roysssia stronk and beating up on weaker non nato neighbours. All Russian military vapourware is for propagandising to the Russian population. Its biggest actual foreign weapons is the same old subversion and encouraging extremists in its precieved enemies, who have no plans to attack Russia but would just like it to fuck off and not be a shithole. But there they are hugging best Korea, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Iran. It's still a cancer state who's population believe that they have a vendetta against the USA and NATO because they refuse to accept the soviet union was a pathetic fuck up all of their own making

>You realize half of each hull was built in Russia, right?
they did was modify the stern and not 'build' half the hull. In the end of they day they had to ask French shipyards to do the mistrals because Russia could not. They are incapable of making a nuclear aircraft carrier worth a fuck

>China has invested infinitely more in the US dollar and US treasuries than it ever will in Russia.
You know they're trying to build the petro-yuan and that they sold a lof of their US bonds right a few years ago right?

> rushed to join NATO
Most of the NATO expansion into Eastern Europe happened in the late 90s early 2000s when Russia was trying to to combat terrorism in the caucuses

> Russification and having orc like rusian colonists transplanted into them while their own people were shipped to gulags
The USSR was never a Russian national state, and neither were any of its leaders. Lenin wa a Russophobe by any standard and Stalin only slightly less so.
Russians were transplanted across the ussr as part of economic central planning, rather out of any ethnonationalist policy.

>All communism was - an authoritarian, totalitarian, police state, censoring, militarist anti-democratic kleptocracy No real change
If that's all communism was Deng wouldn't have needed to try and convince the CCP to relax economic controls in the late 70s, and Russia today is not the totalitarian state that it was under the soviet union.

Central Asia just isn't that valuable to Russia, and their ties there are rather shallow. Annexing Crimea makes far more sense

>Syria
Because Russian doesn't need Syria to become another terrorist ridden failed state due to western adventurism, given that Wahhabis have made their way to Chechnya from the middle east in the past

>but they will defend their interests like any country should.

Their neighbouring countries hate Russia, hated the Russian warsaw pact occupations and gulags and don't want the Russian installed fat man in a bad suit administering their countries into poverty. Its not russias 'interests' to think they have the right to do so. God Bless NATO

Syria is their immediate backyard, dumbass, the distance between Aleppo and Sochi is shorter than that between DC and Quebec.

>not 'build' half the hull
They did literally build half of each hull in Russia. Learn about the subject before posting, dumbass.

Next time you want people to talk to you seriously try to be a bit less of an opinionated clown.

That’s the thing about Ukraine, though. Best I can tell, in any view but an extremely short-sighted one, Russia blatantly invading a sovereign Eastern European state only serves to strengthen the connection between the NATO states on Russia’s border and the US. Poland’s offering to pay for a US airbase to be built in their territory now, the EU and US have implemented a number of sanctions on Russia’s economy, and the belief that Russia is no longer an antagonistic threat to its neighbors like the USSR was has completely disappeared.

>>China has invested infinitely more in the US dollar and US treasuries than it ever will in Russia.You know they're trying to build the petro-yuan and that they sold a lof of their US bonds right a few years ago right?
China is not an oil exporter its a consumer and the vast majority of its investment is still into the USA and not Russia.

>>All communism was - an authoritarian, totalitarian, police state, censoring, militarist anti-democratic kleptocracy No real changeIf that's all communism was Deng wouldn't have needed to try and convince the CCP to relax economic controls in the late 70s, and Russia today is not the totalitarian state that it was under the soviet union.
It's getting there. You can be jailed for just standing with a placard saying you are unhappy.
>Central Asia just isn't that valuable to Russia, and their ties there are rather shallow. Annexing Crimea makes far more sense
Except Crimea is not Russia clay and never was and by invading it they have utterly fucked their chance of joining civilisation for a generation.
>Because Russian doesn't need Syria to become another terrorist ridden failed state due to western adventurism
Reminder that Assad was in charge when that war broke out with all the cards in his hands. Another totalitarian mobster. Russia propped him up to begin with..Furthermore Russia and Assad CREATED ISIS to legitimise assad and stuffed it with extremists from Dagestan. First place it went for was Iraq.

>Syria is their immediate backyard

To a drunk Russian everything is a Russian backyard and every dictator is a fren

Suck my balls Ivan

Did you just imply Crimea left Ukraine out of the blue and Ukrainian Civil War was started by Russia, not Ukrainians dissatisfied with their government attitude to them? What Russia is doing in its backyard is a response to what the US and NATO has been doing there for 20 years after the fall of the SU. Russia is the retaliating side here, not vice versa.

And the shortest distance between Syrian and Russian border is about the distance between Havana and Orlando, my geographically ignorant butthurt friend.

>Crimea is not Russia clay
It factually is.
>and never was
It factually was.

Annexing territory owned by an independent country is a hell of a retaliation for the people of Ukraine kicking a Russian puppet government out of office.

>joining civilisation
I think I might know just the place for you.

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>Did you just imply Crimea left Ukraine out of the blue and Ukrainian Civil War was started by Russia
It was a sham of a vote, just like most "democracy" in russia
>not Ukrainians dissatisfied with their government attitude to them?
a government that constantly fucked them over and overtly lied to them
>Russia is doing in its backyard is a response to what the US and NATO has been doing there for 20 years after the fall of the SU. Russia is the retaliating side here, not vice versa.
russia is afraid to it's economic slave

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Russians will say the same about Donetsk if they ever succeed in stealing it from Ukraine, too.

>>Crimea is not Russia clayIt factually is.>and never wasIt factually was.

t it was not. Ever heard of the Crimean war? Moving on from there the genocide of the tartars by Stalin? You know the people from crimea? Your posts are exactly why people think vatnik posters are vicious lying piles of puke. Russia accepted Ukraine was a sovereign country and then INVADED and ANNEXED part of it. Nice to know the Chinese will have an excuse and precedent provided by Russia itself when they pull the same stunt in east Russia when it suits them

>Annexing territory owned by an independent country
This independent country wanted to join Russia.
>hell of a retaliation for the people of Ukraine
What do people of Ukraine care about Crimeans. They sure didn't during the 25 years after the dissolution of the USSR as indicated by the opinion polls in Crimea and their continuous attempts to leave the Country.
>Russian puppet government
That they themselves voted fore. Just like a number of times before, Ukrainians can't seem to grasp the concept of responsibility.

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>Annexing territory owned by an independent country is a hell of a retaliation for the people of Ukraine kicking a Russian puppet government out of office.

Yet Russians still don't get why their neighbours hate them.....

You already BTFO'd yourself by your own historical knowledge, limited to nothing more than the cold war, but even then, consider the following
>Russian military pensions, the nuclear programme, and all the human resources affairs for people about to enter or having already left the military were part of the Soviet ministry of defense budget
>the USA had its entire nuclear programme rolled into the Department of ENERGY budget
The "the US didn't spend exorbitant amounts of GDP on the military" argument is a myth

Its fucking amazing that you think this shit floats outside of Russia. Maybe you want to tell me that hitlers annexing of the Sudetenland was just fine to? After all Russia and Hitler were allies when they invaded Poland.

Your broken English is showing, Mykola. Better return to sosach/pol/.

>Ukrainians can't seem to grasp the concept of responsibility.
And then they overthrew him by a majority vatnik

>It's getting there. You can be jailed for just standing with a placard saying you are unhappy.
Then by that logic, China was a communist country ever since QIn Shi Huang Di given his legalism.

>Except Crimea is not Russia clay and never was
Tell that to Grigori Potemkin

>Furthermore Russia and Assad CREATED ISIS
>stuffed it with extremists from Dagestan
This is your brain on CNN

>implying america hasn't propped and supported up its fair share of dictators and sells weapons to an abolsute monarchy on a regular basis
hello pot my name is kettle, you're black. America has no problems with dictatorships as long they're beholden to DC

>Chinese will have an excuse and precedent provided by Russia itself when they pull the same stunt in east Russia when it suits them
Don't try to learn geopolitics from Tom Chancey novels, the China's current military focus is on the Navy and not the Army. If anything they're reducing the numbers of the army and treating Siberia as their strategic rear.

Here's Ivan propagandising Russia's illegal unprovoked invasion of a neighbour and installation of puppet annex enclaves. Its like you want the populations of Ukraine and Poland and the Baltics to hate you for generations.

No, I don't want to tell you anything about your desperate analogies. Try again. On a second thought, don't bother. I've got better things to do today rather than arguing politics with an Ukrainian sosach/pol/ refugee on Jow Forums/k/.

Retard.

The Russians were running a military budget of 12.9% of their GDP in 1990, after their economy began to fall apart and spending was reduced. You can’t really make an argument that American military spending was anywhere close to what Russia was spending in comparison to the size of their economies. Excess defense spending is part of why the Soviet system collapsed in the first place.

>America has no problems with dictatorships as long they're beholden to DC

I'm not even American. I did not even hate Russians until they started antiprot posting under Putin. People like you taught me to hate Russians and have a plan to kill every Russian expat in my nation in the event of any Russian incited unrest. You did that. Congratulate yourself.

Seriously. I’m fucking glad I don’t live in Eastern Europe. It must be maddening knowing that Russia still seems to have designs on regaining their former empire.

>Excess defense spending is part of why the Soviet system collapsed in the first place.

Nope. Inept ultra controlling statism and authoritarianism labelled command economics was. If the soviet union was the only collection of humans on the planet it would have collapsed. It could not even supply basics like meat or razor blades reliably