Prepare for war

Thu, 11 Dec 2025 16:09:09 +0100

hans@social.woefdram.nl

There, he said it:

Mark Rutte wrote:

We must be prepared for the scale of war our grandparents and great grandparent endured.

Europe, wake up!

#Rutte #NATO #Russia #Ukraine #EUpol

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/natos-rutte-warns-allies-they-are-russias-next-target-2025-12-11/

politics

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Thu, 11 Dec 2025 20:53:18 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Taschenlampe Müller Who's sending you to the trenches?

Or are you suggesting that the military organization of 32 counties should be lead by a front soldier? Both positions require vastly different qualities, don't you think?

How would you react to the Russian threat? Ignore it? Deny it? Other strategy?

Fri, 12 Dec 2025 00:14:59 +0100

Taschenlampe Müller

taschenlampe@despora.de

@Hans van Zijst I’m not saying anyone is literally sending me to the trenches (for now), nor that NATO should be led by a front-line soldier.

My point is this: History shows that elites survive wars, ordinary people don’t. the people who talk toughest about war almost never bear the same risks as those who end up paying with their lives. That’s true for Putin, for Rutte, for Trump and whoever else I don’t deny Russia is a potential threat. But, who defines that threat and who pays the price? So far, it’s never been those giving the heroic speeches far far away from the line of contact. In 1914, glorious leaders also talked about "unity" and "defending the fatherland" We know how that ended: not with victory parades for the working class, but with mass graves and revolutions/counter-revolutions. So thhe question isn’t just How do we stop Putin? but how do we stop this without destroying ourselves in the process? Now you may ask, Taschenlampe what is your solution? I´d like the quote the German KAnzler Schmidt, who was not a pacifist but a pragmatist:

"Lieber hundert Stunden umsonst verhandeln, als eine Minute schießen!"

I do not see any other solution

Fri, 12 Dec 2025 03:01:20 +0100

Hans van Zijst

hans@social.woefdram.nl

@Taschenlampe Müller We seem to agree on the unfairness and brutality of war.

Umsonst verhandeln isn't the problem, the consequences of it are, if it means your country's overrun and raped like Ukraine is now.

If you negotiate, you need to bring something to the table. Simply appeasing Putin and asking him to be nice doesn't work, you'll need to either buy him off or make a credible claim that you'll seriously hurt him if he doesn't.

First option doesn't work: the "peace in our time" that was supposedly bargained by offering Sudetenland to the bully of those days, did not prevent WWII. On the contrary: it encouraged him, because apparently nobody dared to fight him.

"Si vis pacem para bellum." Bit late for that now, but it still holds true.

What you offer as the solution, nicht schießen, isn't a solution. It means surrender: letting Putin destroy you without opposition.

We don't want war, but what are we going to do if Putin invades anyway? Our country declared neutrality in 1940, but we all know how that worked out for us.

The only solution I see is that we unite and organize our defense together, so that Putin knows invading Europe isn't going to be a walk in the park. That's the only thing that's going to stop him.