r/worldnews • u/hieronymusanonymous • Jan 23 '23
NATO member Latvia tells Russian envoy to leave, in solidarity with Estonia Russia/Ukraine
https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/article-7293365.8k
u/MitsyEyedMourning Jan 23 '23
Ha, leave by Feb. 24th. The one year anniversary of the invasion.
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u/WarthogBusiness1081 Jan 23 '23
Also Estonia independence day.
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u/griever48 Jan 23 '23
Is it too late to return to sender?
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u/NotUniqueWorkAccount Jan 23 '23
I'll ring ops mom.
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u/dismayhurta Jan 23 '23
She said it was fine.
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u/watashi_ga_kita Jan 23 '23
Do we need to package him in an amniotic sac or will gift wrap do?
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u/radome9 Jan 23 '23
Few things unite the Baltic countries like their hatred for Russia.
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u/CaspianX2 Jan 23 '23 edited Jan 23 '23 •
A Polish man is walking on a beach on the edge of the Baltic sea when he sees something odd and surprising - an Arabian-style old oil lamp half-buried in the sand. Picking it up and inspecting it, he's cleaning it off when a genie bursts out of the lamp thanking the man for freeing him, and offering to magically grant three wishes for doing so.
The Polish man thinks about it for a moment, and then he says that he would like the Huns to invade Poland, and then leave. The Genie quirks an eyebrow at this odd request, but then nods his head, claps his hands together, and declares that it is so.
Soon, from their spot on the beach, the pair of them see a hellish sight of the horde of invaders wreaking havoc across the Polish countryside, burning houses, terrorizing the people, and just generally creating chaos. After a few minutes, things die down, and the Mongol horde leaves.
The genie turns to the man, clearly curious about this. Was this truly what the man had wanted? There are tales of trickster genies granting wishes in ways that twist the wish to torture the one doing the wishing, but the genie hadn't even needed to seek out some alternate interpretation of this wish. What was this man playing at?
Nevertheless, the man spoke again, and declared he was ready to name his second wish. The genie expected that the man would do as many before him had done with their second wish, and beg to undo their first wish, but once again the genie was blindsided by what the man had to say. He told the genie that for his second wish, he wanted the Huns to invade Poland, and then leave.
The genie's jaw dropped, but with an uncertain look in his eyes, he nodded his head, clapped his hands together, and declared that it was so.
Soon enough, the chaos and destruction the pair had only just seen coming to an end picked up again, and it was far worse than before, men being slaughtered in the streets, women and children running and screaming, livestock beheaded and bleeding out in the pastures. And then, after this seemed to go on for hours, the onslaught slowly died down and the attackers left the way they came.
Warily, the genie turned back to the Polish man and asked him what his final wish would be, half afraid of what the man would say in response. Sure enough, the Polish man told him that his third wish was that the Huns would invade Poland, and then leave.
Sighing wearily, the genie nodded his head, clapped his hands together, and declared that it was so.
This time, the terror and bloodshed lasted for days. The invaders made it clear that they intended to leave no survivors, and the genie's magical aura protected the Polish man only so he could see the results his wish had wrought. Unspeakable acts were committed on his countrymen, and when this seemingly interminable period of torment finally ended and the Huns retreated back in the direction they had come from, much of Poland was left a smoldering ruin.
Curious, the genie spoke to the man once more, simply asking him why he had done this. Why thrice visit upon his own people such horrors? What could have possibly possessed him to choose this of all things to wish for, not once but three times?
"Because," the Polish man explained to the Genie, "In order for the Huns to invade Poland three times and then return home, they would have to march across Russia six times."
Edit: Okay, for those trying to give me "um actually" corrections about geography, let it be known that:
This is an old joke, I am not the first to tell it.
Traditionally, the joke uses the word "huns" when probably "Mongol hordes" or something like that may be more accurate for what the joke is meant to be saying. I don't know, I'm not a historian, I'm just retelling an old joke.
Such references to an invasion by these hordes seems to be a reference to this. Yes, that's the Mongols under Ăgedei Khan invading Russia's capitol city of Moscow and then eventually working their way over to Poland's major city of Krakow (evidently after taking a detour through Crimea and then coming back around to Ukraine). Is this a practical route for invading Poland from Mongolia? Hell if I know, I'm not a horse-riding nomadic warrior tribe. But evidently it is a route that they took.
Is all that stuff I just said accurate? Dunno, it was going off of vague memories and a few quick Google searches. But this definitely isn't lacking some basis in geographical and historical reality.
Also, genies don't exist. Sorry to get your hopes up.
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u/Spacedude50 Jan 23 '23
Before my visit to Poland I was told 2 things. Do not overestimate how much they love Jesus and do not underestimate how much they hate Russia
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u/va_wanderer Jan 23 '23
Also, never tell anyone from Poland that they're related to Germans, even if you think it's true. It's one of those historical sore points given all the border shifts. Dad was like 1/32 German technically via genealogical records, but when they visited Poland and anyone asked, it was "Polish-American, multiple generations 100%".
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u/Ambitious-Score-5637 Jan 23 '23
A good example of Baltic solidarity.
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u/Lovv Jan 23 '23
Why not Lithuania aswell?
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u/Traversar Jan 23 '23
We're way past that, maybe there will be another way to show solidarity :D
Lithuania officially recalls its ambassador from Moscow May
Lithuania expels Russiaâs chargĂŠ d'affaires over undiplomatic conduct October
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u/HotChilliWithButter Jan 23 '23
Lithuania has always been less dependent on Russia, and more leaning towards Poland. Estonia has always been very friendly with Finland but still did lots of business with Russia. Latvia has had the most business done with Russia out of all the Baltics. Great seeing this change, unfortunately we latvians have to look for another future partner. Maybe Sweden?
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u/Spard1e Jan 23 '23
Don't all three of these countries have enormous tires to the Nordics?
Especially Sweden because it's big (in comparison to Norway, Finland and Denmark) but it's also right there
And once you're in Sweden you're basically highway-ed to their 3 neighboring countries.
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u/seza112 Jan 23 '23
Lithuania was first country to downgrade connecions to ruzzia it did that few month ago
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u/rome425 Jan 23 '23
Russia said on Monday it was downgrading diplomatic relations with NATO member Estonia, accusing it of "total Russophobia,"
This is not "Russophobia" everyone just hates you Russia.
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u/FredTheLynx Jan 23 '23
And it ain't a phobia. It's perfectly rational and healthy.
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u/HotChilliWithButter Jan 23 '23
Exactly lol. We shouldnt call it russophobia, we should call it russiafuckoff
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u/SlightDesigner8214 Jan 23 '23
Itâs not a phobia when theyâre actually consistently invading their neighbors. We call this empirical proof.
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u/mike_b_nimble Jan 23 '23
Yep. And itâs not just Russia. Iâm so tired of âthe majority opinionâ being described as phobias and conspiracies. Whether itâs Russia, China, Israel, or even American Conservatives; if the majority hates your words/actions itâs not a conspiracy, itâs democracy.
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u/Intrepid_Objective28 Jan 23 '23
When you fall into shark infested waters and try to get the fuck out as fast as possible, youâre not being sharkphobic, youâre fighting for your life.
Keeping interactions with Russia to a minimum is the best course of action. Russia and the west are not allies. Russia is a danger to the western world. Cutting us off from them as much as possible is a matter of survival.
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u/Slahinki Jan 23 '23
You're also statistically much more likely to be killed by a russian than by a shark, so it's not an irrational fear either.
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u/rockylizard Jan 23 '23
Russia is a danger to the western world
Russia is a danger to the entire world. Consider their ruthless actions in Syria and Africa, just as two ongoing examples.
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u/Vraxk Jan 23 '23
Russia's Dead Hand system, an automated retaliatory nuclear dead-man's switch, has been holding the world hostage since before the Cold War.
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u/Aschebescher Jan 23 '23
Russia's Dead Hand system, an automated retaliatory nuclear dead-man's switch, has been holding the world hostage
Could you elaborate?
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u/ForgottenBob Jan 23 '23
Russia's Dead Man's Hand system will supposedly launch its nuclear arsenal if it detects a large enough explosion over Russian soil and no Russian leadership is around to deactivate it in time.
However, after the fall of the Soviet Union, one of the generals in charge of developing the program said dead-man's hand was never finalized or implemented because of all the things that could go wrong with it.
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u/bizaromo Jan 23 '23
sharkphobic
It's healthy and rational to fear something that will try to kill you.
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u/ChadInNameOnly Jan 23 '23
This. It's time to stop hiding behind words and acknowledge that there are behaviors and actions that are totally okay to dislike or avoid. We as a society simply can't just tolerate everything out of principle
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u/Lurnmoshkaz Jan 23 '23
I just wish all of Europe followed Latvia an Estonia. Not just completely severing diplomatic ties but also an embargo.
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u/murphymc Jan 23 '23
They got balls in the Baltics and Iâm here for it.
Dear everyone: these are the people who know Russia best and they want absolutely nothing to do with them. Listen to the Baltic states.
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u/j1mmyB3000 Jan 23 '23
âRussophobiaâ was invented by putin.
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u/rich1051414 Jan 23 '23
And extreme projection, after you look at how their state media paints the west. They actually are truly westophobic. That is a real word that has existed for a long time, but we don't hear it as often as perhaps we should.
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u/GerryC Jan 23 '23
Most sane people can draw the rightfully and equally scary parallel between Russia and the rise of the 3rd Reich during the mid to late 30s.
Same play book, different times. There was far too much acceptance of Hitler and Germany during the run-up to WWII. That can't be allowed to happen again.
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u/bizaromo Jan 23 '23
When we look back, we will see this era of Russian history dates back to 1993, an event politely known as the 1993 Russian Constitutional Crisis. Or, less politely, the October coup: When Yeltsin, after illegally dissolving congress and parliament, physically attacked parliament for impeaching him and replacing him with an acting president, Alexander Rutskoy (who has virtually been written out of history and forgotten, along with the once-supreme governing body of the Russian Federation, the Supreme Soviet).
President Clinton immediately called Yeltsin and congratulated him on a job well done! Never mind his actions were unconstitutional, and that Russian soldiers murdered dozens and wounded over 400 peaceful protesters who were unhappy with Yeltsin's policies and power grab. Imagine that: Thousands of Russians protesting the Russian president, and backing his impeachment in parliament!
That is the moment when the power was transferred away from the people of Russia, and into the hands of the executive. It's when the movement to fundamentally change Russia failed. It was largely due to the toxic "economic shock therapy" forced on Russia by the west's most brilliant economics, who did not give a shit for human suffering, so long as it destroyed communism and brought capitalism to Russia. Next came Putin, a slimy former KGB agent, who was immediately correctly assessed by Margaret Thatcher:
"I looked at the pictures of Mr. Putin trying to look for a trace of humanity. I should have known better. [...] They still do not value human life in the same way that we do."
(Which is pretty damning, when you consider how little Ms Thatcher valued life).
So the west has been lenient and appeasing of Russia since 1993. When we (the west) should have supported the people's right for self governance, but instead choose to back the executive power grab since we had the current executive in our pocket. We have been too lenient with Russia's wars in Chechnya and other Republics that attempted to break free of the Russian Federation. We ignored their wars with Georgia, which clearly showed the strategy used in Moldova and Ukraine.
We should have supported the Balkanization of Russia from the beginning. We should have supported Chechnya's independence movement, even though they were Muslim, and the west was unfortuantely Islamophobic. And we should have supported the numerous little rebellions of people trying to break free. There have been many over the past 30 years.
All of this is to say that we have already been too lenient, and ignored the reality of Russian brutality, authoritarianism, imperialism, and expansionism. It has been in front of our eyes for 30 years. The invasion of Ukraine is the direct result of choosing to trade and appease Russia for decades, forging an ever-closer relationship and ignoring the human rights violations. Ignoring the crackdowns on the press. Ignoring the expulsion of NGOs. Ignoring the wars of conquest.
So the run up has already happened. We ALREADY let it happen again. It can't KEEP happening. We have to stop it before it goes any further. We aren't in an eternal equivalent to 1939, much less 1933. We are in the middle of the shit, in the equivalent of the 1940s.
We should be sending NATO tanks, aircraft, and troops to Ukraine, as well as Georgia, and Moldova, to finish this shit off. We should be sending arms and special ops to anyone who wants to fight for independence in Russia instead of being passive cannon fodder in Ukraine.
Russia has already sold the population on the idea that they are fighting NATO troops in Ukraine. What changes if we make their propaganda a reality?
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u/Randomized0000 Jan 23 '23
What changes if we make their propaganda a reality?
Probably world war 3. Not that I entirely disagree with you.
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[removed] â view removed comment
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u/JoopahTroopah Jan 23 '23
A phobia is an irrational fear. Like you say, this is for good reason.
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u/brenstar20 Jan 23 '23
Right and I think most people lack respect and trust for Russia, not fear them. Propaganda is trying to push the idea that people fear Russia when that is not the case
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u/AbbyWasThere Jan 23 '23
The three Baltic nations really are as tight as glue, and it's a bond forged from the collective trauma Russia has inflicted on them.
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u/lepobz Jan 23 '23
Itâs not russophobic to despise what Russia is today. Fuck Putin. Heâs ruined Russia.
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u/cheeze_whiz_shampoo Jan 23 '23
Yeah, it was such a party before Putin. Russia has never not been a despotic hellhole.
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u/Drop_Table_Redditors Jan 23 '23
People like to pretend that Putin isn't extremely popular in Russia. If they remove Putin, it will be because he failed at taking Ukraine, not because he attempted.
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u/Drummk Jan 23 '23
The politicians who signed the Baltic States up to join NATO did their countries a huge service.
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u/bigbobo33 Jan 23 '23
I mean, it says something that almost immediately after they became independent, they went pretty quick to try to gain membership into the EU and NATO.
Above all else, the Baltic States never want to be under Russian occupation ever again.
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u/AlexdDark Jan 23 '23
this self-victimization by Russia will always remain pathetic. Over one fifth of all Russian speakers live outside of Russia. Russian borders have been only growing since the fall of USSR at the cost of closest neighbours and friends.
And according to the propaganda everyone else is a "Russophobe". fair enough, at this point, what's there NOT to fear?
good for u, Baltics!
Putler kaput
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u/TheNothingAtoll Jan 23 '23
"Russophobia". Russia is an insane country. They lie, cheat, kill, steal, spy, manipulate and sow discord - yet others are just supposed to accept it and go on with their lives? Fuck that mafia state.
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u/rougecrayon Jan 23 '23
The Latvians I know are still a little salty (okay a lot) at Russia for how they were treated in the past.
They get it.
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u/Its_Just_A_Typo Jan 23 '23
Because if Latvia wasn't part of NATO, the russians would have made rubble out of Riga by now and parked their puppets there.
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u/Kris_n Jan 23 '23
Thats why all three of them stuck together and did whatever they could to get into NATO. They knew Russia would come back if they stood alone.
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u/Its_Just_A_Typo Jan 23 '23
Yup. The Ruzz would be swarming over Vilnius and Tallinn too if they thought they could get away with it.
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u/tinybluntneedle Jan 23 '23
The way the baltics are unconditionally backing each other up is quite touching âĽď¸
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u/4mrkite Jan 23 '23
Calling them âNATOâs Baltic statesâ every chance they get is a wonderful not so subtle flex
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u/iGoKommando Jan 23 '23
Surely it can't be because of kidnapping Ukrainian civilians/torturing children,killing innocents, invading sovereign nations and just being a pest to the world. It has to be because of russophobia!
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u/Al_Jazzera Jan 23 '23
Thank you, Latvia for telling the representative to leave and don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out. Cheers to any country, especially ones in close proximity, to tell Russia to be civilized or get the hell out.
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u/MetricSuperiorityGuy Jan 23 '23
It's always fascinating to me how little introspection Russia has. Like, the former Soviet blocs/sphere that Russia now wishes to dominate are the countries that hate Russia the most: Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Ukraine, and even Poland.
These countries have the most at stake when it comes to war with Russia, yet they're also the most willing to fight Russia directly. Why? They know firsthand just how genocidal and oppressive living under Russian rule can be.
Hey Russia, it's not us. It's you. You're the fucked up ones.
It's really too bad nukes do exist, because it would be nice to put that paper tiger of a military in its place once and for eternity. We'll show them the reason we don't have universal healthcare over here in the Land of the Free...
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u/cspruce89 Jan 23 '23
It's always fascinating to me how little introspection Russia has.
Only if you are approaching the situation as though they are arguing in good faith. They know it's bullshit, or that it makes you go "WTF?". That's the point. Confuse, distract, sow dissent. They don't expect anyone to truly believe them, or feel bad for them (of course a handful of rubes will).
They're doing it to get a rise. They want to show that rules don't apply to them, including the rules of logic and linguistics.
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u/Ballytrea Jan 23 '23
As someone with a Latvian wife damn proud of that little country and the rest of the Baltic and Nordic countries!
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u/booman30 Jan 23 '23
Russia saying Estonians are Russiophobic is like calling someone a bad host when you broke in their house
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u/doshu99 Jan 23 '23
The Baltic countries know exactly what animal Russia is, hence the âGet the fuck out of our countryâ.
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u/mombi Jan 23 '23
Few people hate Russians. Most hate what their government is doing, for good reason.
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u/buckeye111 Jan 24 '23
They threaten to end the world with nukes every week then complain about Russophibia. Hilarious.
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u/Killme0now Jan 23 '23
I love how Russian says people have russianphobia..... Dude you guys are invading and killing thousands of people. We dont have russianphobia you guys are just dicks and think you can come out of this unscathed.
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u/NorgesTaff Jan 23 '23
Total respect from me. I wish every other European country would do the same and also laughed at Lavrov every time he entered, left or stood to speak at the UN.
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u/Alternative-Flan2869 Jan 23 '23
Baltic countries have more balls than the rest of NATO - designate russia a terrorist state already - they earned it.
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u/LordOfTheWasteland6 Jan 23 '23
Wise choice from Latvians. We Finland should also tell our Russian Ambassador to jog on back to Moscow.
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u/Griffolion Jan 23 '23
Russia said on Monday it was downgrading diplomatic relations with NATO member Estonia, accusing it of "total Russophobia,"
Russia really needs to lay off this rhetorical tactic, playing the victim like that as the big bad aggressor simply doesn't work.
Also, given Latvia are a former soviet satellite nation witnessing their former overlord invade and brutalize another former soviet satellite nation, why wouldn't they be so-called "Russophobic"?
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u/NaughtyCheffie Jan 24 '23
Fuckin' Latvia! I went to HS with the son of one of their top Generals and his bodyguard. We'd drink vodka and breakdance in the dorm after hours. Legendary.
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u/put_tape_on_it Jan 23 '23
accusing it of "total Russophobia,"
Hilarity! If they really were actually afraid of Russia, theyâd keep the diplomatic relationship. Theyâre kicking them out because theyâre NOT afraid!
Ainât no one afraid of yo broke ass sad busted down petrol-state anymore, Vlad.
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u/Infinaris Jan 23 '23
Makes me wonder if a wave of Diplomatic Expulsions could follow in solidarity bar the EU ambassador or one of a handful of bigger players to keep a limited channel open.
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u/Witcher587 Jan 23 '23 edited Jan 23 '23
It's not Russophobia. No one in east europe fear russians, they hate them.
edit: It's acutally only Russians and their propaganda who speaks about it. They feel about themselfs as greater nations if other fears them. But this is their inner, their own world and let's keep them in their world far away from ours.
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u/Kris_n Jan 23 '23
The Baltic States - has been sticking together since 1991. They donât like Russia and arenât hiding it.
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u/hieronymusanonymous Jan 23 '23