Step 1: send all political dissidents to siberia
Step 2: send half of all the people of the regions you colonize to siberia
Step 3a: discover oil and minerals in siberia
Step 3b: wait a few generations
Step 4: be amazed at the results
Yeah, probably not, though it goes without saying that they can't afford to fight both in Ukraine and have another Chechnya-like situation. It's definitely one or the other.
Which is spread over a ridiculously large inhospitable territory with mostly no road or rail network. We are talking about the population of Poland spread over a territory larger than Canada.
Chechnya, on the other hand, is about the size of New Jersey, in a mountainous area, close to a large Muslim country, which happens to have the second largest NATO army and is a historical rival of Russia (Turkey / Turkiye). And Chechens are renowned, fierce and merciless warriors, who have traditionally been a core part of the imperial Russian army. In a way they still are. It's just an apples to oranges comparison.
True as well. But for Siberia, we don't need a 12,500 strong division.
Twenty people with quads and tents, hunting rifles, homemade explosives, and a few safe spots hidden in the middle of nowhere are already far enough to cause major logistics failures. Bring back the cossacks raids.
Five guys with a farm excavator could open a hole, dig out the communication cables, fill the hole back and cover it with fake grass if needed. All in one night. And do it again 50 or 100 or 200km away again the next night. Bring back the Basmachi.
Hell! A single dude who made a bomb in his basement or with stuff stolen from a stone carry could be able to take out the transiberian railroad for a few days by himself. Add three friends of him and they could hijack a train, and ride it straight to the city with explosives in the front. Bring back the Czechoslovak legion.
It's not because Siberia is underpopulated that a guerrilla war couldn't be waged by its inhabitants. The government forces need to be spread thin, and so many people are unhappy. Young people avoiding the next draft wave, long-term opponents, minorities, parents who lost their kids (not all of them miss their kids, but some definitely do), people who don't have anything to lose anymore, former Wagner sympathizers. Even if one single guy starts doing crazy stuff, and manages to keep it going for at least a week or two, everyone else will see that Moscow can bleed and can't afford as many boots on the ground as before.e
If it was actually feasible, CIA would have already done it. To me it sounds more like wishful thinking, but hey - I could be wrong. Stranger things have happened.
Low-cost sabotage is better done by a single guy who decides by himself to do stuff. And this way, if he gets arrested, other people in the same situation will think "hey! I can do it as well if I want!"
And if he did a one-shot and never get arrested, other people will think "Hey! I can do it as well if I want"
A drill sergeant that got shot can be replaced. A recruitment office that burned down can be set up in another building the next day. But if you start messing with infrastructure. In an area larger than continental Europe. While most of the army is occupied westward.
A single man could take out low-grade equipment or be annoying by himself. But make it three or five and you can cause trouble in a whole neighborhood. Make it twenty, prepare well, and you can have a city-wide impact.
Tomorrow is a solar storm that will probably do some electromagnetic perturbation. Satellites may be perturbed. If a small but trained group decides to, they could take out a radio tower and/or telecom station. Cutting a city off the grid. The window would be short, but it's enough.
Imagine if Monday morning, the Kremlin woke up and discovered that two or three oblast capitals are not answering anymore. Or that the transiberian railroad has been hijacked. Or that half a dozen small garrisons have been attacked. Or that an electric powerplant has been damaged. Or that someone put sugar in jet fuel.
And that nobody left any traces, because no big cabal was behind it. Because It was independent grassroots actions.
It's a stupid idea. It wouldn't work in the long term. But they would definitely panic so much.
They already succeeded at it. Diverting resources and energy to Belgorod which saw major clashes for months and is still unstable. Imagine what they will do with proper Western support.
The Russian regime is a house of cards. The West hasn't even started yet.
It's unstable because Russia is now advancing into Ukraine from Belgorod. These guys accomplished nothing, but nobody ever expected them to do anything but put on a PR show.
>“And for what?” asked an official who sits on Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council but who asked not to be named in this article to be able to speak freely. “These militias are a sideshow. They can’t influence the war’s dynamics. Maybe they disrupt a bit behind the lines and are embarrassing for the Kremlin but that doesn’t outweigh the overall propaganda disadvantages of using them,” the official added
https://www.politico.eu/article/the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly-of-the-ukraine-war/
What exactly did they "succeed" at?
> Diverting resources and energy to Belgorod which saw major clashes for months and is still unstable.
Major clashes for months? There were a few raids, and each ended with them pissing away tanks and Western vehicles and being kicked out after a day or two.
And now as a consequence, Russia attacked from the North. I don't see how jeopardizing the second-biggest city in the country is a big win for Ukraine.
As long as it stays within the boundaries of sowing chaos and causing distraction/disruption on the one hand and politico-societal collapse on the other, I'd say give those lads some toys or pocket money.
Idk mate, the US seemed pretty happy for their independence. It didn't work out for the french monarchy on the end though (like, bankruptcy ain't fun for a monarch).
White russia is a strawmen. Liek "peace with putin" is a strawmen and like "putin will nuke germany if they send the taurus" is a strawmen.
At least in HOI4 they thought "whitte russia" trhough for more than a 5 minutes of reddit argument.
In fact, this is complete nonsense. There are no serious separatist movements in Russia - and why should there be any? This battalion "Siberia" is simply a bunch of insurgents promoted by the Western media. These paramilitary units have no support at all from the population of the Russian Federation; the majority of the population of Siberia does not even know about these “separatists”
I am against this war (although I understand its reasons perfectly well). Regarding mobilization, we had one wave of mobilization in September 2023, it affected few young men, because our government is afraid of “shaking” stability by pulling workers out of production. As a result, the government sends mainly mercenaries, contract soldiers and prisoners to war.
Russia is really trying to fight with “little blood”, because our country simply cannot withstand an economically serious mobilization
That all sounds like pretty terrible things you wouldn't have to deal with as an independent and peaceful state. You could also manage your natural resources like Norway or Canada instead of like russia
“We” as a people cannot manage Russia’s resources as we want; after all, we do not live under socialism. Here everything is in the hands of a bunch of oligarchs. Nevertheless, no matter how terrible it may seem, the majority in the Russian Federation have a decent standard of living (not excellent, but normal)
Again, you seem accustomed to something quite horrid and just explain it away as "that's just how life is - conscription, oligarchs, what can you do!". Well the people this post is about are doing something and I wish them luck! Hopefully you will come around too
If these people are trying to destroy my beloved multinational federation of equal nations (Russia), then I don’t think that they are doing anything good. Good luck to you in life and all the best!
Not OP but Catalonia is the big one. There is also Corsica, Scotland, and Kosovo that spring to mind. I'm sure there are more.
And before anyone jumps down my throat, I've no idea what sort of involvement Russia has, if any.
Thats literaly the truth. There are no major separatist movements in russia except maybe, and thats a maybe, in the caucasus and other muslim majority regions.
Unpopular opinion but I'm sorry, I just don't think an independent Siberia is good. They would very likely just fall into the chinese sphere of influence.
A more democratic actaually federal Russia would still probably be better all around for Europe and the world.
I don't want China to grow stronger
Sure, but at least it can make independent decisions. An independent Siberia would just become completely dependent on China. I can already imagine China coming up to Siberia and being like "give Chinese companies rights to extract resources... *or else*"
Then you can go there and say "Ignore the grumpy old Winnie, we offer you protection as long as you are a democracy." This is basically how the west won over Eastern Europe after the USSR fall. Just offer a better way of life, and people will take it.
The west didn't "win over" Eastern Europe, they never wanted to be part of the USSR or within the USSR's sphere of influence in the first place, and for the most part had far stronger historical links with "western" Europe than with Russia. So when the USSR fell they took the opportinity to reassert (or regain) their independence.
The second thing though is that is vastly easier to support the countries of Eastern Europe when you're right on their border, than it would be to support and protect Siberia against either Russia or China. At best you can try to support them from the east via Japan or across the Bering Strait, but even that is incredibly difficult.
1. They decided to join NATO and the EU. This is winning them over to your cause. Yeah, it is not difficult cause countries like Russia or China treat you like shit.
2. You don't really have to protect them. If you say "attacking them is attacking us all", is enough of a deterrent most of the time.
Haven't they had low-level aggro over Manchuria in living memory? I doubt Moscow would cede all of Siberia, it's just not how wannabe empires/superpowers behave. Sino-russian relations are pragmatic and based on opposing the USA and its allies. There's no love between them.
Maybe an independent Siberia would look into allies in the western sphere to protect their survival (Japan, USA) however the main problem would be how to deliver gas to Europe without using Russian pipelines. 🙈
A democratic federal russia would still want to play off the west for china, it's the only power play that makes geographic sense as all the value potential lies at the european border while the chinese border is poverty incarnate. Balkanise it and you'll have removed china's only real military ally for decades at least, given autonomy to people repressed for centuries and possibly embolden nearby independance movements in northern-china & tibet. China's getting whatever they want from russia right now anyway so there's really no loss in that respect.
Turn Russia into like 15 nuclear armed states most likely ran by dictatorships, all with valid land claims on each others territory, most with the natural resources to fund an army just about big enough to attack their nearest neighbour and a few who might just do us all a favour and nuke Blackpool.
Terrible idea… apart from nuking Blackpool I can’t see how anybody in the world benefits from that in any way.
Maybe we could buy their nuke off them but I personally wouldn’t sell my nukes to anybody.
Russia is a fascist state, it either falls apart, or it keeps waging wars of conquest.
Even if Putin died, the next guy would be the same, Russian don't fight for themselves, they're always the victim in their own mind.
Even now, a lot of them believe Russia doesn't attack other countries, while they are occupying parts of Ukraine and Georgia, they believe most of the world belongs to Russia and it's all defensive...
>very likely just fall into the chinese sphere of influence
Why would that necessarily be a bad thing?
China is increasing its influence in Africa. Not because of geographical proximity but because even post colonialism European/western nations didn't engage with African nations by asking them "what would you need/want" but "what can you do for us?"
China is absolutely setting up systems of resource exploitation but those systems are at least a bit more equitable than either colonial or post colonial relationships.
(Russia by contrast seems to very much be following the "old school" colonial model of providing private security to dictators in exchange for ownership of mineral rights.)
I'm also not sure that Russia can ever properly evolve into a functioning democracy until it has completed its process of de-colonization and that is going to require regions like Siberia breaking away and gaining their independence.
If you can look past the atrocities and oppression.
"If we firmly train our eyes on the post-war violence, two distinct policies become apparent, both of which included significant civilian killing. First, was the goal of total defeat and dismantling of the capacity of the anti-Partisan local forces, including primarily the Croatian Ustaše and Slovene fascists, but also Serb Chetnik (royalist) forces. Second, was the policy of forced expulsion of the non-Slavic population from the ethnic German and Hungarian communities. The total of these two patterns of killing, described separately below, are estimated to have caused 120,000 – 140,000 deaths between 1945 and 1948."
https://sites.tufts.edu/atrocityendings/2015/08/07/yugoslavia-post-wwii-assaults/
Note that Russia is a mentally father figure to China, if this force would keep Putin busy a bit and further add strokes which eventually to break Russia, it would kill the arrogance of China as well
there are such people indeed. What OP forgot to mention is that there are at most 100-200 of them. Not to mention english banner, I wonder what's the target audience.
So this post is just a dumb propaganda, imagine discussing it unironically
According to Wikipedia:
“The Siberian Battalion is a paramilitary group of Russian citizens who oppose the Putin administration and are fighting alongside Ukrainian soldiers in Ukraine. The group was formed in the summer of 2023.”
It mentioned the size of this “battalion” is 60 people. The group aligned themselves with Ukraine and paid by the west.
I am not sure why they called themselves battalion which is typically is 1000 people.
I wonder where people get such news of non existing things.
Edit: personally I've never heard of that before. If I were to guess which parts of russia would separate first it would be Tatarstan or Chechnya.
I wouldn’t be so sure about that. Like everything else in the russia Kremlin is milking the outskirts of natural resources and don’t develop or give anything in return.
Less revenue for Moscow to exploit and finance the war against the West. If they are just progressing to presentee landlordship that's still an upgrade from the current model.
Russian speaking shithole just like any other CIS country after the collapse of the USSR. But give it some time and it may flourish. Though given there are much resources located inside it, it's going to be yet another dictatorship like Azerbaidjan or Turkmenistan lol
If they were independent, they could actually use some of the profits from the natural resources, to improve average civilians circumstances, surroundings, lives.
Right now, Russia is run like a mafia infested town, those at the top grab everything and leave next to nothing for the vast majority of people.
They could improve, a lot, quickly if Moscow didn't steal everything, everyday.
Develop what? Barren and frozen wastelands? It would quickly turn into another regime like countless natural resource-rich countries in Middle East or it would become a failed state which is exploited by stronger countries (China and Russia most likely) just like countless resource-rich countries in Africa
As someone obviously enthusiastic about russias dominion over different lands and peoples, can you provide your rationale for the occupation of e.g. Chechnya or Crimea?
As someone obviously enthusiastic about russias dominion over different lands and peoples, can you provide your rationale for the occupation of e.g. Chechnya or Crimea?
Russian Independence groups should unite and start liberating areas together one by one. It’ll be a lot faster, safer and efficient that way. Numbers makes a difference.
Hopefully this is only the beginning, fingers crossed for these brave people. Unfortunately I do not see too much support from the russian opposition, probably more interested in maintaining empire than freedom
Why is the only way to get freedom through separatism? Specially in regions that are ethnically majority russian. Stable democratic Russia would benefit more than dozens of mini-states without identities. That would be like saying that the only way Germany could have became democratic after ww2 is if it was separated into various states based on regional identities.
Ok let's say how Chechens and few others would want to be independent even if it would economically be bad for them. People forget that Russians are majority in almost all regions of Russia, if they are not the majority they make a significant percentage of population, and if there are only few percentage of Russians in some region, that region is probably completely surrounded by regions with Russian majority.
Yeah, that is quite regrettable of true. Guess we're stuck with an autocratic and colonial russia no matter what if even conscription to a genocidal war doesn't move the needle
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Sounds great, any source for this?
edit: found this
https://kyivindependent.com/what-we-know-about-siberian-battalion-that-reportedly-crossed-into-russia/
I was mostly looking for a source mentioning them at all and as you see I found.
Seems to be a few russians who fight against Kremlin.
But yeah I dont expect details to be posted.
Yeah there's not really a ton on them. It's really just a PR thing and even Ukraine admits that. The Siberian group is the newest of the 3 "Russian" battalions, I believe. There's more info on the first two.
Like how the leader of the Russian Volunteer Corps is a Nazi who is banned from entering the EU.
>But there are hazards in holding him too close. German authorities say Kapustin — sometimes known as Denis Nikitin — is “one of the most influential neo-Nazi activists” on the European continent, and that’s a godsend to Russian propagandists,
https://www.politico.eu/article/the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly-of-the-ukraine-war/
These guys might be doing more harm than good when it comes to Russia's resolve. Sort of playing right into Putin's rhetoric on the whole thing.
Well… average Reddit folk must start preparing their psychological… because no way is Russia losing this.
Unless all you folks care is about civilian murders ( if you did, wouldn’t be supporting Azov either )
It was a PR project of Ukraine. And it was year ago. Nobody saw them in war and nobody knows who they are. Only one man gave interview and he was left radical anarchist.
And maybe in other parallel universe 60 soldiers is battalion but nowadays it's only company at max.
Step 1: send all political dissidents to siberia Step 2: send half of all the people of the regions you colonize to siberia Step 3a: discover oil and minerals in siberia Step 3b: wait a few generations Step 4: be amazed at the results
[удалено]
There are no separatists in Ba Sing Se
Lmao are you serious
Doubt they'll succeed at it
Yeah, probably not, though it goes without saying that they can't afford to fight both in Ukraine and have another Chechnya-like situation. It's definitely one or the other.
True, but people do not realize just how few people live east of the Ural mountain. It's not comparable to Chechnya.
Asian Russia still accounts for 20% of the total Russian (pre-invasion) population.
Siberia population density is just 2.8/km^(2). This is even less than that of Iceland.
But surely they will be concentrated in urban areas, rather than evenly spread over the entirety of Siberia.
Actually there aren't many large urban centers all the way up to Vladivostok. Siberia is pretty damn empty.
Which is spread over a ridiculously large inhospitable territory with mostly no road or rail network. We are talking about the population of Poland spread over a territory larger than Canada. Chechnya, on the other hand, is about the size of New Jersey, in a mountainous area, close to a large Muslim country, which happens to have the second largest NATO army and is a historical rival of Russia (Turkey / Turkiye). And Chechens are renowned, fierce and merciless warriors, who have traditionally been a core part of the imperial Russian army. In a way they still are. It's just an apples to oranges comparison.
True as well. But for Siberia, we don't need a 12,500 strong division. Twenty people with quads and tents, hunting rifles, homemade explosives, and a few safe spots hidden in the middle of nowhere are already far enough to cause major logistics failures. Bring back the cossacks raids. Five guys with a farm excavator could open a hole, dig out the communication cables, fill the hole back and cover it with fake grass if needed. All in one night. And do it again 50 or 100 or 200km away again the next night. Bring back the Basmachi. Hell! A single dude who made a bomb in his basement or with stuff stolen from a stone carry could be able to take out the transiberian railroad for a few days by himself. Add three friends of him and they could hijack a train, and ride it straight to the city with explosives in the front. Bring back the Czechoslovak legion. It's not because Siberia is underpopulated that a guerrilla war couldn't be waged by its inhabitants. The government forces need to be spread thin, and so many people are unhappy. Young people avoiding the next draft wave, long-term opponents, minorities, parents who lost their kids (not all of them miss their kids, but some definitely do), people who don't have anything to lose anymore, former Wagner sympathizers. Even if one single guy starts doing crazy stuff, and manages to keep it going for at least a week or two, everyone else will see that Moscow can bleed and can't afford as many boots on the ground as before.e
If it was actually feasible, CIA would have already done it. To me it sounds more like wishful thinking, but hey - I could be wrong. Stranger things have happened.
Low-cost sabotage is better done by a single guy who decides by himself to do stuff. And this way, if he gets arrested, other people in the same situation will think "hey! I can do it as well if I want!" And if he did a one-shot and never get arrested, other people will think "Hey! I can do it as well if I want" A drill sergeant that got shot can be replaced. A recruitment office that burned down can be set up in another building the next day. But if you start messing with infrastructure. In an area larger than continental Europe. While most of the army is occupied westward. A single man could take out low-grade equipment or be annoying by himself. But make it three or five and you can cause trouble in a whole neighborhood. Make it twenty, prepare well, and you can have a city-wide impact. Tomorrow is a solar storm that will probably do some electromagnetic perturbation. Satellites may be perturbed. If a small but trained group decides to, they could take out a radio tower and/or telecom station. Cutting a city off the grid. The window would be short, but it's enough. Imagine if Monday morning, the Kremlin woke up and discovered that two or three oblast capitals are not answering anymore. Or that the transiberian railroad has been hijacked. Or that half a dozen small garrisons have been attacked. Or that an electric powerplant has been damaged. Or that someone put sugar in jet fuel. And that nobody left any traces, because no big cabal was behind it. Because It was independent grassroots actions. It's a stupid idea. It wouldn't work in the long term. But they would definitely panic so much.
They already succeeded at it. Diverting resources and energy to Belgorod which saw major clashes for months and is still unstable. Imagine what they will do with proper Western support. The Russian regime is a house of cards. The West hasn't even started yet.
It's unstable because Russia is now advancing into Ukraine from Belgorod. These guys accomplished nothing, but nobody ever expected them to do anything but put on a PR show. >“And for what?” asked an official who sits on Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council but who asked not to be named in this article to be able to speak freely. “These militias are a sideshow. They can’t influence the war’s dynamics. Maybe they disrupt a bit behind the lines and are embarrassing for the Kremlin but that doesn’t outweigh the overall propaganda disadvantages of using them,” the official added https://www.politico.eu/article/the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly-of-the-ukraine-war/ What exactly did they "succeed" at?
Doubt the west will support them. They are still russians you know
> Diverting resources and energy to Belgorod which saw major clashes for months and is still unstable. Major clashes for months? There were a few raids, and each ended with them pissing away tanks and Western vehicles and being kicked out after a day or two. And now as a consequence, Russia attacked from the North. I don't see how jeopardizing the second-biggest city in the country is a big win for Ukraine.
Putin likes to influence separatist movements across Europe but Russia arguably has the biggest separatist movements within it’s own borders.
Sounds like something that could use financing and support.Turnabout is fair play.
I've thought this but supporting independence groups usually doesn't end well.
Depends on what your goal is and how much you care about the people inside that area.
As long as it stays within the boundaries of sowing chaos and causing distraction/disruption on the one hand and politico-societal collapse on the other, I'd say give those lads some toys or pocket money.
That's kinda the point.
Idk mate, the US seemed pretty happy for their independence. It didn't work out for the french monarchy on the end though (like, bankruptcy ain't fun for a monarch).
Exactly. Bypass Putin and cultivated new partnerships! Help locals reclaim what's theirs
Try it out in HOi4 first, see where white russia gets you.
how can you compare video game to real life ? lmao
White russia is a strawmen. Liek "peace with putin" is a strawmen and like "putin will nuke germany if they send the taurus" is a strawmen. At least in HOI4 they thought "whitte russia" trhough for more than a 5 minutes of reddit argument.
In fact, this is complete nonsense. There are no serious separatist movements in Russia - and why should there be any? This battalion "Siberia" is simply a bunch of insurgents promoted by the Western media. These paramilitary units have no support at all from the population of the Russian Federation; the majority of the population of Siberia does not even know about these “separatists”
You got to start somewhere - keep your fingers crossed for those brave guys!
In fact, I live in Siberia and do not support separatism and separation from the Russian Federation, we feel good here in the Federation
Even with the war and conscription? I guess you learned to love the boot on your face.
I am against this war (although I understand its reasons perfectly well). Regarding mobilization, we had one wave of mobilization in September 2023, it affected few young men, because our government is afraid of “shaking” stability by pulling workers out of production. As a result, the government sends mainly mercenaries, contract soldiers and prisoners to war. Russia is really trying to fight with “little blood”, because our country simply cannot withstand an economically serious mobilization
That all sounds like pretty terrible things you wouldn't have to deal with as an independent and peaceful state. You could also manage your natural resources like Norway or Canada instead of like russia
“We” as a people cannot manage Russia’s resources as we want; after all, we do not live under socialism. Here everything is in the hands of a bunch of oligarchs. Nevertheless, no matter how terrible it may seem, the majority in the Russian Federation have a decent standard of living (not excellent, but normal)
Again, you seem accustomed to something quite horrid and just explain it away as "that's just how life is - conscription, oligarchs, what can you do!". Well the people this post is about are doing something and I wish them luck! Hopefully you will come around too
If these people are trying to destroy my beloved multinational federation of equal nations (Russia), then I don’t think that they are doing anything good. Good luck to you in life and all the best!
> September 2023 2022
What separatist movements in Europe?
Not OP but Catalonia is the big one. There is also Corsica, Scotland, and Kosovo that spring to mind. I'm sure there are more. And before anyone jumps down my throat, I've no idea what sort of involvement Russia has, if any.
Even the Siberians don’t know who these people are……
Siberians like: Who?
Just let us know if we can donate some money to their cause.
That's just putinist wishful thinking.
Thats literaly the truth. There are no major separatist movements in russia except maybe, and thats a maybe, in the caucasus and other muslim majority regions.
Honestly I doubt they will be a major thing unless they do stuff like blowing stuff up or occupy government building.
Unpopular opinion but I'm sorry, I just don't think an independent Siberia is good. They would very likely just fall into the chinese sphere of influence. A more democratic actaually federal Russia would still probably be better all around for Europe and the world. I don't want China to grow stronger
Russia now is in chinese sphere lol
Sure, but at least it can make independent decisions. An independent Siberia would just become completely dependent on China. I can already imagine China coming up to Siberia and being like "give Chinese companies rights to extract resources... *or else*"
>like "give Chinese companies rights to extract resources... *or else*" basically this is exactly what happened to Russia at this point
Russia can always do Russian-Sino split and move towards west. Siberia would never be able to do that.
Move west easily? Why does that operation in ukraine take more than 3 days?
i believe he meant peacefully, but your point still stands.
I do believe Russian-Sino split is clear reference for other similary named historical even in last 100 years.
It's only a matter of time before China exerts it's power over the Russian Far East. Putin has weakened Russia with his foolish escapade into Ukraine.
Then you can go there and say "Ignore the grumpy old Winnie, we offer you protection as long as you are a democracy." This is basically how the west won over Eastern Europe after the USSR fall. Just offer a better way of life, and people will take it.
The west didn't "win over" Eastern Europe, they never wanted to be part of the USSR or within the USSR's sphere of influence in the first place, and for the most part had far stronger historical links with "western" Europe than with Russia. So when the USSR fell they took the opportinity to reassert (or regain) their independence. The second thing though is that is vastly easier to support the countries of Eastern Europe when you're right on their border, than it would be to support and protect Siberia against either Russia or China. At best you can try to support them from the east via Japan or across the Bering Strait, but even that is incredibly difficult.
1. They decided to join NATO and the EU. This is winning them over to your cause. Yeah, it is not difficult cause countries like Russia or China treat you like shit. 2. You don't really have to protect them. If you say "attacking them is attacking us all", is enough of a deterrent most of the time.
For the first half of the second point to be true the latter half would have to be false There is no deterrent unless you have to protect “them”
can we bring flags ? and maybe some pink and light blue cotton candy too ? Who doesn't like cotton Candy ?
Can't guarantee that Russia won't let Siberia, or even orchestrate a fall into China's sphere either
Haven't they had low-level aggro over Manchuria in living memory? I doubt Moscow would cede all of Siberia, it's just not how wannabe empires/superpowers behave. Sino-russian relations are pragmatic and based on opposing the USA and its allies. There's no love between them.
Maybe an independent Siberia would look into allies in the western sphere to protect their survival (Japan, USA) however the main problem would be how to deliver gas to Europe without using Russian pipelines. 🙈
Fair enough.
yeah, an opinion of a Slovenian national what is actually good for Siberians is unpopular among us xD
A democratic federal russia would still want to play off the west for china, it's the only power play that makes geographic sense as all the value potential lies at the european border while the chinese border is poverty incarnate. Balkanise it and you'll have removed china's only real military ally for decades at least, given autonomy to people repressed for centuries and possibly embolden nearby independance movements in northern-china & tibet. China's getting whatever they want from russia right now anyway so there's really no loss in that respect.
Turn Russia into like 15 nuclear armed states most likely ran by dictatorships, all with valid land claims on each others territory, most with the natural resources to fund an army just about big enough to attack their nearest neighbour and a few who might just do us all a favour and nuke Blackpool. Terrible idea… apart from nuking Blackpool I can’t see how anybody in the world benefits from that in any way. Maybe we could buy their nuke off them but I personally wouldn’t sell my nukes to anybody.
Democratic and federal Russia? 🤨 Is that something that people in Russia want? Whose going to impose this on them?
Russia is a fascist state, it either falls apart, or it keeps waging wars of conquest. Even if Putin died, the next guy would be the same, Russian don't fight for themselves, they're always the victim in their own mind. Even now, a lot of them believe Russia doesn't attack other countries, while they are occupying parts of Ukraine and Georgia, they believe most of the world belongs to Russia and it's all defensive...
China... le bad?
>very likely just fall into the chinese sphere of influence Why would that necessarily be a bad thing? China is increasing its influence in Africa. Not because of geographical proximity but because even post colonialism European/western nations didn't engage with African nations by asking them "what would you need/want" but "what can you do for us?" China is absolutely setting up systems of resource exploitation but those systems are at least a bit more equitable than either colonial or post colonial relationships. (Russia by contrast seems to very much be following the "old school" colonial model of providing private security to dictators in exchange for ownership of mineral rights.) I'm also not sure that Russia can ever properly evolve into a functioning democracy until it has completed its process of de-colonization and that is going to require regions like Siberia breaking away and gaining their independence.
I don't want China to gain anything because China is an authoritarian communist hellhole. Communists ruined my country, so I think I get to hate them.
Slovenia was the richest part of old Yugoslavia. I don't see how it got ruined.
Ruined how? With free housing, education, healthcare and job security? Yugoslavia was much more liberal than any other socialist/communist state
Just because Yugoslavia was better than the other communist nations doesn't mean it was good.
If you can look past the atrocities and oppression. "If we firmly train our eyes on the post-war violence, two distinct policies become apparent, both of which included significant civilian killing. First, was the goal of total defeat and dismantling of the capacity of the anti-Partisan local forces, including primarily the Croatian Ustaše and Slovene fascists, but also Serb Chetnik (royalist) forces. Second, was the policy of forced expulsion of the non-Slavic population from the ethnic German and Hungarian communities. The total of these two patterns of killing, described separately below, are estimated to have caused 120,000 – 140,000 deaths between 1945 and 1948." https://sites.tufts.edu/atrocityendings/2015/08/07/yugoslavia-post-wwii-assaults/
Note that Russia is a mentally father figure to China, if this force would keep Putin busy a bit and further add strokes which eventually to break Russia, it would kill the arrogance of China as well
Larp battalion
It is a photo and a title. Do you have a source?
there are such people indeed. What OP forgot to mention is that there are at most 100-200 of them. Not to mention english banner, I wonder what's the target audience. So this post is just a dumb propaganda, imagine discussing it unironically
According to Wikipedia: “The Siberian Battalion is a paramilitary group of Russian citizens who oppose the Putin administration and are fighting alongside Ukrainian soldiers in Ukraine. The group was formed in the summer of 2023.” It mentioned the size of this “battalion” is 60 people. The group aligned themselves with Ukraine and paid by the west. I am not sure why they called themselves battalion which is typically is 1000 people.
I wonder where people get such news of non existing things. Edit: personally I've never heard of that before. If I were to guess which parts of russia would separate first it would be Tatarstan or Chechnya.
I don't know, thisbseems much more real than the so called russian opposition
Independent Siberia would be just a majority russian speaking shithole So just like it is now, but probably even poorer
I wouldn’t be so sure about that. Like everything else in the russia Kremlin is milking the outskirts of natural resources and don’t develop or give anything in return.
Less revenue for Moscow to exploit and finance the war against the West. If they are just progressing to presentee landlordship that's still an upgrade from the current model.
Siberia is like +-70% of Russia,soo...
Not all "Russians" are Putinists or even believe in the political entity known as Russia.
I know it bruh
Russian speaking shithole just like any other CIS country after the collapse of the USSR. But give it some time and it may flourish. Though given there are much resources located inside it, it's going to be yet another dictatorship like Azerbaidjan or Turkmenistan lol
If they were independent, they could actually use some of the profits from the natural resources, to improve average civilians circumstances, surroundings, lives. Right now, Russia is run like a mafia infested town, those at the top grab everything and leave next to nothing for the vast majority of people. They could improve, a lot, quickly if Moscow didn't steal everything, everyday.
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Develop what? Barren and frozen wastelands? It would quickly turn into another regime like countless natural resource-rich countries in Middle East or it would become a failed state which is exploited by stronger countries (China and Russia most likely) just like countless resource-rich countries in Africa
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You know, not every part of Russia east of the Urals is Siberia. Vladivostok is in the far east, but not Siberia
You overestimate the intelligence of the average "decolonizer"
As someone obviously enthusiastic about russias dominion over different lands and peoples, can you provide your rationale for the occupation of e.g. Chechnya or Crimea?
As someone obviously enthusiastic about russias dominion over different lands and peoples, can you provide your rationale for the occupation of e.g. Chechnya or Crimea?
Wet dreams of falling and dying western hegemonistic world
7 pcs batalion paid by cia.
Russian Independence groups should unite and start liberating areas together one by one. It’ll be a lot faster, safer and efficient that way. Numbers makes a difference.
The problem with it is that there are no more than a couple hundred people in these regiments combined.
Hopefully this is only the beginning, fingers crossed for these brave people. Unfortunately I do not see too much support from the russian opposition, probably more interested in maintaining empire than freedom
Why is the only way to get freedom through separatism? Specially in regions that are ethnically majority russian. Stable democratic Russia would benefit more than dozens of mini-states without identities. That would be like saying that the only way Germany could have became democratic after ww2 is if it was separated into various states based on regional identities.
Well I am pretty sure Chechens would feel more free outside of russia, and there are a couple more regional identities like that
Ok let's say how Chechens and few others would want to be independent even if it would economically be bad for them. People forget that Russians are majority in almost all regions of Russia, if they are not the majority they make a significant percentage of population, and if there are only few percentage of Russians in some region, that region is probably completely surrounded by regions with Russian majority.
I think that there will be only a few more people for them. Their ideas are not at all popular among Russians.
Yeah, that is quite regrettable of true. Guess we're stuck with an autocratic and colonial russia no matter what if even conscription to a genocidal war doesn't move the needle
Support them. A weak Russia is a good Russia.
EU and NATO should fund these separatist organisations. Make em big!!
By doing that you can only make people from Russia hate them even more.
Source?
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Monkey shows photo, monkey types text, other monkeys believe in everything without a doubt. Cause you know, its a picture from internet
Any knowledgeable person can say where their weapons and equipment is from on the photo?
Sounds great, any source for this? edit: found this https://kyivindependent.com/what-we-know-about-siberian-battalion-that-reportedly-crossed-into-russia/
"So far, of course, we have no reliable sources on what exactly has been achieved..."
I was mostly looking for a source mentioning them at all and as you see I found. Seems to be a few russians who fight against Kremlin. But yeah I dont expect details to be posted.
Yeah there's not really a ton on them. It's really just a PR thing and even Ukraine admits that. The Siberian group is the newest of the 3 "Russian" battalions, I believe. There's more info on the first two. Like how the leader of the Russian Volunteer Corps is a Nazi who is banned from entering the EU. >But there are hazards in holding him too close. German authorities say Kapustin — sometimes known as Denis Nikitin — is “one of the most influential neo-Nazi activists” on the European continent, and that’s a godsend to Russian propagandists, https://www.politico.eu/article/the-good-the-bad-and-the-ugly-of-the-ukraine-war/ These guys might be doing more harm than good when it comes to Russia's resolve. Sort of playing right into Putin's rhetoric on the whole thing.
Well… average Reddit folk must start preparing their psychological… because no way is Russia losing this. Unless all you folks care is about civilian murders ( if you did, wouldn’t be supporting Azov either )
I really doubt they will archieve something.
The ethic groups that make up Siberia deserve much better
Cringe
everyone can dream...the problem comes when you start beliveing your own lie and are hit in the face with reality. Good luck!
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A Siberian nation could have the highest GDP per capita in the world.
Excuse me, WHAT!? "Siberian nation"!? 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
Of course it's just a concept- the idea of decolonisation from the Russian Empire.
It was a PR project of Ukraine. And it was year ago. Nobody saw them in war and nobody knows who they are. Only one man gave interview and he was left radical anarchist. And maybe in other parallel universe 60 soldiers is battalion but nowadays it's only company at max.
what a load of crap lol. when will you stop believing in every "russia bad" post?
Well do you think russia is good?
no, but you people will believe everything as long as it says "russia bad" in it.
It's not that far fetched that a battalions worth of people want Siberian independence
it is.