Horrendous
- The West is hardly seen as a trustworthy partner by anyone outside the West. You can check with the Kurds, South Vietnamese on that.
- With all genuine respect and sympathy to the Ukrainians, Western outrage always seems incredibly selective. It frankly raises some seriously uncomfortable questions at least in my mind but thereās no point bringing them up lest I be accused of whataboutery.
- Outside the West maybe this is seen as just another European war?
- The West is no bulwark against tyranny. You can ask @Iftikhar . In 1971 when the Pakistanis were committing genocide against the East Pakistanis i.e. Bangladeshis, the US sent an armada to the Bay of Bengal to prevent the Indians from getting involved on tje side of the soon to be Bangladesh. It was the Soviets who warned the Americans away.
- I personally find America super hypocritical. Two decades ago, America shamefacedly invaded Iraq on absolute rubbish pretexts much like Russia has done. The administration then was roundly criticised and later elected out but that doesnāt change the actions of the nation on a global scene. Joe Biden voted in favour of allowing action in Iraq!! Just look at all the shit heās spouting from that context, the puffed up popinjay.
- The hypocrisy doesnāt end there. Under one American regime Iran was sanctioned to the hilt and just a couple of years later when Iranās oil is needed itās being welcomed back. What has changed in Iranās polity? Nothing.
The Eurocentrist view is alive and kicking, blind to its own faults and very quick to judge the Other.
And in geopolitics every nation looks after its own interests all the time. If it didnāt suit the West it wouldnāt criticize Russia.
EDIT: Just in case anyone wants to devote 10 mins to see a different perspective. See below.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CaxY7YKIayn/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=embed_video_watch_again
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ja60QIYNXvI
US: Letās sanction Russia!
China: Not interested
US: F U China. Be careful you māfers
India: Not interested
US: F U India. You will be next you māfers
Turkey: Not interested
US: ā¦ NATO countries are more united than ever!
They really are alike. One of their most prominent MP, who happens to live in one of the most affluent and expensive Athenian suburbs, was on the TV a few days ago saying how she couldnāt stand hearing the words āNATO territoryā.
I get the criticism of the West and the US. I donāt agree on some aspects but I understand. At the same time, there are two aspects. Moral and strategic.
Intrinsically I would have thought Indians would be against colonialism. Why should the logic be, the US can be arseholes why canāt Russia ? Why not denounce both ? You spoke about the west being hypocritical, but isnāt India ?
Why hitch yourself to Russia as an ally? Falling on the same side as China and Pakistan? Surely they are less reliable, surely ? I naively thought relationship was strong with the West. We have lots of migration, lots of trade, lots of aid and embracing of culture.
If China or Pakistan attacked India. Would you anticipate support from Russia ? Would you anticipate western countries turning a blind eye ?
I am not being critical, genuinely interested in understanding a different perspective.
From my perspective it appears India is aligning with a madman. A pariah state. It appears short term benefit (or distrust/hatred of US) is clouding long term judgement.
Some interesting comments on Twitter about how these Russians only seems to recognize the use of force (here UKraine resisting) as a basis for existence and identity.
Nevertheless interesting to see this on Russian state TV.
Just to preface this discussion so no one gets the wrong idea. I respect @ISMF and my opinions are not stated out of any anger at all but just to offer a different perspective. Even if you donāt agree thatās fine but as a request take 5minutes to think about it just for the sake of getting out of the vicious cycle of emotive pulpits that we as a species have found ourselves in.
To come to your points @ISMF .
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Colonialism has a racial angle which is evident. This is my reading of history but Indians didnāt have an issue with the Brits ruling the country until the institutionalised racism of the Raj became apparent. The Indian freedom fightersā initial demands were to become full fledged citizens of the British Empire not outright independance. So I wonāt speak for all descendants of tje formerly colonized but I donāt see a colonial angle in this invasion.
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Again my points were not whataboutery. Putin is clearly the asshole. I was trying to show that outside the West both America and Russia could appear as two sides of the same coin.
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As far as the Indian position goes, Iām not a bureacrat but it seems to be based more on realpolitik than sentiments of loyalty. Russia supplies a majority of Indian arms. Until recently America supplied itās best armament to Pakistan and itās old stuff to India.
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As far as Pakistan goes, India spent decades shouting from the rooftops about Pakistani complicity in terrorism. But the Wests response was always that loss of innocent lives was regrettable but that it was an issue between neighbours. Wellā¦you can see how that applies here.
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Also on Pakistan, for ages the only major power to show any sort of explicit support on the Pakistan issue was Russia. Only recrntly since Macron came to power has France become explicit in its support. So thatās not really a consideration.
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If China or Pakistan attacks India I suspect only Israel would aid India
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To your original point on where does the Indian public stand. You can see some of the live streams of Indian news channels. The support is fully and whole heartedly for Ukraine. Ukrainians are brought on as guest speakers. The resistance is reported with delight. But the war is still too far away and India is too big and complex to care enough to come out into the streets in supoort.
I can guarantee that the Indian position on the war wonāt change unless chemical weapons or nukes are used.
Thanks for putting out the alternative perspective. I realise quite emotive and also why you might be cautious to share it. I respect that you did 
Itās one of the good aspects of the forum that it touches all around the world.
I feel these two quotes address the roots of all confusions or contradictions. While the western world may very well be perturbed with the ethnic cleansing of Rohingya or the continued civil war in Yemen, their actions are determined by strategic benefits.
India is rather caught in the middle here. They canāt afford to alienate Russia as the Indo-Soviet partnership is a long standing one including mainly defense deals but also in other areas. For example, The largest steel manufacturing plants in India came with Soviet assistance and thatās one example alone.
Quoting from an article -
Soviet-aided projects now provide 35 per cent of Indian steel, 60 per cent of domestic oil production, roughly half of the countryās oil refining capacity, 20 per cent of the total electricity generated, and a projected 40 per cent of domestic coal production. This degree of involvement by one country in developing the economy of the worldās 10th largest industrial power is probably Without parallel or precedent.
This was from the time that India was pretty much isolated during the cold war. The US saw it fit to enable radical Islamist terrorists in Pakistan as a means of fighting the soviets in Afghanistan. Also, None of the Soviet help came with terms attached. As opposed to US Aid, when the majority of the āAidā given by the US invariably goes back to the pockets of their own contractors and other strings attached to that aid as well.
Iām uneasy personally on any relations with China as thereās definitely a trust deficit when it comes to the Chinese Govt. Iām not in favour of India joining QUAD as history has often shown that America would rather let their allies face the brunt in the eventuality of any conflict than get involved directly.
I can only speak for myself that I find Russiaās invasion of Ukraine abhorrent and that Putin needs to be kept in check. But it would be naive to say that the West (NATO + EU) havenāt have their share of blame for this to escalate so far.
But the majority view in India seems to be that Russia has been pushed to a corner due to the steps or the mistakes taken by the US and their allies (EU) in the past. There could have been greater engagement with Russia. I donāt see why US continued to expand NATO after the dismantling of the Soviet Union. This is simply not Russia or Putin making a decision all of a sudden to invade Ukraine. There are so many events prior which has led to this happening. I do realize that there would be a lot of people who would say that the EU has pandered to Russia enough. Fair enough, Thatās their perspective.
Oneās news is the otherās propaganda. Itās always been the case. I donāt even take Indian news as face value given how much the news has been skewed mostly for political interests. When thereās a labelling of any news coming from Russia as propaganda and restriction of those news and only news coming from Ukraine is allowed, It becomes really difficult for someone like me who likes to look at both sides version before really coming to a conclusion.
I agree with what @Muad says
And on this, Weāve repeatedly seen that whichever Party comes to power in the US , the foreign policy of US, the war mongering, the bullying of nations , regime changes etc etc donāt really stop. I think thereās a huge difference between whatās called āleftist policiesā in the US and what is generally referred to as āleftist policiesā in places like India for example.
I think India , if Modiās ego allows it and he stops himself from his continuous election campaigning etc etc can play a role to get Russia to the negotiation table. So can China in this case, The more India and China continue to trade with Russia , the more Russia would have to listen to them.
The stupidity is that the very people they prop up in Pakistan are the ones sponsoring the terrorist attacksā¦
I do think there is a visceral effect that comes from being directly adjacent to the conflict. It is one thing to see photos of refugee camps filled with Syrians or Rohingya, and another to see the Syrian family straggling over the border to safety. For Europe, most of their experience has been the former, Ukraine is millions of the latter.
One of the things I have been amazed and touched to see here in Canada is how passionately our new Syrian community have responded to the plight of Ukrainians. Most donāt have a great deal of extra income, having been here less than a decade, and many quite a bit less than that. But the local Ukrainian church has reported they have a steady supply of Syrian-Canadian volunteers coming to help however they can, because they remember in a way the rest of us donāt.
Coming to the point about the media and the reporting. Thereās a Ukrainian social media outlet which posted that only 100 missiles were dropped in Syria in 5 years as opposed to 1000+ missiles on Ukraine.
There is so much wrong with the post beginning with trivializing the sufferings of the Syrians being one major thing. Needless to say that the information being posted is wrong. I donāt even want to go into the double standards on the reporting of the war here with respect to the attacks on Syria/Yemen. These are the kind of posts which donāt make me believe quite a lot of claims that easily. Thereās only the Ukraine perspective being shown here.
With Macron seemingly being able to maintain dialogue with Putin better than other Western leaders is anyone in France uncomfortable with the supposedly close relationship they have?
I think part of the issue is Ukraine is (quite reasonably) very peeved that more support is not coming from Europe.