Putin wouldn't have been able to occupy the Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine if he invaded out of the blue, there would be a massive insurgency, let alone justify the necessity of the invasion to the people he depends on to remain in power if there hadn't been a coup.
But yes, Putin would never have come to power and former USSR countries wouldn't have a problem with right-wing nationalists if we hadn't supported Yeltsin's coup and then intentionally immiserated the population during the 90s.
It's crazy that they protested to allow covid, instead of to make Shanghai comply with zero covid and stop incubating and reinfecting the rest of the country.
Taken from another post:
Covid cases from March-April 2022.
Blue line: Shanghai, orange line: Shenzhen
Shanghai: population 24.87M, density ~4000/sqkm, Western-style lockdown
Shenzhen: population 17.56M, density ~7000/sqkm, Zero Covid lockdown
By December 2022, the entire national Zero Covid policy had to be abandoned. Because one city refused to comply with the national policy.
And with VP, Eric Trump, the republicans don't stand a chance! Surely this time the moderate republicans will vote democrat. And the dem base has to vote for the lesser evil, so that means 99% of Americans will vote democrat!
I can't source the motivations of the HK police, but their taking cautions to avoid the appearance of police brutality should be evident from comparing the HK protests to the police response to BLM in America or the Chilean protests around that time.
But I specifically remember multiple pictures of HK cops engulfed in fire after getting hit directly. Maybe they all lived, but it seems more likely we wouldn't know due to there being no reason for western media to promote them.
At least a quarter of the population was on streets on certain days.
That seems unlikely.
In any case, the HK situation was complicated in the way the Chinese government took extreme cautions not to appear brutal, even when protesters murdered several cops and counter-protesters, while protestors took measures to appeal to foreign audiences to further exploit that.
This dynamic doesn't apply outside of Hong Kong, I can't carry around a sign in chinese in hope that the US fears looking bad to China.
The Chilean protests around that time are much more applicable because the videos coming out weren't designed to appeal to western audiences so they tend to showcase more effective tactics than "bring a $100+ dollar leafblower or have 10 people choreograph a cute routine involving traffic cones", such as "bring a large jug of water, people need water, and you can put tear gas in it." and "use rocks to break up and move police out of an area"
While there's nothing dangerously inaccurate here, these HK protester situation isn't applicable outside of HK, US cops don't use kiddy gloves like the HK police did. See 2020.
I don't see any country being able to engineer coups by supporting terrorists as effectively as the US, so I don't see Russia or other local powers replacing the US's influence in countries where the left presents a meaningful alternative to neoliberalism.
The OG coup happened under the Obama admin, the far-right were forced into government under Trump pt I, Ukraine was forced to sell off state assets and take billions in loans by the Biden admin, and now the US is preparing to pick the bones clean over the next decades.
It's nice that yall are recognizing that the US isn't there to help the Ukrainian people now, but we're all gonna repeat this next war.
The Mujaheddin did need help, they needed weapons, bombs, intelligence, diplomatic support, booby traps specifically procured by the CIA. The US provided it.
And then back home, they used their contacts in the media to make sure everyone knew that the Mujaheddin were the good guys worthy of America's support, even if they were not officially receiving it. Americans, Mujaheddin, and Soviets all understood the US supported the Mujaheddin, even if there was a layer of plausible deniability. It's why the Soviets asked the US to stop the attacks on Soviet soldiers during the pullout and not Pakistan.
The american people were told to see the Mujaheddin as their ally, and the Mujaheddin understood it was the US supporting them.
The CIA using the ISI to transport some weapons and train soldiers isn't "this ISI did everything therefore the Mujahedin weren't supported by the US", it's "the ISI were a tool of the CIA", the operation was run out of Washington. It had US media providing glowing coverage of the Mujahedin as they committed war crimes.
Putin wouldn't have been able to occupy the Russian-speaking parts of Ukraine if he invaded out of the blue, there would be a massive insurgency, let alone justify the necessity of the invasion to the people he depends on to remain in power if there hadn't been a coup.
But yes, Putin would never have come to power and former USSR countries wouldn't have a problem with right-wing nationalists if we hadn't supported Yeltsin's coup and then intentionally immiserated the population during the 90s.