As the Republican Party’s blockade of aid to Ukraine drags on, Pres. Joe Biden has found a new way to give Ukraine’s forces the weapons they need to defend their country.

As the Republican Party’s blockade of aid to Ukraine drags into its fourth month, the U.S. government under Pres. Joe Biden has found a clever new way to give Ukraine’s forces the weapons and ammunition they need to defend their country.

It is, in essence, an American version of Germany’s circular weapons trade—the so-called Ringtausch. The United States is gifting older surplus weapons to Greece with the understanding that Greece donates to Ukraine some of its own surplus weapons.

Greek media broke the news last week. According to the newspaper Kathimerini and other media, the Biden administration offered the Greek government three 87-foot Protector-class patrol boats, two Lockheed Martin C-130H airlifters, 10 Allison T56 turboprop engines for Lockheed P-3 patrol planes plus 60 M-2 Bradley fighting vehicles and a consignment of transport trucks.

All this hardware is U.S. military surplus—and is available to Greece, free of charge, under a U.S. legal authority called “excess defense articles.” Federal law allows an American president to declare military systems surplus to need, assign them a value—potentially zero dollars—and give them away on the condition that the recipient transport them.

    • ForestOrca@kbin.social
      8128·
      9 months ago

      Pro-any other country than your own, and that you were elected to serve is traitorous. I’m not big on nation-states and all that stuff personally. And these folks very much are, so by their own definitions they are traitors. I am kind of amused by Sister City agreements, where cities share solutions, without any way to force the other to comply. It’s down right friendly anarchism.

      • Zron@lemmy.world
        504·
        9 months ago

        Did you forget to take some meds or something? This is incomprehensible.

        • Danquebec@sh.itjust.works
          19·
          9 months ago

          The first 3 sentences are actually coherent. The last 2 too. But the first 3 don’t belong with the last 2. It’s like they’re 2 different posts.

          • vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.works
            11·
            9 months ago

            Calling it a schitzo-post may have been a bit off, but I legit have no other words in my vocabulary to describe how weirdly off kilter their comment is. They went from some type of criticism of elected officials working with other countries only to skip over to an entirely different thing about sister city agreements. It just kinda is bizzare overall.

            Though I sometimes pull the same shit, sleep deprivation and autism are a terrible combination when it comes to coherence.

            • barsoap@lemm.ee
              3·
              9 months ago

              Schizo stuff tends to be coherent, it’s just that it’s coherent in a frame of reference that exactly one person in the world gets. On the far end of the spectrum people just don’t have enough computation capacity to take your frame of reference into account – not because of lower capacity, but because there’s too much shit on their plate at the same time: Effort is focussed on keeping one’s own thoughts at least half-way straight while the external world is secondary. Whereas on the functioning (yes I’m going to use that word) end of the spectrum you probably learn somewhere in school age that you need to slow your mind down and sprinkle in a couple of useful metaphors so the normies can understand. Dunno if my subconscious is less bubbly than that of full-on schizophrenics, or I have natural talent processing things better, or a knack acquired by sheer luck, or just better at not giving a fuck about some things, but it’s definitely also a skill that can and absolutely should be honed.

              For the curious, the EASE scale should give a good impression of how it looks from the inside.

        • Cosmic Cleric@lemmy.world
          151·
          9 months ago

          Fuck the republican traitor filth.

          Pro-any other country than your own, and that you were elected to serve is traitorous. I’m not big on nation-states and all that stuff personally. And these folks very much are, so by their own definitions they are traitors. I am kind of amused by Sister City agreements, where cities share solutions, without any way to force the other to comply. It’s down right friendly anarchism.

          Looks like schizo-posting is back on the menu!

          That’s got to be a bad AI bot in training, right?

  • Ekybio@lemmy.world
    1959·
    9 months ago

    Biden: Does something good again

    Repblicans, unable to stop him: “Sorry Putin, we failed you. This time.”

    • SeaJ@lemm.ee
      431·
      9 months ago

      Technically Reagan did use an ally first: Israel. The Iranians were a little pissed when they saw the Israeli customs stamps on their weapons.

      • TigrisMorte@kbin.social
        8·
        9 months ago

        The middle men, so to speak. But not really the same, though in the same dodge the issue situation. The biggest difference being Reagan sent weapons illegally via a known declared enemy.

  • FlowVoid@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1173·
    9 months ago

    Great news!

    Apropos nothing:

    The Republicans are falling in line with disgraced ex-president Donald Trump’s personal hatred of Ukraine—and equally personal fondness for authoritarian Russia. The Republicans’ allegiance to Trump—and therefore to dictators and military aggressors—wasn’t an issue for Ukraine until they narrowly gained control of the U.S. House of Representatives in the November 2022 elections. When earlier funding for Ukraine ran out in late December, Rep. Mike Johnson—the extremist House speaker—refused to put additional aid to a vote.

    The direct language is a pleasant surprise, and honestly more than I expected from FORBES. Have they always been this willing to call out Trump and his enablers?

  • ThePowerOfGeek@lemmy.worldEnglish
    993·
    9 months ago

    Remember when Republicans used to yell “better dead than red!” to show their hostility to the USSR and communism?

    Now too many of them are preoccupied with twerking for the authoritarian roach that emerged from the USSR’s corpse (and which still has a lot in common with it).

    Also, the Republican party is now the red party, which is pretty funny.

    • SuddenDownpour@sh.itjust.works
      343·
      9 months ago

      Nothing surprising for everyone who already knew that what they disliked about the USSR wasn’t really the totalitarianism, just the lower wealth unequality.

      • oatscoop@midwest.socialEnglish
        161·
        9 months ago

        More so that sort loved the USSR: it provided the ultimate boogyman they could use to justify just about anything.

        Accuse your political foes of being commies, and “investigate” them. Advance Christian nationalism by pointing at the “godless Soviets”. Need to get your political donors want some sweet defense contracts? – well we need weapons to fight the reds.

        The USSR did the same thing with the “decadent west”.

    • mochisuki@lemmy.world
      311·
      9 months ago

      And just as it was back then, the red menace was ALWAYS about distracting the masses away from voting against corporate interests

    • Wrrzag@lemmy.ml
      1·
      9 months ago

      I don’t get what’s strange about this. They didn’t like commies, Russia is no longer even calling itself socialist, so why would they still be hostile to the Russians?

      • jaemo@sh.itjust.works
        39·
        9 months ago

        Then I’d call you a complete liar with a weak grasp on reality, and a poor understanding of where and when you ought to open your ill-informed mouth, before I walked off and continued with my day, secure in the knowledge that you’re as wrong about something as it’s physically possible to be.

        That’s what.

          • LarmyOfLone@lemm.ee
            25·
            9 months ago

            It’s almost comical to see “leftists” scream about the lies that Trump and GOP tell - but if you suggest there was a diplomatic solution they explode immediately lol. War propaganda is working incredibly well these days and any pacifist notion is attacked as subversive and downvoted. Vast majority of millennials and gen Z are just as brainwashed and are murderous war mongers the boomers were.

            PS: I’m really missing a fitting word for this. They are not fascists and nationalists or imperialists is too weak. War mongers sounds a bit lame too.

            • CableMonster@lemmy.ml
              28·
              9 months ago

              I think millenials and older know about how the left used to be the party of peace and the right was the war mongers. Now some of the rights is still warmongers but the left is just as bloodthirsty. Its like “Putin must pay!!! Send more Ukrainian young men to their death!!!”

              • LarmyOfLone@lemm.ee
                1·
                9 months ago

                You mean they don’t know about the left being pro peace? Or that they are overcompensating because they do know?

                There is a documentary by Adam Curtis about how the rhetoric in geopolitics changed to good vs evil, not just Reagan but all the third way leftists. A very successful PR / brainwashing campaign.

                But ever since Ukraine started this has massively changed on reddit which is supposedly “leftist”. Presumably the “science and technology of propaganda” is improving. If the Irak and Afghanistan happened today, there wouldn’t be any major opposition to it online. There wasn’t any in mainstream media either at the time, but back then the internet actually was less… warmongery?

                • CableMonster@lemmy.ml
                  15·
                  9 months ago

                  I dont know if they dont know what the more traditional leftists believed in back in the 90s and earlier, or other interests have taken over their rhetoric, or if they are just using the oppressor - oppressed world view to pick Ukraine and Palestine. Do you think they got co-opted by big business interests or something else?

  • rusticus@lemm.ee
    986·
    9 months ago

    Umberto Ecco’s rule #8 of fascism: “The enemy is both strong and weak.”

    Hey Republicans, which is it this time? Is Biden a demented old fool or a dictator? lol.

    Dark Brandon strikes again.

    • littleblue✨@lemmy.world
      11·
      9 months ago

      The Republican way is to smugly grease palms, but the way around them is simply via Greece and shrug. 🤷🏼‍♂️

  • alvvayson@lemmy.world
    6928·
    9 months ago

    The Democrats outsmart Republicans yet again.

    Next up: border secured just in time to win the November elections.

    • TheJims@lemmy.world
      381·
      9 months ago

      Define securing the border, because that goal post is mounted to a bullet train by republicans as long as trump isn’t president.

    • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
      4321·
      9 months ago

      You think Biden closing the border as soon as he’s able is a good thing?

      Like, you understand that wouldn’t just be a one time thing right? Future presidents could do it to, and Republicans actually do out things in motion in their first days.

      I mean, Biden went from saying the border wasn’t an issue to saying we need that literally over night.

      That doesn’t concern you?

        • Zaktor@sopuli.xyzEnglish
          15·
          9 months ago

          But objectively, illegal immigration is at record high numbers.

          No it isn’t. Not even close. This is just assuming that because Republicans say it is that it’s actually the worst its ever been. Somehow every presidential election it’s the worst its ever been and news organizations parrot the accusation without just calling them out on the BS.

          https://www.factcheck.org/2021/03/the-facts-on-the-increase-in-illegal-immigration/

        • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
          219·
          9 months ago

          it’s mostly due to the hot economy, but American voters don’t understand that)

          What?

          The economy is propped up by record breaking fossil fuels drilling and corporations increasing prices 2-3x while not raising pay…

          That’s something virtually every American is aware of right now…

          And while Biden trying to brag about the economy hurts him. Either he doesn’t understand that very basic thing, or he doesn’t give two fucks about theaverage American, just corporations and billionaires.

          Which has been a critique of American neoliberalism since James Carville started spouting all this stupid shit to begin with

          • Tja@programming.dev
            34·
            9 months ago

            Holy hyperbole batman. Prices rose by about 15% on average and wages rose as well, but not as much (between 7 and 12% depending on the source).

            Which given 10 years of almost no inflation and moderate wage growth, is not that surprising.

            • SwampYankee@mander.xyz
              3·
              9 months ago

              Unemployment at a 60-year low, real wages at a 50-year high. That’s not to say there aren’t problems (largely the cost of housing, education and healthcare eating up all the gains over the last half century), but the economy is good, Jack.

            • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
              125·
              9 months ago

              No, the person I replied to said increased immigration is due to our “hot economy”…

              But it’s not, because all that money is going into a very small amount of pockets.

                • rockSlayer@lemmy.world
                  112·
                  9 months ago

                  Didn’t you just say you weren’t American? Why are you discrediting the experience of people living in the US?

                • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
                  104·
                  9 months ago

                  Oh wow…

                  Yeah. I don’t think me explaining anything else to you is gonna help then bud.

                  The difference is I’m going to do something so I never accidentally try again.

      • Nudding@lemmy.world
        1966·
        9 months ago

        Or the fact that he can just bypass congress to give weapons to Israel, or the record oil extraction during his first term? Dems pretending their party isn’t actively destroying the world is wild.

    • Sami_Uso@lemmy.world
      173·
      9 months ago

      These comments look so much like the comments from a sports team sub.

      Biden totally should have ran the ball there at the end, then Trump wouldn’t have enough clock left before the end to win! It’s like reducing politics down to it’s absolute dumbest, I can’t imagine why more and more people are choosing not to participate.

    • Deceptichum@kbin.social
      1627·
      9 months ago

      I love seeing Biden copy republican ideas. Really great to see the bipartisan effort to fuck people over.

      • Sami_Uso@lemmy.world
        52·
        9 months ago

        “uh actually I really care about border security now”

        Jfc these peoples ideals change as the wind blows. All it takes is a geriatric to tell them to care about it

      • ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca
        112·
        9 months ago

        It’s such a geopolitical mess because their geography is vital but that same reason is why they’ve historically been an enemy so there is a lot of bad blood and distrust

        • _dev_null@lemmy.zxcvn.xyz
          2·
          9 months ago

          I think the whole Turkey having started buying Russian armaments predates the current embargo. Like, I can recall them buying some Russian anti-air defense shit designed to down NATO aircraft about 5 years ago or so.

          So it’s been more so about Erdoğan trying to assert some weird ass attempt at displayingf dominance. That fucker’s been the president for a decade straight now, looking awfully lot like a despot at this point. And they’re a NATO member right there, mmhm. Yup.

    • yesman@lemmy.world
      52·
      9 months ago

      Turkey and Greece got beef going back to the bronze age. Two of the best armed members of the EU, with those guns pointed at each other. This isn’t the first time Ukraine has benefited from that situation.

      • grozzle@lemm.ee
        3·
        9 months ago

        You’re thinking of Persians - back in the bronze age, proto-Turks were still in central Asia. Also, Turkey is not an EU member, you’re thinking NATO.