"Which country is the largest threat to world peace?"

[bilaps]

United States. By far. Not even close.

[bilaps]

American exceptionalism talk, america giving lessons in values and human rights, all that we are role models crap is what drives people to these feelings in Europe. While at the same time when American allies are at question like Saudis then nevermind that women can't drive etc. Hipocricy is what drives people away. Not to mention American interventionism from coups in S America and C America to open military interventions in Balkans and Middle East. I'm truly surprised to see that people are surprised by these numbers.

I mean you don't have to go further than this Russia histeria. Yeah, Russia wanted Trump, so what? America influence elections all over the world all the time and America is threatening Russia much more than the other way around. US has the military budget like next 10 nations combined, is only superpower in the world, NATO is at the Russian border, west was supportive of a prowestern coup in Ukraine, of course Russia will react. What would happen if Russians install their government in Mexico or send missiles to Cuba, oh wait...

[bilaps]

there is a looooooot of US-scepticism over here ...especially after snowden....but putin has easily reached the same amount of hate and fear with his crimea-annexion....until trump came along.

In Austria? I can get Poland, Ukraine, Estonia, baltic states, but in central Europe and western Europe? I mean he did annex Crimea against international law, no doubt, but when Kosovo declared independece where was international law then? I mean he was provoked to do that by things happening in Ukraine. If NATO and Russia are enemies, then when NATO threatens your borders, what would you do? Not to mention that in Eastern Ukraine and in Crimea there is Russian ethnic majority. The country was divided evenly before the coup 50-50 prowestern prorussian. Now there is prowestern government which controls 90% of the country. So if ocupation is word people use one could argue that there are many ocupied Russians in Ukraine right now.

[bilaps]

I mean he was provoked to do that by things happening in Ukraine

he was not - clearly and without any question.

don't want to derail this thread too much but.....the NATO defense is imho utter nonsense. the NATO would never ever invade russia and even if it wanted to (ridiculous), the question of nuclear weaponry prevents this anyway.

if russia would try to cooperate with democratic states, independent from moscow, on a friendly level and wouldn't treat EX-Sovjet-states like slaves who should be happy about hand-outs, it wouldn't need to be scared all the time about losing control.

otherwise....your numbers are bogus, no offense.

only a minority of eastern "left-wing" ukrainians want to secede, even if they detest the western/central government and if anybody crushed any hopes for a pro-eastern political revival, it's russia itself.

the crimea doesn't hurt very much in terms of elections...the people's republics of donetsk and Luhansk do.

if those 2 areas would vote......it's possible to create an anti-kiev alliance. without them....there are not enough votes left, especially votes which would prefer russian dominance.

the majority of eastern ukrainians think about secession as treason..plain and simple.

it is far from clear. you saying it is clear doesn't mean it's true. was there a legitimate govt in ukraine? was there a coup? legitimate govt wanted to stop euro-integration process, you may not like it, others may not like it but it's a simple fact. if majority of ukrainians wanted euro path they could have opted for one astonishing path. it's called ELECTIONS. so they overthrow legitimate govt with western help ofcourse, screw the laws there nevermind and they install prowestern government. that's what happened. imagine now this happening in mexico.

you're talking about hand outs is really funny cause that is how us foreign policy works. and essentialy every foreign policy works that way. europe may not want to be russian slave but surely many countries are nato or us slaves. they don't have their foreign policy, it's what comes from Washington.

if my numbers are off i would like to see your numbers. also i didn't talk about independence, i was talking about a number of russian native speakers who are living in ukraine.  

[bilaps]

it is far from clear. you saying it is clear doesn't mean it's true. was there a legitimate govt in ukraine? was there a coup? legitimate govt wanted to stop euro-integration process, you may not like it, others may not like it but it's a simple fact. if majority of ukrainians wanted euro path they could have opted for one astonishing path. it's called ELECTIONS. so they overthrow legitimate govt with western help ofcourse, screw the laws there nevermind and they install prowestern government. that's what happened. imagine now this happening in mexico.

you're talking about hand outs is really funny cause that is how us foreign policy works. and essentialy every foreign policy works that way. europe may not want to be russian slave but surely many countries are nato or us slaves. they don't have their foreign policy, it's what comes from Washington.

if my numbers are off i would like to see your numbers. also i didn't talk about independence, i was talking about a number of russian native speakers who are living in ukraine.  

3 points.

1) i am ofc talking about my own opinion.... and how i see the facts...since this is an US-style-board i am more outspoken than on a german one....but in the end, i am only defending my own case.

the current government of ukraine is democratically elected and the last one has been too....until it decided to use violence against protestern. without the violence, the students would have been finished after a few weeks, after the violence, their parents joined the fight too.

the last government became the enemy of the people. so it has had to got.....if earlier elections would have been negotiated earlier, all of this would have ended without additional bloodshed.

i'm not going to argue with 3rd point because a) we shouldn't beleive in polls in a country that is essentialy at war b) of course that support will drop down, they are at war vs russia, what do you think is propaganda in countries that are in war. i can tell you, i was in a country like that and it's not nice and people generaly turn to their leaders even if they don't like them. we will see hopefuly after the war what will happen

i don't want to go much further even though i don't think it's too much offtopic. i just want to make a case for why your first point is silly. do you really think that's what happened? in your heart of hearts as it's said. i mean this is like a bad sciense fiction movie, peaceful protesters and with no reason somebody shoots at them? second thing, even if i accept your premise and there are many reasons why that's not the case if police uses violence against protesters than it should be a coup in a country. fast forward to usa in 21st century. how many times obama should been thrown out of office when protesters were attacked by police on for example dakota land. it's propaganda. there were many "bad hombres" among the protesters there, they shot at the police, they shot at the army, they even had special units coming, it was a classic coup.

[bilaps]

i really find that hard to beleive, no outside help, no nothing just people rose up? not buying that. sure, govt made mistakes, but at the end of the day it was a coup in which legitimate govt was overthrown and new one was installed. in democracies that is done on election day.

[bilaps]

i have to respond sorry

i mean early election is when there is a fall of govt support in the parliament, or when president calls for them, or pm resigns, you are confusing the terms. change of govt was here prior to any election and when new elections were scheduled country was already in war. elections were not held legaly at all here, there was a protest followed by clashes followed by ousting of the govt in undemocratic way. sure million people were on the protest, so that leaves how many million that were not.

[bilaps]

i have to respond sorry

i mean early election is when there is a fall of govt support in the parliament, or when president calls for them, or pm resigns, you are confusing the terms. change of govt was here prior to any election and when new elections were scheduled country was already in war. elections were not held legaly at all here, there was a protest followed by clashes followed by ousting of the govt in undemocratic way. sure million people were on the protest, so that leaves how many million that were not.

only responding to the election-thingie:

look for example at thailand and/or romania....

both countries have a strong  political "separation", like ukraine, but between cities and rural areas....

both countries are (or have been in the case of thailand) always in danger of early elections, cause of mass protests and gridlock.

and both countries.....again and again...voted the same party into power, cause even if government agrees to resign, a majority is the majority.

if the ukrainian majority would really have stood behind the old government, it would have been re-elected.....even without the party of regions, there were major east-ukrainian parties participating.

to be honest I have to read it twice to understand what you're trying to say. look, thailand is no comparison, they still have monarchy there as i recall it, i think it's very volatile country for many different reasons.

now romania is a good example. however, romania is relatively stable country. it's a member of EU, member of NATO, it's still a poor country, you are right about huge difference between urban and rural areas but how exactly this compares with ukraine? they were not at war at any time, they don't have national separation like in ukraine, they are romanians, they speak the same language, it's just not comparable. only thing is yes they have some protests. they have it right now, but nobody is shooting at anyone, govt isn't changed through coup etc. so yes, why ukraine was not like romania is excellent question and answer you may not like.