#mainly bc it wouldn't export right

[killjoy-prince]

Team Mirai Toshi de Acchi Kocchi in Devil's Manner

[apas-95]

Please bear in mind that I'm not disagreeing with you or anything like that, in fact I appreciate your views on Russia-Ukraine and this is why I just want to ask this. So, to simplify, you believe that the conflict is of two imperial powers, NATO vs Putin's Russia. Okay. What I struggle to understand is this, and um I myself am from Kazakhstan, so I guess bear that in mind. So if Russia is seeking new colonies (Crimea as the source of oil, famously), why wouldn't they rather colonize Kazakhstan? We are richer than Ukraine, our oil reserves are greater, we can mount no defense like Ukraine and obviously would not receive any help from NATO. In fact during January events we explicitly asked them to help us, their army entered, and then left (even though many claimed they would overturn our government). Idk how much you know about our country, so you might claim that Russia already has us as their colony, but I know for a fact that the most of oil reserves belong to Italian, German and American companies. Our president (Tokayev) while might seem like Putin's puppet, even during this war has gone against Putin - remained neutral about the conflict (like Belarus we technically could help), and also accepted the greatest number of refugees from Russia who refused to join the war (in my country many have argued that he's done more than the West to truly stop the conflict with this act). There are 14 Post-Soviet Republics, if not us, why not colonize any other country except the one that gets help from the States? (Armenia famously got their help during the whole Azerbaijan invasion) Also - you might say that Ukraine bc of their crimes against Russians gave a better reason, then we, too, have anti-Russia's movements that technically could provide a reason. Again, I'm not pro-Putin, obv, and mb this isn't important in the context, mb I shouldn't include such a narrow point of view, just, if you have anything to say about that, I would love to hear it, thanks!

I would say that there are a few main points that should be got across.

First: taking it as given that the Russian Federation is an imperialist country, in the Marxist sense of the term, we would have to conclude that it's a much weaker imperialist country than the USA.

From the start of the Russian Federation, it was a very impoverished country, one that survived mainly by selling off its natural resources and cannibalising the industrial base it took from the USSR. However, imperialism relies more on the wealth of the capitalist class than the country as a whole, and there was a lot of Soviet wealth and expertise to cannibalise. In Marxist terms, the key feature of imperialism is the export of capital, rather than resources or commodities, becoming the key part of the economy. The bourgeoisie of the Russian Federation has been able to build up enough capital to begin making this possible.

As it stands now, in the cases of CSTO countries, while the RF is often not even the largest investor, it is still a substantial investor, when looking at Foreign Direct Investment figures. Kazakhstan specifically has far more European investment (in part because of its resources compared to other countries), but it's undeniable that the RF is an influence - that we could describe the CSTO as, broadly, the RF's sphere of influence. While the US's sphere of influence is basically the entire world; and the EU's sphere of influence is all of Europe, most of Eurasia, and most of Africa; the Russian Federation would have a comparatively much smaller sphere of influence with a lot of overlap.

The second thing is: the Russian Federation's invasion of Ukraine is not, principally, an attempt at simple economic expansion, but motivated primarily by competition with the US imperialist bloc.

You are right - if the RF was looking to just invade and directly take control of whatever country it wished, it wouldn't choose Ukraine, it would choose somewhere closer to home. However, direct colonisation isn't how modern imperialism operates. Financial control with the threat of military action is far easier to maintain, once you've built up the capital. Being an imperialist country is exactly what makes 'primitive accumulation' through seizing territory no longer necessary. The reason the Russian Federation invaded Ukraine in 2022, and began military action against the country in 2014, is specifically because the prior neutral government was overthrown in a US-backed coup which installed a right-wing, nationalist government, which was explicitly hostile to Russia.

This isn't fueled by a simple, moral justification of 'well they hate Russians, so we should invade them' - it's a political move based on the fact that this new government was explicitly allied with the USA. From the USA's side, it was a move specifically to split the EU and RF blocs. The EU was becoming less interested in the alliance with the USA, and more interested with closer ties with the Russian Federation - the USA provoking a war both weakens the RF, as well as demonstrates its military dominance to the EU. Had the Kazakh government instead called for NATO to assist it, the Russian response may have been different. Imperialism is fine with nominal independence - it wants influence, not direct control - but when that influence is threatened, when a country takes a hard, military stance against it, then it acts violently.

So, again, I'd say the character of this conflict is inter-imperialist competition, instigated mainly by the US imperialist bloc, in order to weaken ties between the RF and EU imperialist blocs. The war is fought between the capitalists of each nation over which group of them gets market access to which territories, and the working people gain nothing either way. The workers, once united under a socialist state, now kill each other, so that the oligarchs that keep them poor can get richer. Neither side of this conflict fights for the workers.

Hope this helps explain my position! Also, for what it's worth, I lived in Kazakhstan for a time as a child, in Almaty.

[yatgb]

Ok empires oc time

Like all my minecraft self inserts his name is VultureZombie and he joined the gathering of emperors in the beginning, just bc he heard about it in passing and decided it'd be fun to show up and also lay into some boundaries so thered be no future misunderstandings

You see while some people chose the mesa or the desert or the ocean as their grounds to rule, VZ here 1) didn't choose a biome and 2) didn't choose to "rule." He chose his domain as the Nether for him to protect and guard from everybody decimating it for resources.

Nobody knows where VZ came from to even be at the gathering, since literally no one could find the nether portal he came in and out of. But they let him stay and communicate with them because hey get a load of this guy and also he's not trying to kill us

His base in the Nether is a Bridge Bastion that he's fixed up and made to suit him, but its not like he kicked out all the Piglins. In fact even the Piglin Brutes are still there, patrolling the halls and treating him like a friend! (As long as he wears gold of course but when is he not?)

His main export is anything Nether-related. Emperors can ask him to gather just a couple things, or get a discount bundle for every material in a biome. His most popular export is Netherite. Yeah you have to go through him to get your Netherite. Nobody wants to know what happens if you try to get it yourself since he said that if someone snuck around him to get their own supplies they wouldn't like the consequences. He's kind of scary. He joined the gathering with a robot arm and an eyepatch he's already been through enough shit to give him a robot arm and an eyepatch Jesus christ dude where the fuck did you come from

Its not that he wants control over the Nether, or he wants to rule the Nether with an iron fist and be a bitch, its just that this dude really really loves the Nether and doesn't want to see it decimated by twelve different people begging for all the resources they need for their builds. If he's the one gathering the resources, then he can responsibly harvest what the others need so they get the blocks and he gets to still enjoy his home.

He has an office in his bastion base, mainly for empire connections and guest visits, and nobody likes going there its like getting called to the principals office. Maybe its the way he always faces out the window, maybe its the way there isn't even a chair to sit down on, or maybe it's the lever in the side of the wall that he doesn't even acknowledge or tell anyone what the purpose is. Yeah he's charming and cool and is easy to compromise with but dude what does that lever do I am begging you to tell me

This man is so gentle and kind but also so batshit insane like one moment he'll be in introspective conversation with a Piglin about how their culture goes misunderstood and the next they're catching an enemy by the collar and throwing them mercilessly into the lava ocean waiting below. He can be shaking hands with Pixlriffs and thanking him for the copper one meeting and then pulling the lever on Joey the next. He's an unhinged man. God forbid you're on his list.

Xornoth tried corrupting him but 1) he didn't notice the corruption around because it was hidden in the rest of the crimson forest and 2) he just simply isn't scared. He's built different if you will. Xornoth tried mind controlling him and instead he got sat down at a nice table with a cup of Twisted Vine Tea and asked to talk about his day. VZ essentially tamed the powerful frightening demon on the server but only when he's in the Nether.

Okay I said "everybody loves him" but that isn't true Joey fucking hates his guts because he keeps "stealing" Xornoth from him. They have such a one-sided rivalry its hilarious. Joey has declared him enemy number one right at the top of the hit list and VZ is just. Clueless. Has hardly seen this man in his life.

Please ask about him i have so many scenes and story plots