Тег: Ukraine

Preventing nuclear war under ancap

Hi! I really dislike your answers regarding the prevention of nuclear war. You say that ancaps will shift the costs onto the nomenklatura, but these answers are far from reality. A bounty of 11 million euros was placed on Lukashenko’s head, yet there weren’t even any attempts to eliminate him.

Suppose there is a nomenklatura sitting in a very deep bunker under a densely populated city. They are protected by loyal security services.
What will libertarians do if this nomenklatura starts a nuclear war against Ancapistan (=what do they threaten with to prevent it)? It would be preferable to provide some specific military measures.

Nenavision

Okay, let’s imagine such a picture. Zelensky arrives at the front to hand out another box of medals, and there he is suddenly kidnapped by an enemy sabotage and reconnaissance group and taken to the RF. Next, they push a peace treaty on him, which he agrees to sign publicly. At the solemn signing ceremony, he inevitably gets within handshake distance of Putin, after which he clenches his jaw, breaks a fake tooth—in short, some trash in the spirit of Frank Herbert happens, only Vladimir Putin turns out not to be as lucky as Vladimir Harkonnen, and also dies.

In the RF, power is seized by a club of angry patriots, who move into a bunker under Moscow, surround themselves with loyal security services, and give the order for an immediate general mobilization, as well as bring the Strategic Missile Forces to a state of highest combat readiness.

Meanwhile, in Ukraine, the central government is paralyzed by another Maidan; control over the supply of the front, as well as other state functions, are taken over by volunteers; the Maidan declares the complete abolition of taxes and complete freedom of private initiative, as well as general armament—in short, literally a month after the incident with the kidnapping of Zelensky, Ukraine becomes an ancap society in a first approximation.

Great, a minimally plausible picture of a deadly deadlock between a fanatic dictator and an ancap society with clear territorial borders has been established. How do the ancaps defend themselves against Girkin? They have no nuclear bomb, no medium-range missiles, no strategic aviation, no unified command, and no time to waste.

The ancaps react to the threat in their favorite manner: everyone does what they are best at. For the most part, this means occupying themselves with matters far more important than war. For example, importing goods from the EU into Ukraine duty-free, and also exporting them duty-free through the leaky Russian border in the area of a conditional Shebekino, and selling them there for bitcoins.

The front gradually collapses because the mobilized realize that there will be no criminal prosecution for desertion, provided their own don’t shoot them in the back immediately. Armaments and ammunition from warehouses gradually and mysteriously disappear into someone’s private stores. Several highly motivated groups prepare for partisan warfare, while the less flexible prepare to stand to the death on their tiny section of the front, but for some reason the enemy prefers to attack where they are not.

Girkin realizes that he no longer needs general mobilization, and that he can do without nuclear weapons as well. He focuses on organizing an effective occupation administration, plus he is forced to pay more and more attention to the internal agenda. He has to climb out of the bunker more and more often, travel through the regions, solve purely civilian issues—and after three months he is finally killed by Ukrainian partisans, somewhere on the way from Vladivostok airport to the city. The first car hits a mine, then the motorcade is shelled by mortars, and then the survivors are cleaned up with small arms. This episode becomes the occasion for previously scattered attacks on representatives of Girkin’s occupation administration to turn into a full-scale hunt.

Power in Russia is taken by Sobyanin, who orders an immediate retreat to the 2014 borders and begins bargaining with the international community for the lifting of sanctions in exchange for the withdrawal of Russian troops from Crimea as well, replacing them with UN peacekeepers. Along the way, he releases Navalny, stating that he would be happy to see his former opponent in the post of Moscow mayor, as he is not in doubt that this time he will definitely win the election. But that is a completely different story.

A column of light armored vehicles is an easy target

A provocative question

It has been a while since I wrote anything about the war. The bleakest of predictions has come true; the war has become protracted. The warring parties will not exhaust the resilience of their economies anytime soon. The Russian side—due to skillful tactical actions on the economic front. The Ukrainian side—because financing Ukraine is not yet particularly burdensome for its allies.

On the other hand, the global economy has obviously begun to crack, undermined by the war in addition to the preceding COVID madness. This leads to the thought: are all these economic sanctions really so necessary to destroy the RF? Actually, no, but that is a boring topic, let’s not dwell on it; I want to ask about something else.

Ukraine asks for more and more weapons, yet receives them in quantities obviously insufficient for a quick victory. In this regard, I am purely humanly curious how Ukrainians would react to a certain dilemma. The greedy capitalists say: the reserves of our charity are exhausted. You want to keep fighting—fine, you will have your weapons. We will sell them to you. In exchange, we want your Ukrainian land. As our capitalist private property. And so that you—we know you, you damn socialists—do not nationalize it immediately after victory, we demand extraterritoriality for the land we buy. We will establish our private military bases there, so that you don’t dream of stretching your greedy hands toward us later. Sell us Odessa; we will organize a free city there. Without mines in the waters, securely protected from the Russian, Turkish, and Ukrainian fleets. And without taxes, of course. And with the free circulation of our capitalist currencies, whichever are convenient for us. And without your officials, naturally—our managers are more efficient.

Do you think a conditional Zelensky would agree to such an insolent proposal? Would he give one seaside city into the ownership of a consortium including a conditional Lockheed Martin and other esteemed gentlemen? In exchange for the products of these very Lockheeds and Martins. And a conditional Zelensky voter—how would he react? Would he say, “Oh, to hell with Odessa-mama, give me F-35s”? Or would he scream angrily that he will not yield an inch of native land to anyone, and that after the ammunition runs out, he will fight with stones and sticks?

Who wants muskets? Real muskets from white people!

Reparations

It is quite funny that the RF is still fully attempting to go on the offensive, still holds a substantial advantage in the air, and continues to throw new goals of the war into the information space—while on social media, discussions are already in full swing about how Russia will pay reparations to Ukraine, whether one should push for them, and whether those who were initially against the war should have to pay them.

I’ll throw in my two cents as well. It seems to me that the absence of reparations is primarily in the interests of Ukrainian libertarians, but also Russian ones. Meanwhile, statists on both sides should heartily approve of reparations.

The thing is, reparations are money that a state pays to a state. But the state always collects this money from its subjects. How did the rise of the Moscow Principality begin? It began when the Moscow Prince Ivan received the privilege from the Horde Khan to pay reparations on behalf of all Russian principalities. In the process of collection, much stuck to his hands, and Moscow grew strong. When a conditional Leonid Volkov begins collecting reparations for Ukraine, Moscow will also only grow stronger from this, because what on earth is federalization and the transfer of powers to regions when you need to squeeze money out of people and pay the Ukrainian president?

But let’s assume that the international anti-corruption fund, led by the valiant Ivan Zhdanov, manages to find and lobby for the seizure of such a quantity of property from major Russian corrupt officials that it will be enough to pay reparations, and no extraordinary taxes will need to be levied from other Russian citizens. What will the kind Ukrainian president do upon receiving reparations from the kind Russian president? He will begin, on behalf of the state, to commission various works to restore what was destroyed during the war, strengthen the Ukrainian state army, police, customs, tax authorities, provide additional funding to the national bank, and so on. In short, he will strengthen the social state. Is this a good thing? “Of course, it is,” the government officials who will distribute all this money will answer the Ukrainian libertarians, as well as their relatives who, by a happy coincidence, receive government contracts.

Naturally, any caring person has many moral grounds to help Ukrainians in the war, in life in emigration, and in the restoration of the ruined economy after returning home. But for this, they do not need state coercion; it is more likely to get in the way. For instance, states block the bank cards of RF citizens (making it harder to donate), create a mass of restrictions for emigrants, which complicates their settlement in a new place and hinders providing them with help, and at the stage of post-war assistance, they will surely surround private initiative with a bunch of hurdles. Therefore, partisan activity against all states proves to be in demand: against the state of Ukraine, which prevents some refugees from leaving it freely; against the state of the RF, to sabotage military conscription, the work of state institutions, disrupt military supplies, and demotivate private individuals from supporting the war; against other states that hinder emigrants from finding employment, settling in, and conducting monetary transactions. But all of this is not reparations—do not whitewash this cringe-worthy word.

P.S. I forgot to add one more important point. The best outcome of this war is the complete destruction of the Russian state. But in that case, there will certainly be no reparations: the subject from whom they can be taken will vanish. And this is another very important reason why Ukrainian libertarians should dream not of reparations, but of a far more pleasant outcome.

Of course, the absence of reparations does not cancel the possibility of prosecuting private individuals and bringing claims against them for specific damages.

Where do reparations come from? Allah gives!

Anti-Ukrainian post

As a series of posts directed against the Russian state was published, about forty people unsubscribed from my Telegram channel, and now I intend to exacerbate the situation by taking a swipe at the state of Ukraine.

The Great Patriotic War is taking place in Ukraine. The national spirit is strong, and the Javelins are fast; if only there were a no-fly zone, the occupiers would have been destroyed in a week, and without it, the task will stretch until summer, provided, of course, that the “snuffbox” factor doesn’t play a role. The state trusts its citizens so much that it distributes combat weapons to them without any documents and has officially declared that the killing of Russian soldiers by private individuals is not a criminal offense. In essence: be partisans, you have our blessing. Foreign volunteers are flocking to the country because human hunting is the most exciting of hunts, as we have read much about in the classics. To top it all off, the Ukrainian government is receiving serious amounts of aid not only in weapons and humanitarian cargo, but also in money.

The question is, why the hell does military conscription still exist in Ukraine? Why the hell are men up to 60 years old not allowed to leave the country? Firstly, this is sexism (well, that’s me lightly touching upon the “agenda”). Secondly, this is direct state slave-ownership. Thirdly, it is simply inefficient. If a man has already reached the border, he certainly does not intend to fight. He intends to get his family to a safe place, and there, in that safe place, he will at least no longer be a burden to the Ukrainian state social security system, will not increase the casualty count of the civilian population, and will hover before Russian embassies with a Ukrainian flag—and then, who knows, he might even return to join the war, but voluntarily. This is quite likely, especially given the fact that Ukraine is able to pay its soldiers quite generously, while refugees can only rely on their own savings and the help of the local Russian-Ukrainian diaspora.

The question is, why the hell has Ukraine kept border guards and especially customs officers on its western border at all? Does the state have nowhere to put its people? Does the state wish to obstruct the free movement of goods under conditions of extreme tension within civil society? Has the state lost its fucking mind? Customs should have been sent in full to the front on the first day of the war, so they could have all perished there. Or at least fired, for goodness’ sake.

In short, I am far from admiring the actions of the current Ukrainian leadership. It could destroy Putin’s occupiers no less effectively while not tyrannizing its own people. This would serve as a much more weighty moral example to the world than the president keeping an automatic rifle at his workplace. Look, Lukashenko also posed with an automatic rifle; some knight he is.

War between Russia and Ukraine

Voluntarist, Bitarch

Now we can clearly observe where violence as a method for solving problems and achieving goals leads. Regardless of who holds what views regarding the conflict in Donbas, the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics, the relations between Ukraine and Russia, the state of affairs in both countries, or who is right and who is wrong, in all possible positions, the attempt to achieve something by violent—in this case, military—means can be called both the root cause and an aggravating factor of the existing problems.

Indeed, what can we expect in a world where governments and states declare themselves “monopolists” of the right to “legally” use violence to achieve certain goals. And now, the Russian government has simply exercised this “right to violence.” As any other government that relies on force instruments will do, if it seems profitable enough.

Some may justify what is happening by saying that it is a response to the violence of the Ukrainian government toward the residents of Donbas who are unwilling to submit to it. But even if that is the case—can any force measures be justified in this instance other than purely defensive ones? Can an invasion of peaceful cities with accompanying human casualties be justified? No, and again no! And if someone thinks otherwise, if someone considers the death of people to be an adequate and acceptable price for achieving some geopolitical goals, then their opinion can only be called the position of a rapist and a psychopath who does not care about human life. And I have said more than once that a position allowing for forceful coercion, the infliction of harm, and the killing of people simply has no right to exist.

Of course, actual rapists and psychopaths make up only a tiny percentage of society; far more people simply hold such a position due to their own stupidity and lack of understanding. It was a tiny percentage of people who were responsible for violent attacks throughout all of human history, while the vast majority of people never needed this—they have their own families, concerns, and goals, and in general, they simply feel an instinctive aversion to violence and would never be able to commit a murder with their own hands.

Understanding all this, we must first and foremost fight against violence as an approach to achieving any goals, against the existence of any force structures in society that may have an advantage in their potential for violence relative to ordinary people, and most importantly—against rapists for whom committing a murder costs nothing, and with such a position, they successfully advance either into force structures or government bodies. After all, as long as someone has the opportunity to freely commit violence, they will do so in pursuit of their goals at the first convenient opportunity. And if someone holds violent views and possesses power over certain force structures staffed by violent people, then even war ceases to be something surprising and unexpected.

Fight against violence and war. And stay with us to learn more about how we can deal with the problem of violence and achieve a free, non-violent society.

What reforms, measures, and methods must be undertaken for a post-Soviet country to become truly 100% decentralized?

The Average Ukrainian

To accomplish this task, it is not enough to simply, for example, give communities the right to keep most of the taxes: such rights are easy to give and easy to take away. It is important that the reforms be very difficult to reverse. In other words, they must improve people’s lives very quickly and very significantly.

How do you quickly improve people’s lives in the poorest country in Europe? Only by opening the country to a very wide flow of investment. So, the literally first package of proposed reforms is a serious reduction of state intervention in the regulation of the economy.

Right off the bat—the first thing—the abolition of customs, along with duties. If other states want to restrict the export of goods to Ukraine or the import of goods from Ukraine, that is their right. But in Ukraine, there is no one to deal with this nonsense; if people want to trade, they trade.

Second—granting communities the right to take any state functions under their own jurisdiction. If they wish to collect all taxes themselves and set their rates—be my guest. After that, let them negotiate with the center on how much money they are willing to provide as a dowry for those issues they cannot handle on their own. If they do not wish to decide anything themselves—be my guest; the center will appoint people, set the tax rates, and carry out full administration until the citizens gather for a meeting and declare that they have had a nice rest and are ready for self-governance again.

How to choose a president? You don’t need to choose him; sell this unpaid position at auction, for one year without the right of extension, and as for the powers, leave only the right to veto laws passed by the Verkhovna Rada. But that is not urgent; that is already ornamentation. If you don’t want to make money by selling the presidential office, do as they do in Switzerland—it’s not bad there either.

And what about the south-east? There, a Donetsk Sich is created. Since the country is decentralized, few communities will dare to maintain serious armed forces, but here is a region where it is vitally necessary. This means a safari park is needed, where everyone interested in hunting separatists will go, as well as representatives of volunteer organizations who will ensure that the hunt is conducted without poaching. You arrive, pay for a trip—and off you go. Whatever you capture is yours. The task of the Sich leadership is to organize coordination so that they don’t shoot each other; that’s what the money is collected for. And to promptly conduct the demarcation of those districts whose residents have decided to reclassify themselves from hunting grounds to a full-fledged territory of the Sich, handed over their separatists for trial, and elected representatives to the Sich self-government—and that’s it, the residents of the territory have regained their status as human beings. I don’t know how effectively this will reduce the size of the hunting grounds, but the question was about what measures are needed to ensure decentralization. Well, without a decentralized volunteer army, you will not hold a decentralized country.

It turns out I didn’t even invent this term. I wouldn’t be surprised if all the other advice also turns out to be sheer banality.

A little more about Zelensky

Yesterday’s spontaneous post about how Ukraine has finally waited for a libertarian president caused a number of comments from actual Ukrainian libertarians, such as, for example, Vladimir Zolotoryov. The comments boil down to the fact that there is nothing to rejoice about; Zelensky is as much a libertarian as Zolotoryov himself is a communist, so he will ruin everything no better than Balashov.

Indeed, Zelensky’s statements are quite contradictory: he simultaneously quotes Reagan, with his “government is not the solution to the problem; government is the problem,” immediately proposes the concept of government as a service, and then promptly reports that it would be a good idea to imprison more people for tax evasion and introduce total income declaration. So, Zelensky is certainly not a convinced libertarian; he is an obvious populist trying to guess the demand of the target audience to gain maximum support.

What do I see as the merit of Zolotoryov, Balashov, Yurovsky, and even the—heaven forbid—late Sherstnyov? It is that they, and many other Ukrainians, broadcast the libertarian agenda so loudly and convincingly that the populist Zelensky believed: this is the people’s demand, and this is what I will latch onto. Zelensky, having no distinct program of his own, is an amplifier of someone else’s agenda. Yes, his microphone captures noise along with the signal, introduces its own distortions, and then delivers something close to a cacophony to the public. But he draws attention to the libertarian doctrine itself, and after that, interested people can already bend the ears of others and explain that taxes are theft, the state is a gangster, and this is how ancap works—take it and use it.

In Russia, however, Vladimir Popov asks an interesting question in his channel. Generally, the channel is mostly dedicated to weapons, and I love it dearly, but opinions on a wide variety of topics are found there. Vladimir asks: how is it that when Enteo says he is a libertarian, everyone brushes it off as something you’d expect from a fool. But when people say Zelensky is a libertarian, everyone rejoices wildly that Ukraine succeeded. What is the libertarianism of Zelensky, how does he differ from Enteo, and what did Ukraine succeed in?

Zelensky, unlike Enteo, does not practice direct aggressive violence, declares a desire to end the war, and defends the desire of Ukrainians to live their own private lives. And if the statement “Enteo is a libertarian” evokes nervous laughter and a response of “why don’t you call the Tsapkovs libertarians too,” here it is more of a shrug and a thoughtful “well, in some ways—yes.”

So, it makes sense for Ukrainian minarchists to express joy and start broadcasting something like “Hooray, Zelensky is a libertarian, which means he must lower taxes, reduce regulations, carry out decentralization, and privatize state enterprises. Show us the scoundrel who dares to hinder our beloved Mr. President in these libertarian endeavors, and we will cover them in shame.”

The same applies in Russia: if Putin says he is a libertarian, the reaction will be like it was for Enteo. If Navalny says he is a libertarian, it makes sense to express joy and bring the good news to the city and the world: finally, we have reached Navalny, he has become imbued with libertarianism, renounced the minimum wage and other leftism, and will now change the economic block of the program—forward, Navalny to the Duma, and so on.

And yet, Ukraine has finally gotten its libertarian president!

Remember, a long time ago, I rejoiced along with you that a libertarian ran for president of Ukraine? In the elections, Gennady Balashov received some ridiculously low numbers of support, partly because his electorate went to Volodymyr Zelenskyy. And, as it turned out, not in vain! A representative of Zelenskyy in the Rada just stated that his “Servant of the People” party will run in the parliamentary elections with a libertarian program.

Of course, judging by current polls, the chances of the libertarian party of Ukraine obtaining an absolute majority in the Rada are slim, and they will have to form a coalition, but slow and steady wins the race; this is already significantly more than one could have hoped for. I congratulate our neighbors on this stroke of luck; the cat that came out of the bag turned out to be exactly the right kind of cat.

Ukraine as a trendsetter

Until now, this predominantly theoretical channel had only one post dedicated to the Ukrainian presidential elections, where I informed readers about the nomination of libertarian Gennady Balashov. But, as we all saw, a slightly different person won in the first round—Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the main character of the series “Servant of the People” about a populist’s journey from the people to the presidency.

If the world’s leading movie empire keeps even a slight eye on foreign election technologies, then I think a decision is already ripening in the depths of the Democratic Party to suggest that Kevin Spacey, the main character of the first five seasons of “House of Cards,” run in the primaries. Who, if not him, is capable of defeating Trump in 2020?

But those are overseas affairs, not very interesting. Meanwhile, here in Russia, and moreover, among Russian libertarians, we have our own professional screenwriter. How about filming a TV series “The New Federative Treaty” by 2024? I usually get lost in front of the camera, but here I’d even agree to an episodic role as “the girl with the sign.” I’ve already thought of the sign. It will feature Zalina Marshenkulova and the caption “Federation Pose: people on top.”

By the way, about the signs. The episode, of course, should be filmed at Lenin Square in Novosibirsk (the central square where almost no one is allowed except communists), and this is also an interesting technology that I haven’t heard of before. Imagine the announcements: “The filming crew of the series ‘The New Federative Treaty’ invites those wishing to appear as extras in the role of rally participants. Filming will take place then and there; the square accommodates up to 10,000 people. We cannot provide payment, but every participant will receive a souvenir badge. Please bring your own posters, flags, and other attributes.”

Switch from the Moscow bottle to the federalization of Siberia