>>48378
>Just because the US govt aren't the good guys it doesn't mean those can be found in Moscow and Beijing.
Yeah, I'm not 12 or USian, I'm not interested in finding "the good guys".
For the rest of your reply, I'm going to interpret it as principally referring to this bit:
>Malcom Fraser: "Aus need Usa alliance for its defence but Aus only needs defending because of its Usa alliance". The same can be said of the countries gobbled up by nato in its expansion towards russia.
(That's a former aussy PM, btw) Well, I think my comment ("the same can be said...") is correct. In particular, this was/is literally the narrative peddled, for example, in the case of the Ukraine or Finland: "b-bu-but don't you know they need to invite the military apparatus of a far-away power to the borders of its designated enemy because of the threat posed by the latter?" conveniently ignoring that they are bringing about such threat by that very act.
>Also being neutral for small(er) countries just doesn't work.
It has worked for many decades. But anyway I'm not really talking about small countries. I'm talking about the geopolitical power balance, which mostly involves major countries.
>Russia has the same imperialist mindset as the US does.
>It's either naive to think that Russia would leave alone the small guys
Well, there are some differences (possibly inherent) between thassalocratic empires like the British, from whence the US empire follows, and a more typical tellurocratic empire (e.g. the Roman, Persian, Russian), but as I said, I'm not concerning myself with "the small guys". We can worry about them the day the exceptionalist empire goes back to mind its own business in its own corner of the world. And, as he >>48379 mentioned, it will be, then, arguably better for them in a hypothetical multipolar international arrangement, as they will be freer to pursue their promiscuous "multivectoring" to their hearts' content ;). Because the Russia today simply doesn't have the capability to do to "the small guys" in Europe what US can. Russia has demonstrated it will choose war rather than outright losing the "satellites" Bielorussia and Ukraine (which were more than once part of the same state and are populated by very close people) but all the propaganda about "the Russians are coming" that we hear from Atlanticist sources (e.g. both Sunak and Truss in their UK premiership pseudo-campaigns) is just that: war-time propaganda.
>if the US won't provoke her by making those into her clients
This framing is somewhat misleading. The term "client" or "client state" is typically used to describe economic dependence. By extending its military apparatus onto the borders of its designated adversaries, the US did/does something much more dangerous and threatening than simply "intrude" into "spheres of influence".
>so I rather assume the first situation in case of you.
Well, you would be wrong in either case. I have been explicit in previous discussions about the reason for my support for Moscow or Beijing in the geopolitical matters that involve them and Washington: in short, I want the sick global US hegemony replaced with a multipolar international arrangement that will provide us (Europe in general but my country in particular) with greater opportunity to exercise independence. (Of course, apart from that, I think supporting those two in their struggle to keep the Great Satan at bay also happens to be the historically-informed morally-correct position.)
>Same with China, and with the "separatists".
Among the "great powers", China is probably the farthest thing from a thassalocratic empire like the Britain and later USA. Ming China actually stopped itself from going on transoceanic conquest of colonies when it very much had the means.