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Sinteres posted:You obviously don't think Russia's doing all of this to overthrow Lukashenko either, so I don't know what point you're trying to make with that response. He doesn't have to overthrow Lukashenko? There's little reason to do that, its much more likely he'll be told to shutup and color.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 00:55 |
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# ? May 24, 2024 17:02 |
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Least Reassuring Message 2022
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 00:56 |
i'm sure this is no shock to anyone but looks like Ukraine's position is that those explosions posted earlier by that nazi guy were russian shells https://twitter.com/christogrozev/status/1495510868607516683
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 01:00 |
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Lukashenko plays the game pretty well. He's well aware that he's running a client state and has to follow Moscow's lead, on the other hand he knows that Moscow would prefer a client buffer state in place in Belarus rather than annexing it outright, so as long as he doesn't cross any red lines he can do whatever he likes.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 01:10 |
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I could see Russia trying to force some sort of basing deal down Batka's throat so they can keep substantial forces just across the border from Kiev even if they do draw down their present deployments. Then again I'm not actually clear on the specifics of present security agreements between Russia and Belarus so this might already exist.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 01:27 |
Vincent Van Goatse posted:I could see Russia trying to force some sort of basing deal down Batka's throat so they can keep substantial forces just across the border from Kiev even if they do draw down their present deployments. Then again I'm not actually clear on the specifics of present security agreements between Russia and Belarus so this might already exist. You can read up on “Union State” for the agreements specifics. In short, mutual defence treaty, shared military doctrine, joint use of military infrastructure - countries are quite well integrated in that dimension, but the relationship has always been thorny. Or was thorny, since Lukashenko sold himself out over 2020 “election” bailout.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 01:46 |
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Vincent Van Goatse posted:You're probably right, but look at it this way: Don't you think it's been madness to expand east NATO presence in the last 20 years, and then expect Russia to stay calm and not retaliate some way?
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:11 |
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Knightsoul posted:Don't you think it's been madness to expand east NATO presence in the last 20 years, and then expect Russia to stay calm and not retaliate some way? No, there's a reason all those countries were begging to get into NATO. Putin is proving why NATO expansion was necessary. Poor Putin. All those mean people are forcing him to be an imperialist rear end in a top hat.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:16 |
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Knightsoul posted:Don't you think it's been madness to expand east NATO presence in the last 20 years, and then expect Russia to stay calm and not retaliate some way? The Eastern European nations joined NATO willingly and had plenty of motivation to do so after 50 years of Russian occupation. What gives Russia the right to retaliate against sovereign states that join defensive alliances?
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:19 |
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Joining NATO was equated with joining the Western European order. Post-Soviet Russia wanted in on it too.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:19 |
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NATO was looking pretty obsolete and moribund until Putin just so happened to remind all it's members why the organization is useful in a post cold war world.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:20 |
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Maybe Russia wouldn't feel so threatened if it spend the last few decades making allies instead of enemies.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:22 |
sounds like a bad sign https://twitter.com/howardfineman/status/1495563857280081920
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:25 |
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eke out posted:sounds like a bad sign This seems extremely far-fetched.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:27 |
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https://twitter.com/AFP/status/1495562132947095557 https://twitter.com/AFP/status/1495565091353526275
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:28 |
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Sir Bobert Fishbone posted:This seems extremely far-fetched. I am not buying it either, would surely be more widely reported
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:28 |
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Invading Ukraine "in its entirety" is something Russia's military is logistically incapable of, and they know it. More importantly, trying to occupy the entire country would result in far too many dead Russians and Ukrainian relatives of Russians to be acceptable domestically.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:29 |
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Conspiratiorist posted:Joining NATO was equated with joining the Western European order. I do feel the West made a huge mistake generally in not basically providing post-Soviet Russia with Marshall Plan levels of foreign aid; they got a little during Bush Sr, but it dried up due to domestic political issues and a strong desire domestically for a "peace dividend" and a severe cutting back on military spending. If Russia was given some kind of associative membership into the EEC right around 1992 and avoided Shock Therapy because the aid would've allowed for state ownership to continue to function long enough for the economic transition to a mixed market economy; the world would've been a very different place and the US would have a northern flank on China right now. Conspiratiorist posted:Invading Ukraine "in its entirety" is something Russia's military is logistically incapable of, and they know it. More importantly, trying to occupy the entire country would result in far too many dead Russians and Ukrainian relatives of Russians to be acceptable domestically. How so? War isn't just about comparing numbers, otherwise Barbarossa wouldn't have gotten as far as it did against the Red Army's 50,000 tanks and 20,000 planes.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:29 |
sounds like macron got them both to agree separately 'in principle' but https://twitter.com/kaitlancollins/status/1495564034619416584 considering biden reportedly cancelled family plans to remain in Washington tonight and Macron got off the phone with Putin at like 2:45am Moscow time, feels like everyone thinks something is going to happen soon eke out fucked around with this message at 02:34 on Feb 21, 2022 |
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:30 |
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Raenir Salazar posted:I do feel the West made a huge mistake generally in not basically providing post-Soviet Russia with Marshall Plan levels of foreign aid; they got a little during Bush Sr, but it dried up due to domestic political issues and a strong desire domestically for a "peace dividend" and a severe cutting back on military spending. If Russia was given some kind of associative membership into the EEC right around 1992 and avoided Shock Therapy because the aid would've allowed for state ownership to continue to function long enough for the economic transition to a mixed market economy; the world would've been a very different place and the US would have a northern flank on China right now. This is very true, but I am not sure EEC membership would not have made things worse. A lot of sectors of economy just weren't very competitive -- sure, Russia has a lot of extraction, but that only helps so much for people in other jobs.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:39 |
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Conspiratiorist posted:Invading Ukraine "in its entirety" is something Russia's military is logistically incapable of, and they know it. More importantly, trying to occupy the entire country would result in far too many dead Russians and Ukrainian relatives of Russians to be acceptable domestically. If they do invade, I think bluffing that they intend the attack to be more serious than it really is so they can intimidate the government into collapse and/or send the country into disarray and/or appear to make concessions when they stop short of those maximalist goals might make sense, but yeah I really really don't think anything beyond Kiev seems very realistic, and even Kiev seems like a longshot to me.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:39 |
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Raenir Salazar posted:How so? War isn't just about comparing numbers, otherwise Barbarossa wouldn't have gotten as far as it did against the Red Army's 50,000 tanks and 20,000 planes. Taking cities is a bitch and a half and under Russian doctrine involves turning them into rubble, plus the Western half of Ukraine would be an insurgency nightmare for sustained occupation. Even if we assumed that domestically they were willing to accept >10k dead Russian troops over the course of a week, >50k dead civilians would be unacceptable given Ukraine's close cultural and historical ties with Russia. Vlad's looking for a realistic win here. They'll take Mariupol. If they're feeling real dangerous they'll push to the Dnieper. Beyond that? Far too much to lose for little gain. Sinteres posted:If they do invade, I think bluffing that they intend the attack to be more serious than it really is so they can intimidate the government into collapse and/or send the country into disarray and/or appear to make concessions when they stop short of those maximalist goals might make sense, but yeah I really really don't think anything beyond Kiev seems very realistic, and even Kiev seems like a longshot to me. Yeah. I've said it before but Western media pushing the optics that taking Kyiv is in the cards means it can be used as an apparent compromise. I believe Russians have been at the least feeding this kind of info to leaky divisions to have it make its way to the media. Conspiratiorist fucked around with this message at 02:49 on Feb 21, 2022 |
# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:46 |
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A Russian siege/conquest of Kiev would be a tremendous disaster for everyone involved but especially the civilians. If there's an invasion, which seems more likely than it did two weeks ago, I'm still hoping it's just "we have a land bridge to Crimea now and Donetsk et al are ours or autonomous, please contact your local Russian artillery battalion with any objections and we'll get back to you real soon".
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:48 |
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Generation Internet posted:The Eastern European nations joined NATO willingly and had plenty of motivation to do so after 50 years of Russian occupation. It's not a question of "rights" or "wrongs", it's just the reality of geopolitics. Russia since 5 centuries ago has been an empire, and like every other empire its mindset is determined by spheres of influence: Russia right now is a shadow of the former Soviet Union, but still can't accept that an alien organization to her (NATO) expands to its very doorsteps. It's very reasonable, if you're smart enough to undertand that geopolitics rules didn't die with the end of cold war era. In 2008, at the bucharest convention, our genius NATO officers declared boldly that we would integrate into our happy family called NATO, countries like Ukraine and Georgia. THAT was a turning point. Do you remember what happened just 8 days later? Let me remind it to you: russians tanks were freely running up Georgia's rear end while Georgia's president was cryin' on the phone with french president Sarkozy, asking for a westerner intervention and in response the french told him to shut the gently caress up and wait for the end of russians operations. Hilarious, isn't it? All this mess called "ukrainian crisis" is all on our western shoulders, and in the end (a bitter end) only Ukrainians people will pay the price: the price for have tried to pretend to be more than an ant on the shoulder of the russian bear. Knightsoul fucked around with this message at 02:59 on Feb 21, 2022 |
# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:51 |
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i cannot accept the idea of putin being stupid enough to try to occupy the entire ukraine much less use reserve troops to try to do it??? Occupying is a lot harder than invading see: iraq/afghanistan. so wouldn't you use the dudes who are in their prime and have actual recent experience fighting vs a dental hygenist who trains on weekends???
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:54 |
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Conspiratiorist posted:Taking cities is a bitch and a half and under Russian doctrine involves turning them into rubble, plus the Western half of Ukraine would be an insurgency nightmare for sustained occupation. All your analysis is reasonable.. assuming Putin's thinking is reasonable. There have been plenty of times where leaders, especially those kinda racist towards their enemy (which Putin near certainly is) have done outrageously dumb poo poo because they were too arrogant of their supposed superiority to their enemies. See e.g. Churchill and Gallipoli (yes, I know it wasn't entirely his idea, but the original idea of his might have been worse --- 1) force the straits 2)??? 3) Victory! )
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:57 |
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For context, the Russian approach to successful city fighting is very straightforward: First, level the block you're advancing into with artillery and airstrikes. Second, advance with recon infantry teams that put thermobaric RPGs into any remaining structures that might house possible points of resistance. Third, advance with general infantry backed by armor to clear anything that isn't dead, dying, or wishing it was. It's real loving bad and Russian leadership knows it looks real loving bad. They'll avoid it as much as possible.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:57 |
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Knightsoul posted:In 2018, at the bucharest convention, our genius NATO officers declared boldly that we would integrate into our happy family called NATO, countries like Ukraine and Georgia. you mean 2008 right also Ukraine wouldn't be such an albatross around putin's neck if he had kept the bodycount under 1000 like he did in Georgia. Every drop of blood shed will make this worse for him. The Germans don't want to cancel Nordstream 2 but they will not countenance the massive loss of life that an invasion of Ukraine would involve
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:58 |
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Knightsoul posted:It's not a question of "rights" or "wrongs", it's just the reality of geopolitics. This is all very new information to the thread, especially the part where Russia's actions aren't even 1% Russia's fault. Thank you.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 02:59 |
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Conspiratiorist posted:For context, the Russian approach to successful city fighting is very straightforward: Putin’s also seems to want Ukraine so bad in part for sentimental nationalist reasons. He commonly says Russians and Ukrainians are both descended from Kievan Rus. Is he willing then to obliterate Kyiv from the map?
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:00 |
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Conspiratiorist posted:For context, the Russian approach to successful city fighting is very straightforward: Why would they try to avoid that? If they’re already seen as the bad guys, does being “really bad” mean much?
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:01 |
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Knightsoul posted:It's not a question of "rights" or "wrongs", it's just the reality of geopolitics. I'm obviously sympathetic to that viewpoint in an amoral pure geopolitics sense, but the ant on the shoulder of the Russian bear part seriously reads like comic book villain language. Or maybe Erdogan.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:01 |
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SopWATh posted:Why would they try to avoid that? If they’re already seen as the bad guys, does being “really bad” mean much? See VVV BIG FLUFFY DOG posted:Putin’s also seems to want Ukraine so bad in part for sentimental nationalist reasons. He commonly says Russians and Ukrainians are both descended from Kievan Rus. Is he willing then to obliterate Kyiv from the map?
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:03 |
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Conspiratiorist posted:Taking cities is a bitch and a half and under Russian doctrine involves turning them into rubble, plus the Western half of Ukraine would be an insurgency nightmare for sustained occupation. I'm not sure if its necessary to "take" kyiv. Destroying Ukraine's army in the field and sweeping to the Dniepr is presumably within their means; fording the river could be difficult but then again that's why they have Belarus to flank around and tie up forces at Kyiv. They don't have to take it to turn it into a massive drain of resources from the overall defence. They could probably take up to the city limits and then sit there; to tie up forces and make it easier to force a crossing further south and then roll up the city from the other side; by which point the war is probably over. If the game plan *is* to fully occupy Ukraine then Ukraine absolutely needs to defend the river, potentially even pulling back from Eastern Ukraine to defend it, they probably for political reasons absolutely cannot do that which is what gives Russia its opening. Because if Ukraine's heavy equipment is ablated from air and ballistic missile fires and their organization a mess from being pushed back from the east to the river; there's not a lot they can do. That's another issue as well; if Ukraine's military is caught in a rout and is trying to cross the bridges or on ferries to get to the other side; that's highly chaotic and they might not be able to blow the bridges in time before they're taken by special forces. BIG FLUFFY DOG posted:i cannot accept the idea of putin being stupid enough to try to occupy the entire ukraine much less use reserve troops to try to do it??? Occupying is a lot harder than invading see: iraq/afghanistan. so wouldn't you use the dudes who are in their prime and have actual recent experience fighting vs a dental hygenist who trains on weekends??? If the war is quick enough they don't have to be there for long.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:04 |
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SopWATh posted:Why would they try to avoid that? If they’re already seen as the bad guys, does being “really bad” mean much? They're seen I think more as like, the Grinch of Europe by most of Western Europe. This scary grumpy party pooper who lurks on the edges of town, but most of his unsavory actions happened in dark exotic corners of the continent (like Chechnya) so you can ignore it and it doesn't seem like it's happening in town. This would elevate them to straight up Sauron, and they'd be hacking up much more clearly European areas right in their front yard, sending quite a few of them scattering into EU territory. Kinda similar to Turkey, who does the really ugly stuff in Syria and considerably more Middle Eastern areas, and just sticks their tongue out in the European direction. Yeah there's Cyprus, but that happened forever ago at this point, and also only lovely British tourists seem to remember it exists anyway. Instead like imagine Turkey invading Greece all the way to Athens or some poo poo, instead of war criming quietly and out of sight in the Syrian desert. That's Russia full on invading Ukraine.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:06 |
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Raenir Salazar posted:If the war is quick enough they don't have to be there for long. But then you aren't talking about invading "in it's entirety", Raenir. That's the part that involves taking cities. Destroying the totality of Ukraine's airforce, C3 nodes, support bases, and any force concentration capable of making a counter-advance while pounding garrisons into dust with artillery and airstrikes is a matter of course for any plan that involves pushing into Ukrainian territory.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:08 |
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SopWATh posted:Why would they try to avoid that? If they’re already seen as the bad guys, does being “really bad” mean much? They’re seen as the bad guys in the west which they don’t care about. Russian state media is heavily invested in portraying Russians as the good guys. A leveled city that Russians can actually point to on a map would be difficult to hide or censor.
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:13 |
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BIG FLUFFY DOG posted:They’re seen as the bad guys in the west which they don’t care about. Russian state media is heavily invested in portraying Russians as the good guys. A leveled city that Russians can actually point to on a map would be difficult to hide or censor. Yeah, they can censor TV but they can't really censor family ties. (Heck, I have relatives in Moscow myself).
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:15 |
https://twitter.com/alexbward/status/1495584075209392129 seems like the US side thinks they agreed to something that's not really likely to happen
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:34 |
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# ? May 24, 2024 17:02 |
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Knightsoul posted:It's not a question of "rights" or "wrongs", it's just the reality of geopolitics. I know right. If all these pesky former soviet republics allowed themselves to be dominated economically and militarily by Russia, they could enjoy the freedom, sovereignty, dignity, and booming economic growth that Belarus does. I'm currently pitching a movie script where Putin mercilessly beats his wife while weeping and saying, "Look at what you made me do!" That poor guy. (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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# ? Feb 21, 2022 03:39 |