|
Deltasquid posted:The EU is more credible and has stronger structures than NATO. (...)
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 16:49
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 28, 2024 19:02 |
|
|
I find it hard to see how the EU is more credible considering that at this point they are funding Russia's war crimes by keeping buying fuels, it doesn't help that Hungary holds a veto over any meaningful action.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 16:54
|
|
|
Alchenar posted:Cool. Who is the EU's equivalent of SACEUR? Does it matter? If e.g. France wants to send troops to Finland's defence, they can (despite any "German veto" or whatever), and they are legally required to. That was the original point I was making. For whatever it's worth, I imagine it'll be the EUMC or EUMS stepping up to that role in the hypothesis that they need it to.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 16:55
|
|
|
To be honest the “Taiwan is an island” thing cuts both ways. On one hand it’s much harder to conduct a successful opposed landing into very mountainous terrain. On the other hand it’d be easier to blockade it as well and prevent foreign aid from arriving, as well as simply trying to choke the country out. Also yeah after HK I don’t see peaceful reunification any time soon, and while invading Taiwan would be incredibly stupid we live in an age of stupid miracles - invading Ukraine was supposed to be dumb as hell too.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 16:56
|
|
|
Warmachine posted:Maybe I'm naive, but I still don't see how the powers-that-be in either country would risk open war over Taiwan. Both China and the US are keenly aware how interdependent they are, and while China could probably retool and develop economic independence faster, is the cost really worth trading over a small but embarrassing island? It has little to do with how interdependent the two countries are, Tiawan is the lynch pin to the world semiconductor (and obviously the overall tech sector) trade. The US is trying to bring that home but give them another 20 years and trillions spent before writing off that “embarrassing little island.”
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 16:58
|
|
PerilPastry posted:If this were so and the mutual defense clause had teeth why is Finland contemplating sheltering under the NATO umbrella? Because over 40% of global defense spending happen outside EU but inside NATO? (39% US, 3% UK, 1,1% Canada, 0.9% Turkey)
|
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:06
|
|
|
Deltasquid posted:Does it matter? If e.g. France wants to send troops to Finland's defence, they can (despite any "German veto" or whatever), and they are legally required to. That was the original point I was making. here's the main issue: these aren't enforceable laws. that the EU's mutual defense pact sounds stronger than NATO's doesn't make it more credible. the main issue here is that the EU does many things, NATO does one thing. if NATO disregards Article 5, it's done. it is a dead letter, because it has no purpose anymore. if the EU disregards its mutual defense components, the rest of the EU can simply hum along without automatically collapsing like NATO does. this makes NATO's deterrent much more credible - which is why it is viewed internationally as more credible. it is also worth noting, of course, that one huge advantage NATO has that the EU does not have is the membership of the world's largest military and one that many EU militaries are partially designed around being supported by
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:07
|
|
|
Tomn posted:To be honest the “Taiwan is an island” thing cuts both ways. On one hand it’s much harder to conduct a successful opposed landing into very mountainous terrain. On the other hand it’d be easier to blockade it as well and prevent foreign aid from arriving, as well as simply trying to choke the country out.  Taiwan is a lot closer to Officially Japan Islands than you might think, and if China blockades those islands as well it has essentially declared war on Japan, so I think a naval blockade would have some issues. Granted you would have a very hard time bringing a lot of stuff to the east coast of Taiwan, and it would make sense for Taiwan to expand some capacity to receive shipments in that area...
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:10
|
|
|
KitConstantine posted:On that note - not sure if this is the full reporters briefing or an individual interview, but the thread is interesting. This quote seems the most apropos at the moment At this rate wont have anything to parade on May 9th. They need to immediately start fixing the old stock vehicles to parade in the Red Square.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:11
|
|
|
Risky Bisquick posted:At this rate wont have anything to parade on May 9th. They need to immediately start fixing the old stock vehicles to parade in the Red Square. They could use the Armatas for something at least
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:12
|
|
|
fatherboxx posted:Just managed to connect and call, learned that they were able to get to Taganrog in Rostov region today (at least some military are decent people so they got them through border past filtration etc), grandmother is getting medical care, family already driving from Volgograd to pick them up, hopefully tomorrow we will be able to take care of them. hell yeah dude 
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:13
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:here's the main issue: these aren't enforceable laws. that the EU's mutual defense pact sounds stronger than NATO's doesn't make it more credible. I strongly disagree with this part, if parts of the EU can be invaded and potentially occupied without the EU doing anything then it's dead as a political union.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:15
|
|
|
Der Kyhe posted:Cynic in me says that "we get to hear several heart-breaking eulogies for the Finnish people" because Germany will block all economic sanctions and EU activities that might hurt their economy, and Hungary will block all NATO assistance. That is a weird and insane take. The integrity of the EU is viewed by Germany and France as a matter of utmost priority for national security and both view a threat to the EU as a direct existential threat to themselves.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:16
|
|
|
https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1511667387124301827 https://twitter.com/John_Hudson/status/1511679112317915141 Christ, I cannot imagine what those 100,000+ people are going through right now.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:23
|
|
|
Alchenar posted:Cool. Who is the EU's equivalent of SACEUR? Considering the bulk of the EU is also in NATO, I'm fairly certain that the answers you seek here are fairly similar.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:24
|
|
|
Youth Decay posted:https://twitter.com/KyivIndependent/status/1511667387124301827 i am guessing the russians are just shooting everyone they see and claiming "azov" or "nazi". its gonna be the future of any city they take probably.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:25
|
|
|
Nessus posted:
while naval blockades remain Officially An Act Of War that was famously flouted in the Cuban Missile Crisis by simply declaring the blockade was not a blockade so that it wasn't an act of war, and then seeing if anyone was going to start a war over it. as a practical matter, the same thing would apply. but as discussed below, that's just not at all the chinese plan: Tomn posted:To be honest the “Taiwan is an island” thing cuts both ways. On one hand it’s much harder to conduct a successful opposed landing into very mountainous terrain. On the other hand it’d be easier to blockade it as well and prevent foreign aid from arriving, as well as simply trying to choke the country out. the issue with this theory is that navies are one of those things where it's mostly the money you spend that matters (as opposed to, say, infantry where you can spend a lot but at the end of the day you've got squishy humans that can be shot at with low-tech weapons). its very symmetric, as opposed to the asymmetric kinds of wars that the US can underperform in (occupying territory). the united states has spent a lot of money on its navy. a lot. a staggering amount. the us navy outclasses the navies of the rest of the world combined by a genuinely staggering degree. the only way china can potentially blockade taiwan is if they have really capable anti-ship missiles that can be deployed on land to cover the whole area without needing to actually have the chinese navy acting as a picket force around taiwan, because they'll get destroyed by american carrier groups. that would be picking a fight with the united states on the most symmetric basis possible, playing into the strengths of the united states as much as possible. that is, uh, not the plan. my understanding is that the chinese plans to invade taiwan largely revolve around using anti-ship missiles, missile strikes on taiwan, and china's relatively modest navy to clear the actual corridor between china and taiwan and enough of the space around it, then rush troops through to land on taiwan and try to seize the island and set up defenses before american carrier groups can respond and destroy the invasion force at sea (because once the land forces are on the island and control some part of it, you can't retake the island with just carrier groups). it's definitely not to enact a naval blockade and try to starve it out, because then you're getting into a naval battle on as unfavorable terms as possible. the basic idea is that perhaps anti-ship missies are an effective asymmetric warfare against the us navy (my understanding is this is hotly debated if they have actually managed this and how effective they would be, but with real risk they are right) so you can create an area where the us navy cannot effectively operate within that missile range, then try to use that opening to make a landing, and then you have a land war which does not play to the US strengths.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:28
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:here's the main issue: these aren't enforceable laws. that the EU's mutual defense pact sounds stronger than NATO's doesn't make it more credible. I sincerely doubt that "the rest of the EU can simply hum along without automatically collapsing like NATO does" because the territorial integrity of the internal market is pretty essential to its functioning. Part or the entirety of a state being occupied is one hell of a non-tariff barrier... And yes, I do agree that NATO has many advantages over the EU simply by virtue of being specialised and having the USA in it. That's beyond dispute. But I do think that the EU mutual defence pact has teeth and assuming that the EU's member states will sit by idly while Russia invades one of them, while at the same time arguing that NATO would more credibly intervene, is both politically and legally unsound. the EU is united on many more things than NATO is, judging by the general reluctance of Member States to engage in American adventurism in the Middle East (comparatively speaking...) and the previous US Administration's questioning of NATO's raison d'être...
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:30
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:while naval blockades remain Officially An Act Of War that was famously flouted in the Cuban Missile Crisis by simply declaring the blockade was not a blockade so that it wasn't an act of war, and then seeing if anyone was going to start a war over it. as a practical matter, the same thing would apply. Anti-ship missiles also have notorious difficulty in destroying submarines. Which the US has a lot of. And Submarines are particularly good at removing surface vessels and other submarines. China would be reduced to attempting to take Taiwan entirely by air, and uh, we've seen how well that works out...
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:35
|
|
|
It's pretty impressive that during maybe the strongest showing of unity from "the west" in decades people are still arguing that countries in that group will be left out to dry because ??? No NATO Isn't going to just let Russia invade the Baltics, the EU won't let Finland be taken over. Ukraine less than a decade ago was solidly in Russia's "sphere of influence" and they are currently not only recieving billions of dollars in aid but also benefiting from levels of sanctions on Russia that, let's be honest, seemed insane at the start of the war. Now take a country like Finland that is economically, socially, culturally and financially integrated into the west. The "west" from Germany and France to the US and UK would have a decision to make. Continue the policy of ensuring peace in their sphere of influence which has been beneficial for all parties, or let it all fall apart. Russian forces would burn. NATO and the EU wouldn't push into Russia, that would give them justification to use nukes, but the conventional force used would be overwhelming, if for no other reason than to put rest to the idea that anyone could do such a thing in the future. I have no idea what would happen with Taiwan, but attacking Europe? Lol.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:36
|
|
|
Speaking of Hungary, Orban has just announced Hungary will start paying for Russian gas in Rubles. https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/hungary-working-solution-pay-russian-gas-may-foreign-minister-2022-04-06/
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:38
|
|
|
ranbo das posted:It's pretty impressive that during maybe the strongest showing of unity from "the west" in decades people are still arguing that countries in that group will be left out to dry because ??? ukraine is very specifically not getting the aid that we're talking about : militaries of other countries helping them destroy things and kill people as opposed to providing material for ukraine to do it itself. that deterrent is credible, which is why ukraine desperately wanted to be part of NATO and it is very unfortunate it was not. the question is if EU membership alone is enough deterrent compared to NATO as well. it appears Finland, for one, does not believe it is as much of a deterrent - and we're talking more gradations of which is a better deterrent. Finland's choice appears to signal that NATO is a better deterrent than the EU. and remember: the whole point is to have the deterrent credible enough the invasion is deterred. ukraine's invasion was, clearly, not deterred, so there's clearly some work to do on deterring future invasions.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:43
|
|
|
Deltasquid posted:I sincerely doubt that "the rest of the EU can simply hum along without automatically collapsing like NATO does" because the territorial integrity of the internal market is pretty essential to its functioning. Part or the entirety of a state being occupied is one hell of a non-tariff barrier... The absence of US, UK and Turkey would be very extremely significant, but OTOH I don't think the US would manage to keep its dick out of any war the whole of EU is involved in. Same for the UK. evilweasel posted:ukraine is very specifically not getting the aid that we're talking about : militaries of other countries helping them destroy things and kill people as opposed to providing material for ukraine to do it itself. that deterrent is credible, which is why ukraine desperately wanted to be part of NATO and it is very unfortunate it was not. For Finland, I think they definitely see an advantage in deterrance. Even if the practical response would be 90% the same, joing a dedicated defense organization is a clear message that they don't like what russia is doing and want the maximum security guarantees possible, including credible nuclear threat. (in addition to  of course)
mobby_6kl fucked around with this message at 17:49 on Apr 6, 2022 |
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:45
|
|
|
Atreiden posted:I strongly disagree with this part, if parts of the EU can be invaded and potentially occupied without the EU doing anything then it's dead as a political union. It’s not really a political union though and that’s the root of many of its problems. It is trying to become one.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:46
|
|
|
Concerned Citizen posted:i can't find any corroboration for this at all, i don't see when ukraine has advanced that far. Saw this earlier: “Ukraine army entered Sinuhuriyka, 7km (4.3mi) east of Kherson. Forces are said to be anywhere between 20-12km in the vicinity. So far so good. Unsubstantiated rumors that Russia is planning to leave the city.”
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:47
|
|
|
https://twitter.com/georgegalloway/status/1511729349204103170
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:48
|
|
|
Regardless of how credible you consider the EU's security clauses to be, it still behooves Finland to join NATO as well since the latter includes the 800lb gorilla that is the US.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:49
|
|
|
Oh George can we go through your finances and donations and verify your status as not a Russian backed supporter? Oh..
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:50
|
|
|
Re: EU vs. NATO -- The American presence in NATO offers it a radically different level of nuclear deterrence. No NATO state will ever have its sovereignty questioned by a non-nuclear state, ever, period, full stop. And everyone knows it. (If a NATO member state has its sovereignty questioned by a nuclear state, there's another thread for that, but it also probably won't happen) I'm sure Ukraine would take either or both at this existentially significant moment, but I'm not surprised that in general NATO feels like a stronger security guarantee for the existence of a state.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:52
|
|
|
it's very funny that he did not delete the Sputnik links from his bio until a bunch of people in the @s pointed it out and screenshotted it
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:54
|
|
|
evilweasel posted:ukraine is very specifically not getting the aid that we're talking about : militaries of other countries helping them destroy things and kill people as opposed to providing material for ukraine to do it itself. that deterrent is credible, which is why ukraine desperately wanted to be part of NATO and it is very unfortunate it was not. NATO has one major benefit over the EU that I can see, which is US Air Power. The US may or may not come to the aid of a EU nation, whereas you can be certain it would come to the aid of a NATO nation. EU countries do have US supplied equipment for their air forces in a lot of places, but the US is really the undisputed king of the air, and has such stocks of precision air-launched munitions as to render any standing army (such as Russia's) absolutely moot. Plus there's the fact that Russian air power, while it has not been able to obtain supremacy in Ukraine, it is still effective enough to hurt/limit Ukraine's army. Being able to wipe that off the board within hours would be quite significant. It is quite possible that the EU's combined air power would be able to handle the Russian air force, however I still suspect it's lacking in sufficient stores of guided munitions. This may change after Ukraine, but Finland's likely thinking of the near future with a move to NATO.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 17:59
|
|
|
Fray posted:Regardless of how credible you consider the EU's security clauses to be, it still behooves Finland to join NATO as well since the latter includes the 800lb gorilla that is the US.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 18:00
|
|
|
VideoGameVet posted:Saw this earlier: I can't find any a trace of any such town. What is your source?
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 18:02
|
|
|
Probably Snihurivka? Edit: that's North of Kherson, but is about 5 mi East of Kherson oblast boundary. OddObserver fucked around with this message at 18:07 on Apr 6, 2022 |
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 18:03
|
|
|
Fully deserved as he's been repeatedly trying to make out that Bucha is a false flag, whilst avoiding directly saying so.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 18:06
|
|
|
https://twitter.com/BackAndAlive/status/1511751581749940240 Wild the defenders are still getting supplied. But wouldn't those commercial drones be very easy to jam?
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 18:11
|
|
|
Trump posted:https://twitter.com/BackAndAlive/status/1511751581749940240
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 18:11
|
|
|
Trump posted:https://twitter.com/BackAndAlive/status/1511751581749940240 They would be quite easy for a competent military with adequate SigInt equipment to jam, yes. Read into that what you will.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 18:12
|
|
|
OddObserver posted:Probably Snihurivka? Every town in Ukraine has like 5 different English spellings, such is the wonder of translating Cyrillic text.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 18:12
|
|
|
|
| # ? May 28, 2024 19:02 |
|
|
Not that it's something I want to happen anyway, but I have to imagine a Russian invasion of Finland would go...not well since they're falling on their face in Ukraine, burning through ostensibly the best of what they have, and Finland is getting time to prepare.
|
|
#
?
Apr 6, 2022 18:15
|
|
