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What is the most powerful flying bug? This poll is closed. |
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|---|---|---|---|
| 🦋 |
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15 | 3.71% |
| 🦇 |
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115 | 28.47% |
| 🪰 |
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12 | 2.97% |
| 🐦 |
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67 | 16.58% |
| dragonfly |
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94 | 23.27% |
| 🦟 |
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14 | 3.47% |
| 🐝 |
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87 | 21.53% |
| Total: | 404 votes | ||
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and indeed continue fighting for a whole year with strategies that seemed to take no account of the western military aid posing risks in ever increasing amounts
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Dec 4, 2022 18:38
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| # ? May 26, 2024 00:44 |
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Plus, Russia was pretty openly prepping for invasion more than a year ago, and these preparations were reported repeatedly in the press. So even more aid and Ukrainian preparations took place, faster than usual from ~14 months ago through the kickoff of Russian invasion and beyond. It’snot like Russia rolled in and then surprise, there was Western aid no one could have foreseen. Or beyond Western aid, years-long deliberate defenses made of stuff like earthworks, built by Ukraine post-2014.
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Dec 4, 2022 18:41
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lollontee posted:and indeed continue fighting for a whole year with strategies that seemed to take no account of the western military aid posing risks in ever increasing amounts Meh, the Russians had been focused on attrition for a while, it is they finally realized the US wanted to actually go whole hog. Their mistake was the falling to the same issue Russia has always have had, the West will never give them a fair shake and will always consider them inferior regardless of what they due and the only way to deal with Westerners is force of arms. As for the course of the war, the Russians got pushed out of Kherson but left in good order and have been hammering the Ukrainians quite hard for the past month and are slowly pushing towards Bakhmut. The war is going to be dragging on for quite a while. Ardennes has issued a correction as of 18:44 on Dec 4, 2022 |
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Dec 4, 2022 18:41
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lollontee posted:and indeed continue fighting for a whole year with strategies that seemed to take no account of the western military aid posing risks in ever increasing amounts biggest mistake seemed to believing they could roll in with such a small force and do a quick regime change, underestimated how Ukraine's military had improved since 2014. everything since that initial mistake has been snowball effect. like the western military aid didn't even play as big a role until well after it was clear Russia wasn't going to just roll in and turn the government over. honestly i suspect most of the biggest current western backers had low hopes of the Ukrainian government surviving the initial push too.
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Dec 4, 2022 18:43
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speng31b posted:biggest mistake seemed to believing they could roll in with such a small force and do a quick regime change, underestimated how Ukraine's military had improved since 2014. everything since that initial mistake has been snowball effect. That said, while Western aid has kept the Ukrainians in the fight and allowed them to push the Russians from Kherson, there has been a lot of issues with Western systems and honestly the Ukrainians are still not particularly well equipped. In addition, the Russians seem to bombing infrastructure pretty consistently. Basically, the right-wingers in the Kremlin were still dreaming of the 90s and in their hearts thought America was still secretly their friend/ally. They couldn't have been more wrong. The US had been ramping up aid before the Russian build up of troops, it was gear from the get go that Biden was spoiling for a fight. It was the Kremlin's issue they assumed it was simply a bluff not a sign that the US was trying to go for the throat.
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Dec 4, 2022 18:48
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everyone forgets the whole reason trump got impeached the first time, over his perfect beautiful phone call, was because he threatened to stop sending military aid to ukraine. in 2018 or so, after it had already been going on for years. the invasion this year was an escalation of the conflict that had already existed since 2014, and you can maybe argue that one side or the other was attempting to deescalate since then with the Minsk agreements but every major government involved was clearly unwilling or incapable of making the concessions necessary
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Dec 4, 2022 18:53
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^^^There's been articles posted in this very thread about how the Americans were ruing the lost opportunity in 2014 to bloody Russia up and they've spent the last 8 years building up Ukraine into the "mother of all proxy armies" to stomp the Russians when war inevitably broke out again, including training tens of thousands of Ukrainian soldiers in NATO military bases, building the most extensive set of field fortifications that have been seen in the world since the Maginot line, and ramping up military aid to levels unparalled outside of aid to Israel. The people pretending that America and Ukraine weren't looking for a war in the future with Russia and the invasion last spring was completely unprovoked and impossible to predict are disingenuous at best in many cases malevolent actors.Ardennes posted:As for the course of the war, the Russians got pushed out of Kherson but left in good order and have been hammering the Ukrainians quite hard for the past month and are slowly pushing towards Bakhmut. The war is going to be dragging on for quite a while. Yeah for as much as the Ukrainians were gloating about capturing or killing 20,000 Russians stranded on the wrong side of the river and how they had complete fire control over the only potential exits I'm surprised there wasn't more backlash to those 20,000 slipping quietly out the back door with like 99% of their equipment and vehicles while Ukraine had their entire attention focused on Kherson. Kind of seems like a pretty shocking failure on the part of the Ukrainians not to take full advantage of the best Russian units being in a potentially disastrous scenario, but it's not like Russia hasn't also been guilty of the same in previous engagements when Ukrainian forces were allowed to slip off the hook and get out of encirclements that looked impossible to escape. Only the Azov neanderthals were too stupid to escape when they had a chance and that was Ukraine's greatest defeat of the entire engagement so far, although if Ukraine is actually going to feed all their best remaining fighting forces into Bahkmut and the teeth of the concentrated Russian army that might change soon. Starsfan has issued a correction as of 18:58 on Dec 4, 2022 |
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Dec 4, 2022 18:53
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Ardennes posted:Meh, the Russians had been focused on attrition for a while, it is they finally realized the US wanted to actually go whole hog. Their mistake was the falling to the same issue Russia has always have had, the West will never give them a fair shake and will always consider them inferior regardless of what they due and the only way to deal with Westerners is force of arms. then what was the plan to begin with in occupying kherson, izium and all the rest of the areas that russia was pressured to retreat from in a hurry? the russians might've gotten their retreating into good order by the time that the order to abandon kherson had come, everything preceding that was a series of clown cars full of explosives driving away from encirclements while honking hilariously
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Dec 4, 2022 19:00
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Starsfan posted:Yeah for as much as the Ukrainians were gloating about capturing or killing 20,000 Russians stranded on the wrong side of the river and how they had complete fire control over the only potential exits I'm surprised there wasn't more backlash to those 20,000 slipping quietly out the back door with like 99% of their equipment and vehicles while Ukraine had their entire attention focused on Kherson. Kind of seems like a pretty shocking failure on the part of the Ukrainians not to take full advantage of the best Russian units being in a potentially disastrous scenario, but it's not like Russia hasn't also been guilty of the same in previous engagements when Ukrainian forces were allowed to slip off the hook and get out of encirclements that looked impossible to escape. Only the Azov neanderthals were too stupid to escape when they had a chance and that was Ukraine's greatest defeat of the entire engagement so far, although if Ukraine is actually going to feed all their best remaining fighting forces into Bahkmut and the teeth of the concentrated Russian army that might change soon. To be honest, I don't think the Ukrainians had anywhere near to full fire control over the bridges, but at the same time they were hitting them consistently enough and creating enough issues that the Russian position wasn't untenable. The Russians called it before they actually got into serious trouble. In the end, it didn't make a major strategic difference because the geography of the areas was too akward to mount offensives from and at best they were occupying a much of Ukrainian forces. Also, the Ukrainians had dumped a ton of men and equipment in previous offensives that had went no where on their own. So right now it is back to attrition with a renewed emphasis on hitting infrastructure, but I expect this war will be going on for months to come. lollontee posted:then what was the plan to begin with in occupying kherson, izium and all the rest of the areas that russia was pressured to retreat from in a hurry? the russians might've gotten their retreating into good order by the time that the order to abandon kherson had come, everything preceding that was a series of clown cars full of explosives driving away from encirclements while honking hilariously Kherson was just a stop point from the initial invasion, they were sitting there because there was no real reason to move and the Ukrainians were taking heavy losses to get it back. I guess because you are talking about Russians you can call it a "clown car" but honestly they have retreated in good order from honestly all the territories they lost with little equipment or prisoners captured. Admittedly, the Donbass offensive was more unclear as the Russians put a lot of effort for not much gain but arguably it is why they throttled back on it. Ardennes has issued a correction as of 19:06 on Dec 4, 2022 |
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Dec 4, 2022 19:02
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look, i just like clown cars full of bombs as a mental image is all. i wanna be one myself
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Dec 4, 2022 19:11
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lollontee posted:then what was the plan to begin with in occupying kherson, izium and all the rest of the areas that russia was pressured to retreat from in a hurry? the russians might've gotten their retreating into good order by the time that the order to abandon kherson had come, everything preceding that was a series of clown cars full of explosives driving away from encirclements while honking hilariously I mean from what I understand the Russians were allowed to just walk into Kherson on the second or third day of the conflict because of a shocking degree of negligence by the local Ukrainian forces in not detonating the bridges or putting up any sort of organized resistance despite forewarning of the Russian invasion.. Arguably this was at the point in time where the Russians were expecting the Ukrainian government to just collapse under pressure so advancing as far as the other side will let you probably didn't seem like it could come back to bite them in any way. Russia did a very good job defending Kherson during their time there, the Ukrainians never actually came close to putting any real pressure on the forces in the city to withdraw despite atleast two large offensives in that direction. The ground around Kherson is very unfavorable for attacking over (wide open) and it was unclear if Ukraine was ever going to be able to directly capture the city, if you take the Russian's word on it their calculus on holding that ground changed when it became apparent that the dams up the river were being threatened by Ukrainian artillery and a potential flooding situation could strand the Russian combat group in the city away from the rest of their forces and supplies. I can't speak for Izium except to point out that in the north and east it seems like there's been the lightest concentration of forces for both sides throughout the conflict and we've seen big swings in territory as one side advances, realizes they are over-extended and then get pushed back. For whatever reasons these towns around Kharkiv don't seem to factor in much to the strategy of either side. Ardennes posted:So right now it is back to attrition with a renewed emphasis on hitting infrastructure, but I expect this war will be going on for months to come. I can't see this ending anytime in the next couple years. The Russians seem to specialize in this protracted drawn out conflict and nothing about the way they are conducting their operations suggests to me that they are going to finish this with some sort of final grand offensive. Maybe the Ukrainians can mount a grand offensive in the spring (honestly I doubt it, but who knows) but even if the Ukrainians did re-capture all of their territories and push into the DPR and LPR I don't think that would end the war. I think Russia is quite content to fight this one out even from their borders and to keep going until they get what they want. Starsfan has issued a correction as of 19:17 on Dec 4, 2022 |
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Dec 4, 2022 19:11
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https://twitter.com/AdamBienkov/status/1599335366992875520
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Dec 4, 2022 19:15
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lmao
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Dec 4, 2022 19:18
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Ardennes posted:Kherson was just a stop point from the initial invasion, they were sitting there because there was no real reason to move and the Ukrainians were taking heavy losses to get it back. Did you forget that Russia announced that it annexed Kherson? And that you said the Ukrainian attack on Kherson was a disaster? Russian troops weren’t sitting there with no real reason to move. It’s the capital city of an Oblast that Russia claims is now part of Russia via conquest and supposed referendum. Ardennes posted:Their mistake was the falling to the same issue Russia has always have had, the West will never give them a fair shake and will always consider them inferior regardless of what they due and the only way to deal with Westerners is force of arms. I do not think that is a wise lesson. Yeah, sure having a credible defense and deterrence is good. Challenging the west with force of arms is not going well, even in a limited proxy fight. If nothing else, the west just has a lot of people and a lot of money, and that makes it hard for Russia to “deal with Westerners” through “force of arms.” Russia would have been better off not fighting this war at all and continuing to deepen its ties into European economies and their dependence on Russia. Or maybe going back in time and fighting this war much sooner. China is an example of a nation that is heavily investing in its military and developing capabilities and force structure to deter western intervention into its goals sphere of influence, but China also is happy to take economic rather than military advantage when America routinely decides to step on a rake. If Russia absolutely wanted to fight the war in Ukraine, go immediately for something like a land bridge to Crimea and then try for peace or armistice rather than trying to topple the whole Ukrainian regime through military might, especially when preparations are not made with effective secrecy.
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Dec 4, 2022 20:00
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Remember folks, if you strike, you're striking for Putin.
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Dec 4, 2022 20:01
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mlmp08 posted:Did you forget that Russia announced that it annexed Kherson? And that you said the Ukrainian attack on Kherson was a disaster? They simply annexed everything including territory that was marginal, Kherson was an administrative center but it isn't critical to the war. quote:I do not think that is a wise lesson. Yeah, sure having a credible defense and deterrence is good. Challenging the west with force of arms is not going well, even in a limited proxy fight. If nothing else, the west just has a lot of people and a lot of money, and that makes it hard for Russia to “deal with Westerners” through “force of arms.” Yeah... the West is far from all powerful and they are taking their own damage from this conflict. The issue was hoping the West would be easy on them rather going for the throat in the beginning and expecting it to be a no holds drag down fight to the end. Russia's weakness obviously is still it's exposure to liberalism and that its leadership are still in their hearts Westernizers. Either way the war was going to be fought and the nordstream 2 pipeline showed that the US wasn't going to allow deeper integration, maybe they should have gone in around Euromadian but again the issue was hoping the West would give them a fair shake (and the Russian military was also in worse shape at that point). Also, China had a different political trajectory and could industrialize and bide its time while Russia was trying to stablize itself well through the 2000s. The Russians made mistakes as well but it is more not devoting more funding into their military after 2014 with the expectation of the inevitability with a conflict with the West. Either way you slice it, the US has no plan expect for making life for the Russian population as nightmarish as possible, the failure of the Russians is not realizing this although views are starting to finally harden even in Moscow. The West is no friend, they're a blood enemy.
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Dec 4, 2022 20:19
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mlmp08 posted:I think Russia is bright enough to know Ukraine wasn't going to get into into NATO any time this decade. If you want to stick with proclaimed posturing counts as the Real Reason why the war happened, then Russia also claimed Ukraine isn't a real country and belongs to Russia... 
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Dec 4, 2022 20:22
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Ardennes posted:They simply annexed everything including territory that was marginal, Kherson was an administrative center but it isn't critical to the war. This runs counter to Russia’s claims. https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2022/9/30/putin-announces-russian-annexation-of-four-ukrainian-regions “At the ceremony on Friday, Putin said Russia has “four new regions”, calling the residents of Ukraine’s occupied Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia regions “our citizens forever”. “This is the will of millions of people,” he said in the speech before hundreds of dignitaries at the St George’s Hall of the Kremlin. “We will defend our land with all our strength and all our means,” he added, calling on “the Kyiv regime to immediately cease hostilities and return to the negotiation table”.
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Dec 4, 2022 20:23
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I don't think Putin saw the west as friends, but more like just didn't expect Germany and France to capitulate to American demands like that.
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Dec 4, 2022 20:23
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Lostconfused posted:I don't think Putin saw the west as friends, but more like just didn't expect Germany and France to capitulate to American demands like that. so he wasn't delusional, just really, really, collector's edition level stupid
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Dec 4, 2022 20:31
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 Beautiful! This is why I’m proud to be an American orc. Lok’tar semper fi.
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Dec 4, 2022 20:41
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indigi posted:so he wasn't delusional, just really, really, collector's edition level stupid I don't think anyone expected the west to go in as hard as they did. Same with the Ukrainian level of resistance. There was a post in the previous thread where some US army general was talking about how he expected Ukraine to fall almost immediately or something like that too. It's silly to look at everything in hindsight and go "wow this guy was really dumb huh?".
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Dec 4, 2022 20:41
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AnimeIsTrash posted:It's silly to look at everything in hindsight and go "wow this guy was really dumb huh?". He was contemporaneously considered very reckless and shortsighted to invade. And warned it would just straight suck for months on end before crossing the line into Ukraine. It’s not just hindsight at all. Hell, a lot of people who doubted Putin would order the invasion doubted it based on “that would be very stupid, so he won’t do it.”
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Dec 4, 2022 20:44
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AnimeIsTrash posted:I don't think anyone expected the west to go in as hard as they did. Same with the Ukrainian level of resistance. There was a post in the previous thread where some US army general was talking about how he expected Ukraine to fall almost immediately or something like that too. it's no real secret that a lot of the western Europeans not only expected but wanted Ukraine to lose quickly
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Dec 4, 2022 20:44
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Turtle Watch posted:
I'm glad someone saw it lol https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XQKdqxCla24 I've never edited a video before and I don't think I would again. I can't believe people do this for fun. It was through a sense of duty that I had to be the "What if Part of Me was about Orcs?" I wanted to see in the world. If I knew how I probably would have found shots closer to the music video in LOTR, done a better job with the cuts and score, synced up the Orkish music with the beats in Part of Me, but I am not technically inclined. If this is still bothering me tomorrow I'll pay someone on Fiver. Frosted Flake has issued a correction as of 20:53 on Dec 4, 2022 |
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Dec 4, 2022 20:47
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speng31b posted:it's no real secret that a lot of the western Europeans not only expected but wanted Ukraine to lose quickly which is why they cooperated with the US every step of the way? remember Germany pulling Nordstream 2 was a big deal and completely unnecessary at the time
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Dec 4, 2022 20:51
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indigi posted:so he wasn't delusional, just really, really, collector's edition level stupid Look on the bright side, european union commingling suicide is extremely funny.
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Dec 4, 2022 20:59
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mlmp08 posted:This runs counter to Russia’s claims. It is hot air, and in this case, it made more sense to retreat than to fight for it. Admittedly, they may have done completely have written off Kherson at the time but it is clear the Russians are not going to die to the last man for Ukrainian territory. The problem with Kharkov was they could have made the Ukrainian losses far more punishing and that is on them.
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Dec 4, 2022 21:05
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indigi posted:which is why they cooperated with the US every step of the way? remember Germany pulling Nordstream 2 was a big deal and completely unnecessary at the time https://www.businessinsider.com/germany-denies-boris-johnson-claim-it-wanted-ukraine-lose-quickly-2022-11 I don't really disbelieve that stuff like this was the initial attitude, even if they weren't loud about it and deny it now. the western euros got dragged along with NATO and the US, but I don't think they really wanted or expected protracted war that was going to hurt their own economies and make the US MIC that much richer and stronger https://www.politico.eu/article/vla...iting-from-war/ speng31b has issued a correction as of 21:07 on Dec 4, 2022 |
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Dec 4, 2022 21:05
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Frosted Flake posted:I'm glad someone saw it lol It was great! People are way too fixated on this dumb, pointless war, and they have forgotten about the humble orc heroes, male and female, who fight for their freedoms. Turtle Watch has issued a correction as of 21:08 on Dec 4, 2022 |
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Dec 4, 2022 21:06
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https://kprf.ru/announcements/114239.html - CPRF opens up branches in Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regionsDeepL Translation posted:On December 5 there will be Conferences to establish regional branches in Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions Donbass Devushka mentioned that the CPRF opened a branch in Lugansk too. If they had opened a branch in Donetsk it probably slipped my mind.
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Dec 4, 2022 21:21
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Wonder why the US doesn't fund the Russian communist party if they want to overthrow they putin regime so badly. Strange.
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Dec 4, 2022 21:55
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Slavvy posted:Wonder why the US doesn't fund the Russian communist party if they want to overthrow they putin regime so badly. Strange. I have some bad news about the CPRF...
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Dec 4, 2022 22:41
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mlmp08 posted:Plus, Russia was pretty openly prepping for invasion more than a year ago, and these preparations were reported repeatedly in the press. So even more aid and Ukrainian preparations took place, faster than usual from ~14 months ago through the kickoff of Russian invasion and beyond. Enough with the Pitler apologia. Based on the equipment involved, it is clear Russia was openly preparing for invasion for a century !
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Dec 4, 2022 23:04
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Telegram is saying some civilians in Luhansk were hung, with the excuse that they were passing on info to Ukraine. Apparently it was "pearl clutching" to express concern for civilians being similarly targeted by Ukraine in areas retaken.
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Dec 4, 2022 23:19
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Corky Romanovsky posted:Telegram is saying some civilians in Luhansk were hung, with the excuse that they were passing on info to Ukraine. War is a team sport; my team, right or wrong. 
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Dec 4, 2022 23:29
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УралВагонЗавод - УВЗ posted:Another shipment T72B3Ms also being shipped out in addition to the T-90s being built.
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Dec 5, 2022 00:06
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Majorian posted:War is a team sport; my team, right or wrong. thats why i supoprt the astros
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Dec 5, 2022 00:08
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Danann posted:(from t.me/uvznews/2270, via tgsa) Somehow reads like a note you find in Deadspace
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Dec 5, 2022 00:14
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| # ? May 26, 2024 00:44 |
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Frosted Flake posted:People talk about them not knowing how the machine of empire works and pressing buttons they've disconnected from anything, and I think that's true. At first it may have been to strip the wires out for profit, but now it feels like the disconnection has taken on a life of its own that they haven't fully grasped the implications of. I realize this is more evident probably in areas like covid, climate, the economy, but neoliberalism is really ... it's something. I don't think I fully understand what, but jfc.
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Dec 5, 2022 00:22
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