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Kavros posted:Sometimes I really wonder what he thought he was going to be able to do, but with this nordstream stuff it just seems bafflingly irrational throughout. What was the play? Russia (and the USSR) has a long history of making bad faith public proposals (like the Stalin note, etc), which are not intended to be taken seriously, but are 'win-win' for Russia, and 'lose-lose' for the recipient. In the incredibly unlikely event Germany said Yes - bam, instantly a huge political wedge is driven in the Western bloc, which can be weaponised in propaganda, used to weaken support for Ukraine and provide hope to Russians that 'King Cotto.. I mean Gas' will deliver victory and divide Europe. But instead, if Germany goes on record as saying no? Bam, Russian propaganda is provided with material of the German government saying no to cheap gas, which will be used by its troll farms/useful idiots to blame Berlin for the winter gas price crunch and economic hardship. Its inevitable that at least some citizens will be susceptible to messaging blaming their government for causing the crisis, putting more pressure on Berlin to waver.
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Oct 12, 2022 21:11
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Ynglaur posted:If India and China want to be seen as global leaders, they need to start having opinions on questions such as "should one country genocide another country". "Both parties should resolve their differences through dialogue and consultation".
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Oct 12, 2022 22:06
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cinci zoo sniper posted:It’s the latter, a reasonably traditional deep-end mythology for Russia’s far right. Yeah, there are some truly amazingly batshit insane rabbitholes - like Formenko's New Chronology and its 'Jesus was actually a 12th century Byzantine Emperor, and all ancient history is popish lies to erase the wonderous achievements of the ancient global russian empire that once ruled the entire known world' thesis.
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Oct 18, 2022 15:02
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Edit: Oh lol the incident was on 29 September not today. That changes things. I assumed it was today, which given all the political chaos in the UK, made it more likely to be a deliberate Russian attempt to cause an incident to destabilise things (actively firing near it, not necessarily trying to shoot it down). Much less sure about that now. Tigey fucked around with this message at 17:01 on Oct 20, 2022 |
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Oct 20, 2022 16:56
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Ynglaur posted:Don't kid yourself. As soon as Russia evacuates--if they do--they will shell it into oblivion. And booby trap the poo poo out of the place. I fully expect to see doors, food and child's toys with explosives rigged to them.
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Oct 22, 2022 21:44
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Some audiences in Africa, Asia and Latin America might be sympathetic to bits of this, especially the anti-Western rhetoric, but ultimately none of them care enough to do anything of substance. At best, Russia will get some weakly supporting comments that mildly rebuke NATO expansionism and failure to accommodate 'all sides' security concerns. Those audiences have, as I think one African diplomat recently described it, enlightened self interest'. Put bluntly, they don't see how the war concerns them apart from market disruption l, and so are only really interested in what they can get (I'm not singling them out, its hardly a unique stance in international politics). And ultimately Russia has nothing to offer them. Why should they do something stupid like abandon dollars and accept lovely rubles they can't pass on, or otherwise damage their economies for something that's not in their interest.
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Oct 27, 2022 17:23
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Huge number of rumours flying around - until I see geolocated images of Ukrainian troops in the city and raising the flag, I'm withholding judgement. But if the reports of Russia troops withdrawing from Kherson city are genuinely true, it would be hugely significant. In military terms it would likely save both sides from a potentially hugely costly urban meatgrinder battle, the horrors of which would be even worse during winter. It would also (to an extent) spare the remaining civilians there from being caught in the crossfire (though I fully expect Russia to spitefully bombard the poo poo out of the city for months to come). Whilst it may have military benefits for Russia, shortening their tenuous supply lines and enabling them to use the Dnipro itself as their main defensive barrier, its also a massively symbolic political climbdown. Kherson is one of the biggest cities that fell to them - and it seemed to fall relatively quickly and easily (as opposed to one of the other few big cities to fall, Mariupol). To withdraw from it without a fight - the capital of one of the recently annexed territories? Yikes, going to be difficult to spin this one. I wonder if the plan is to try to hold the line at the Dnipro, and try to push for that as a new 'natural border'
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Nov 3, 2022 14:24
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I'm often dubious about those intercepted calls. They often feel a bit too on the nose
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Nov 5, 2022 15:08
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The War in Ukraine has done to CSTO what Putin had hoped it would instead do to NATO - test its collective solidarity and resolve and find them wanting, leading to dissension in the ranks and some members actively pursuing their own interests at the expense of each other. Not only do the membership (except Belarus, and this support is limited/indirect) want nothing to do with supporting the invasion (compared to NATO who have been surprisingly willing to oppose it), it has caused dissension and division amongst the membership, including very visibly showing one of its main benefits - the Article 5 equivalent - to be completely worthless, with Armenia's desperate cries for help against increasingly dangerous Azerbaijani aggression being ignored. Every member is now almost certainly thinking about the value of having Russia as their main security guarantor, with some, like Kazakhstan, increasingly assertively pursuing their own interests, whilst others have been using Russia's current weak position as an opportunity to seek better terms (ie: more $). I'm also sure that the usual critics would vocally oppose any expansion of CSTO with the same rigor that they do with NATO. Tigey fucked around with this message at 11:26 on Nov 7, 2022 |
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Nov 7, 2022 11:23
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And even if Zelensky's appearance was broadcast live, there's a good chance Russia wouldn't be able to react in time. There have been multiple reports that Russian decision making chains for receiving intelligence on targets and then launching air/drone/artillery strikes, take much much longer than Ukrainian ones (and US in Iraq/Afghanistan). Have zero military knowledge and can't recall the precise details (so will happily defer to military goons), but it was something like it takes the Russians a day or more to receive intel, analyse it, make a decision, pass it along, launch the attack, etc, compared to hours in the case of the US/NATO, etc (the attack on the convoy in Libya that led to the death of Gaddafi comes to mind).
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Nov 15, 2022 00:26
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Voting to recommend (even if UNGA has no power to make any of it happen) actual consequences for Russia, would always attract less support than just a mealy mouthed 'This is bad mkay' Symbolic principles vs symbolic consequences
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Nov 15, 2022 14:05
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3D Megadoodoo posted:Is he the guy who doesn't believe in normal shirt collars? He's like TIK: occasionally posts something of mild interest, but has really lovely and awful personal views and can't stop bringing them up. I caught one wiff of him getting riled up about  , then pieced together a couple of other warning signs, and blocked his vids.
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Dec 2, 2022 14:55
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Whilst it probably would be economically inefficient to use expensive Patriot missiles against cheap drones, Ukraine isn't the one paying the bill. There have also been repeated rumors (not confirmed afaik) about the Iranians potentially also supplying short-range ballistic missiles to Russia, above and beyond their ongoing drone deliveries. Ukraine's air defence network is likely already strained, and would probably find it difficult to intercept these at the moment. Patriot, which has pretty decent capabilities against short-range ballistic missiles, would beef up their defences against such attacks (whilst also being generally useful and dissuading other air/missile attacks). Tigey fucked around with this message at 12:05 on Dec 21, 2022 |
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Dec 21, 2022 12:02
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Yeah, the latest Enhanced Sea Sparrows are basically broadly comparable to a BUK, and are specifically designed to counter Soviet Cruise and Anti-Ship Missiles. Due to its Air Force, the US has never really had a focus on land-based SAMs, but their naval ones are very good - only problem is they are designed to fire from ships... But if they have found a way to target and fire ESSMs from BUK launchers, it could go a very long way (alongside Patrio, NASAMS, and Iris-T) to restocking Ukraine's depleted air defense network and relieving the pressure on the S-300s and BUKs - which was one of the big concerns flagged in a recent Perun video.
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Jan 6, 2023 12:56
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Its of course motivated primarily by the UK Government feeling left out by France, the US and Germany sending IFVs (and it struggling domestically with unpopularity, weak economy and ongoing transport and nurses strikes) Not sure 10 tanks would really be that useful given tiny number, complicated logistics and training needs, etc, but it would break the invisible wall of no one wanting to be first, and hopefully help put the question of providing Western MBTs in more serious numbers (ie: Abrams or Leopard 2) on the table. It should of course be acknowledged that multiple Eastern Europe countries already donated many of their own, Soviet-era MBTs much earlier in the conflict.
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Jan 9, 2023 17:41
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To be fair, 'logistics', 'supply chains' and 'interoperability' are all factors that the German leadership in 1941 chose to stick their fingers in their ears about when planning Operation Barbarossa. Sometimes good lessons get learned too well.
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Jan 11, 2023 17:47
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MonikaTSarn posted:I don't see how saying they didn't officially apply for an export license is an excuse. You wouldn't send the official request at all unless you know it's going to be allowed. Are the other countries really expected to cause a diplomatic quagmire and hope germany's coalition doesn't break apart over it simply because Scholz is to scared to say yes himself ? Yeah, this attempt by some to spin a 'poor sweet innocent Germany' routine is grating. You absolutely don't formally submit such requests if you believe the answer will be "No". This is fundamentally a political issue and will only be resolved politically, not by bureaucratic processes. That's why political statements like Poland's are being made (of course, its absolutely also due to it playing well with their base) - to put the issue on the table. Germany cannot hide behind a bureaucratic process. It cannot claim it is ignorant of the fact that the US, UK, Poland, Baltics, etc, want them to allow Leopard 2s to be sent. They don't need a copy of form REQ/12141/4242/B submitted in triplicate to know this! These political statements put pressure on Germany to engage in behind the scenes political discussions, during which Germany can discretely signal it will be OK with allowing Leopard 2 operators to send their tanks to Ukraine. The appropriate form will then promptly be correctly filed. Yes, Poland and others are enjoying poking Germany. But this is a political question not an administrative one.
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Jan 19, 2023 15:04
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lagidnam posted:Scholz just said that they want Ukraine to receive 2 battalions of Leopard 2 tanks. As a first step Germany is sending over 14 Leopard 2A6. Those come directly from the Bundeswehr. So they are sending 14 Leopards now, and 88 overall? As in 14-88 tanks?  May want to send 1 more (or less) to avoid the Hitler number.
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Jan 25, 2023 14:57
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There has been the odd vague mention of "Of course Ukrainians are currently being trained on F-16s" for a while, but these are usually background noise from commentators and I have never seen it formally backed up by a credible or official source.
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Feb 8, 2023 13:24
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Good rhetoric from the Austrian Foreign Minister - but I was a bit surprised as I had thought Austria was one of the more wobbly EU countries on Russia. Maybe I was confusing their strict military neutrality for wider unwillingness to act.
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Feb 13, 2023 18:41
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fatherboxx posted:Surkov is a famous cocaine fiend and a pathological liar but the only reaction to what he says here is "no poo poo" because Russia clearly treated Minsk agreeements as a temporary measure to comfort ~deeply concerned~ european leaders before Ukraine breaks from internal pressure (and lets pro-Russian politicians into power). This did not happen (even with Zelensky being a dove) so Putin went all in. Yup. Its why the talk of ''War is hell! Why is the West being so bloodthirsty and prolonging the fighting? Why can't rational, sensible people in the West just negotiate a cease fire on Ukraine's behalf, trading a few insignificant provinces in exchange for peace?" Yes, war is horrible. Congratulations on such a deep and cutting insight. But Putin isn't interested in a cease fire, peace, or anything other than Ukraine as a permanently subjugated vassal state, under a puppet government. In an ideal world, he would probably prefer direct integration, but the failure of the initial goals of the invasion means that is no longer realistic. But control of a Ukrainian puppet regime is the absolute bare minimum he will accept. Anything else, including a cease-fire or some kind of Minsk 3 framework, is just a short-term expedient designed to pacify external voices (such as concerned Europeans) and generally smooth the way to achieving that goal - either through subsequent military action later on, active measures, or political/economic pressure. The only actual way to make him actually accept some kind of cease fire or peace agreement, is to make him realise that there is no prospect of even remotely achieving his current goals through military means, which will reduce the scope of his ambitions and eventually force him to the table.
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Feb 17, 2023 13:58
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Charlotte Hornets posted:The Chinese Peace plan aka inane rambling 1: Standard pleasant sounding fluff about diplomatic principles, which are designed to make the rest of the proposal easier to swallow. You can be assured every single one of these principles will be contradicted in full later on in the proposal. 2: The security of a country should not be pursued at the expense of others - although this only applies to countries other than us and our partners. A balanced, effective and sustainable European security architecture should be formed... based upon the insistence that small and medium European countries have no right to ally themselves together against a would-be regional hegemon, and certainly have no right to align themselves with the US. Instead, they must accept a model which places the wannabe regional hegemon in a position of entrenched privilege that allows it to militarily dominate and bully its neighbours. We haven't written it outright, but having such a model in Asia too would be great! 3&4: All parties should support Russia and Ukraine in working in the same direction and resuming direct dialogue as quickly as possible, so as to gradually deescalate the situation and ultimately reach a comprehensive ceasefire... ie: the West must immediately drop its support for Ukraine and pressure it into accepting a ceasefire as soon as possible, in order to freeze the current battlelines before Russia's position deteriorates further, and give them time to entrench themselves and make these the new de facto borders. 5, 6 & 7: Filler fluff we don't really care about, but include to make our proposal look reasonable 8: The United States must admit to and shut down its biological weapons labs in Ukraine that are clearly targetted at Russia. 9: Agreements like the Grain Deal, where Russia gets a disproportionate say and can disrupt it at any time for political leverage, should be the model for any future agreements. 10: All sanctions on Russia must immediately be lifted. Countries shouldn't suffer consequences for attacking others. Unless its our enemies. 11: Don't you loving dare touch our exports. 12: We want in on any juicy contracts to help rebuild Ukrainian infrastructure.
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Feb 24, 2023 16:56
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If I recall correctly, they also capped remittances, which further disincentivises workers with required skills from migrating to Russia.
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Feb 26, 2023 02:28
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Deteriorata posted:Apparently, telephones in Russia only work one way. Odd. The Almighty Tsar shouldn't have to prostrate himself before other leaders. Instead they should come to the imperial capitol and kowtow to him, offering tribute and concessions, before he deigns to hear them.
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Feb 28, 2023 16:23
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The key distinction is the Yemenis are 1) Brown, 2) Muslim, 3) Far Away, 4) Poor, and not influential/important/valuable as a trading partner. Its not moral neutrality, its self-interest.
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Mar 14, 2023 16:23
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Senjuro posted:I don't get it. Russia deliberately brings down a US drone flying over international waters and then tries to steal it and the US just calls it unprofessional? Isn't it essentially an act of war? Not saying it's worth going to war over or that anyone should but I was expecting a bit more of a response. The US is simply not interested in escalating - they're content with current trajectory of the conflict - Russia is heading for a loss. See how the US and Europe have downplayed other Russia attempts at escalation - ignoring nuclear rhetoric, ignoring Nord Stream incident (although circumstances around that appear more dubious), ignoring (much weaker than feared) cyberattacks, etc Russia on the other hand knows its not doing well, and so likely is incentivized to try to change the framing/circumstances of the conflict. Its only tools for doing this are non-conventional means (ie: harrassing but not directly attacking NATO - they would lose any conventional conflict, and nobody wants nuclear war). If the US did react to the downing, third parties will immediately see the US as overreacting, and Russian narratives will be furthered: "Look at those warmongering yankees! Nobody was hurt, it was just an unmanned drone! And what was the US doing flying so close to Russia anyway - more evidence of NATO encroachment!" The waters get muddied, and the perception and focus of the conflict moves away from it being a clear-cut illegitimate and illegal Russian invasion of Ukraine, to a 'Russian and American Empires vying for supremacy in Europe - both as bad as eachother!'. Third parties - some genuinely fearful of conflict between nuclear powers, others who just cynically want to stick it to the West, could then start weighing in and calling for de-escalation, mediation and 'compromise' (ie: concessions to Russia). Whether it would actually work out like this? Who knows. But they have to try something. Tigey fucked around with this message at 12:51 on Mar 16, 2023 |
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Mar 16, 2023 12:49
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I agree it was a solved issue in D&D due to already tight moderation, but it was undeniably contested elsewhere on the forums, and whether you agree with the criticisms or not (I personally feel a lot were in bad faith, but I'm biased), they were undoubtedly driving major interforum drama. Our glorious and far-sighted admins have arrived at a tenuous compromise, which is being enforced forum-wide, irrespective of whether it was a historical issue in this subforum. We basically have to adhere to the terms of a 'posting cease-fire' - that most people on both sides are not overly happy with. The moderation feels harsh because it is - it aims to quickly tackle any violations that could be jumped upon by vocal posting minorities in an attempt to own their ideological rivals, and no-one in power wants to go back to those days. To be fair, some posters in other places are annoyed on similar restrictions on their posting (being unable to SYQing the bloodthirsty libs, make 'War is Bad' posts, etc). So everyone is unhappy with it. Its a fait accompli and probably better than the alternative. Probably. EDIT: And even if you disagree, there's nothing that can really be done about it at this thread's level by cinci or fatherboxx. If you really don't like it you'd have to take it up with our benevolent despots.
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Mar 29, 2023 23:34
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Fair enough - got overexcited by the declaration of a period of glasnost. In an attempt to be more constructive:cinci zoo sniper posted:The one thing I'd like to do myself about the rules is to shorten them. The rules are 1200 words, or 3 printed pages, long. While I believe in all of you, I think it's only polite to concede that they could be rewritten shorten. My initial take would probably something like this. This is broadly good. The rules should ideally be as short as possible, or people will gloss over them. The clancychat/nato/nukes type rules can probably all be merged into one. They're all broadly similar in intent, about avoiding excessive speculation about (generally unlikely) future developments, and keeping discussion focused around current events. I'd personally like to see a loophole for talk about nuking willo567's balls on tuesdays, but we can't have everything. The DSA have disappeared off the radar, and the tankie moaning chat has tailed off, so is probably ditchable, and treatable as just an implicitly boring topic. Which it is. I'm not sure if you intend to delete the one about slurs. But I'd actually keep it and tweak it to cover dehumanising people, as I feel that better captures the intent and its an important principle. Maybe something like: quote:“Casual” slurs or dehumanising terms targeting anyone - such as "Orc", "Ruskie", "Ivan", "Hohol", "The Ukraine", etc - are forbidden. This is not an exhaustive list, and is not just about words - if a term (or the tone of your post) dehumanises people, you really shouldn't be doing it. In terms of process, it would be good for any significant rules changes to be clearly highlighted. For a change that might lead to something becoming bannable (like the footage thing), I would suggest it is probably best to have a temporary thread title change for at least a few days, possibly a week or so. It doesn't need to be specific about the change, but should signpost the fact there has been an important change. Ideally the changed/new wording should at least be bolded or highlighted in colour in the OP.
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Mar 30, 2023 00:33
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Haystack posted:Armenia can't really cozy up with the west due to both geography and because the west cares about Turkey 100 times more than it could ever care about Armenia, which closes a lot of doors. You are right about the West caring more about Turkey, but its not just them. With Europe divesting from Russian gas, several countries turned to Azerbaijan as an alternative supplier. Baku now has a lot more economic leverage over Europe than it did before the invasion. Armenia is in an abysmally bad position - geopolitically, economicly and militarily. I personally think its quite likely the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict will flare up again once Baku feels the time is right, with Armenia being pushed further back, if not out of the territory completely. EDIT: Small White Dragon posted:NK is... North Korea? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nagorno-Karabakh Tigey fucked around with this message at 23:30 on Mar 30, 2023 |
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Mar 30, 2023 23:27
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Saladman posted:That's completely meaningless anyway. The current constitution allows him to "legally" be president until 2035, as he can be elected again in 2025 ("first term under new constitution") and 2030 ("one re-election allowed under the constitution"). So even if he kept his word, he would only be out of power in summer 2035, just after his 82nd birthday. He would only be a sprightly, middle aged dictator by then, so I imagine the people will demand an exception be made to this strong figure of the fatherland, and he will need to extend it again by one or two times. And beyond this, all Dictators say this kind of thing on a regular basis, promising that this is their last term, and they really will stand down at the end of it. He really means it this time. Honest.
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Mar 31, 2023 17:13
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