Ukraine War 6: what the hell are the Russians thinking?

[Kalnestk Oblast]

1 minute ago, Fez said:

Seems like this may actually end up happening. And, while maybe it won't help too much in November (not to turn this to US politics), I think it is good if Republicans get on record supporting the policy that increases gas prices and it's not just Biden that can be "blamed."

HAHAHHAHA

[Padraig]

4 hours ago, Maithanet said:

It's still an unreasonable position, but it is a LOT closer to something that the Ukrainians could accept.  This is a big step down from demanding regime change.

I'm not sure I agree with that.  If Ukraine is forbidden to join the EU and NATO then its effectively a vassal state of Russia.  At least, if one read the fine print, i'm pretty sure that would be what it meant.

This all began in 2013/14 when the Ukrainian President said he would not sign a pact with the EU, instead choosing closer ties with Russia and the Eurasian Economic Union.  That launched a revolution.  Russia's demands brings it back to pre-revolution days, with the added benefit of Crimea and the Donbas (and I imagine its the full Donbas region also, not half the region they controlled pre this year's invasion).

Zelensky staying in power with a Russian appointed PM would almost be irrelevant.  He would have little ability to direct Ukraine in an independent way.  If you can't do much trade with the EU, you have to rely on Russia.  Game over.

In fact, assuming those conditions, i'm not even sure the West would give Ukraine that much money after the war, since it would probably just flow into Russian hands.

Now, Ukraine may have no choice but accept these conditions in the end but it would be the end of the sovereign state we know.  The only thing not mentioned is its military.  What would be allowed there?  Probably not much, given everything else.

[DMC]

20 minutes ago, Fez said:

Seems like this may actually end up happening. And, while maybe it won't help too much in November (not to turn this to US politics), I think it is good if Republicans get on record supporting the policy that increases gas prices and it's not just Biden that can be "blamed."

It also appears Katherine Tai is pushing for Russia to be suspended from the WTO and deny Belarus entry.  [ETA:  Should have said Tai would be compelled to push for these things as USTR.]

On responsibility attribution, I don't think it matters how much bipartisan buy-in there is.  The president/president's party will be blamed for rising gas prices, that's just how American public opinion works.

[Maithanet]

12 minutes ago, Padraig said:

I'm not sure I agree with that.  If Ukraine is forbidden to join the EU and NATO then its effectively a vassal state of Russia.  At least, if one read the fine print, i'm pretty sure that would be what it meant.

The Russian proposal is obviously not something Ukraine will accept, as I said quite clearly.  I'm not sure that Ukraine agreeing not to join NATO (particularly if there's a time limit on there) is necessarily a non-starter  At least until this crisis, NATO didn't seem particularly interested in letting Ukraine join anyway.  That was true for joining the EU as well, although it's quite possible the politics have changed in the past two weeks. 

My point is that Russia making any sort of concession just 10 days into the war is a sign that they acknowledge that the war isn't going well and that they will need to make some negotiations to extricate themselves from this situation.  Russia acknowledging this reality is a good thing. 

[DMC]

18 minutes ago, Padraig said:

If Ukraine is forbidden to join the EU and NATO then its effectively a vassal state of Russia.

While I agree with that the specific conditions being discussed are unacceptable, if Ukraine wants to reach a resolution where there's some agreement they won't join NATO for a certain period of time will not necessarily make them a vassal state of Russia.  It was very clear they weren't going to join NATO anytime soon anyway before this started.

[Fez]

27 minutes ago, DMC said:

On responsibility attribution, I don't think it matters how much bipartisan buy-in there is.  The president/president's party will be blamed for rising gas prices, that's just how American public opinion works.

True. Still, I'll be glad to at least have the hypocritical fucksticks on record.

11 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

The Russian proposal is obviously not something Ukraine will accept, as I said quite clearly.  I'm not sure that Ukraine agreeing not to join NATO (particularly if there's a time limit on there) is necessarily a non-starter  At least until this crisis, NATO didn't seem particularly interested in letting Ukraine join anyway.  That was true for joining the EU as well, although it's quite possible the politics have changed in the past two weeks. 

My point is that Russia making any sort of concession just 10 days into the war is a sign that they acknowledge that the war isn't going well and that they will need to make some negotiations to extricate themselves from this situation.  Russia acknowledging this reality is a good thing. 

Agreed. Also, even without being part of NATO, this war has made clear that NATO will offer substantial aid to Ukraine if its attacked by Russia again in the future. So joining officially isn't quite as important. What is important is ensuring that Ukraine retains its sovereignty, including the right to have a military, and its territorial integrity. Obviously things are up to Ukrainians; but if they get cut-off from the Black Sea it would destroy their economy for good. So any rump-state proposals should be a complete nonstarter.

 

In other news, the first proof of the International Legion existing on the ground has been released:

And apparently those guns are some fancy assault rifles that Belgium had promised to send 3,000 of to Ukraine. So it's also proof that at least some those showed up too.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

18 minutes ago, Maithanet said:

The Russian proposal is obviously not something Ukraine will accept, as I said quite clearly.  I'm not sure that Ukraine agreeing not to join NATO (particularly if there's a time limit on there) is necessarily a non-starter  At least until this crisis, NATO didn't seem particularly interested in letting Ukraine join anyway.  That was true for joining the EU as well, although it's quite possible the politics have changed in the past two weeks. 

 

Depends on how you define joining the EU.

Full membership? Ukraine is not meeting the criterias the join the club. It simply isn't. Some sorta Customs Union deal like Norway et al, or like Turkey, that could very well be on the menu. Technically speaking that's not joining the EU, but it's putting the Ukraine closer into the EU orbit. So presumably not in the spirit of terms that Puta dictated. 

[Tywin et al.]

4 hours ago, karaddin said:

At this point I just can't imagine trusting peace negotiations because I'd expect Russia to take a breather to try sort out logistics issues etc and then declare war again as soon as they're ready. Putin has made it pretty clear that he doesn't consider deals made with an entity he views as illegitimate to be binding in any way.

I'm not sure if they would try to attack again in the short term, but I do hope some of the sanctions stay in place for a while to scare them off if they're thinking about it. In a different world I wish they'd stay in place until Putin leaves office, but that's not going to happen. 

[IFR]

1 hour ago, Corvinus85 said:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-07/russian-shelling-destroys-ukraine-atomic-lab-built-with-u-s

I don't know what other research facilities exist in Ukraine but at this point we shouldn't disconsider any type of hazards that the Russian could "accidentally" unleash upon the world up to and including the creation of a mini black hole.

It's worth noting that this institute used a linear accelerator driven subcritical assembly. Meaning that the assembly itself was designed so that criticality could not be achieved without the photoneutrons generated by the accelerator (if the power goes off, the assembly goes subcritical). And the electron beam was at 100MeV, significantly less than the several TeV that some research institutes use.

I imagine that the aside from the uranium plates used in the assembly itself, the only radioactive material they would have there are low level neutron generating sources for daily checks of the radiation monitoring instruments, and any activated materials from leakage of high energy electrons and neutrons (which would be low level waste) and maybe tritium in the coolant.

The way Russia is handling the nuclear power plants is cause for concern (not the panic that seems to flare up, but certainly it is not ideal). Otherwise some chemical disaster seems like a more likely event with what is going on.

[SpaceChampion]

 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

10 minutes ago, SpaceChampion said:

 

I wonder if he was forced to do that?

[Ran]

1 minute ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

I wonder if he was forced to do that?

Could be, but I doubt it.

The worst thing about it was that he had it on the podium, next to the Ukrainian gymnast who took first place.

[DMC]

Saw that yesterday.  That guy definitely has a very punchable face.  Should be noted a Ukrainian won gold at the event and refused to acknowledge Kuliak - who came in third.

[Mlle. Zabzie]

3 minutes ago, Ran said:

Could be, but I doubt it.

The worst thing about it was that he had it on the podium, next to the Ukrainian gymnast who took first place.

Confident he is being fed a very different (in his case dis-)information stream than everyone on this board.

[Which Tyler]

3 minutes ago, Mlle. Zabzie said:

Confident he is being fed a very different (in his case dis-)information stream than everyone on this board.

Agreed, but....

He's out of the country, so should have plenty of access to non-Russian information.

[Red Tiger]

5 minutes ago, Mlle. Zabzie said:

Confident he is being fed a very different (in his case dis-)information stream than everyone on this board.

Can confirm. I have friends in the East who are getting a completely different narrative. Russia, China, India and other countries are getting a completely different story than us.

[Ran]

2 minutes ago, Mlle. Zabzie said:

Confident he is being fed a very different (in his case dis-)information stream than everyone on this board.

Most definitely. 

Speaking of this sort of thing, this Youtube channel named 1420 (not quite sure why it's called that) by a young videographer in Rostov-on-Don (in the Rostov oblast which borders Ukraine) is basically a "man on the street" thing, asking Russians what they think of various topics and so on. Naturally, in the last weeks it's turned towards the war. I was surprised when a new episode released today, looks like he's managed to get things out through a VPN but it'll be a question how much longer he'll be able to post if Russia goes through with cutting the country off from the global internet.

Bearing in mind that Rostov-on-Don hosts the Southern Federal University, and so many of the people interviewed are university students, I found this one fairly heartening for the most part regarding what young people think... The couple at 2:10 are fun:

 

[Which Tyler]

https://www.facebook.com/175207162568485/posts/5231251463630671/

[Kalnestk Oblast]

3 minutes ago, Which Tyler said:

https://www.facebook.com/175207162568485/posts/5231251463630671/

The day may come when @Which Tyler will learn how to link things without linking to Facebook, when his Facebook dependencies will falter

BUT IT IS NOT THIS DAY

[Fez]

It remains amazing how many Russian senior commanders find themselves in harms way during this war. As more knowledge people have pointed out, it likely speaks to how bad Russian logistics and planning have been that its necessary for generals/colonels to be up at the front to try to pull rank to clear things up.