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Ukraine 14 - Back to the Mud


Maithanet

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8 hours ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

The degenerate Russian soldiers are filthy rapists of boys, girls, woman and men according to this report.

https://news.yahoo.com/russian-soldiers-accused-of-raping-women-men-and-children-in-ukraine-224021315.html

Putin would give the child-rapists medals but will grimace in disgust at the mere presence of a gay man and have them arrested.

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Very interesting analysis of the current battle in Donbas by an Austrian army colonel on the official Austrian army channel (for non German speakers, switch on the subtitles) with a comparison to the Battle of Kursk at the end:

 

 

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1 hour ago, Alarich II said:

Very interesting analysis of the current battle in Donbas by an Austrian army colonel on the official Austrian army channel (for non German speakers, switch on the subtitles) with a comparison to the Battle of Kursk at the end:

 

 

The subtitles are in Deutsch.

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I hope they succeed.  But the final part of the encirclement is always the hardest.  I'd say much more likely is that the Russians are forced into a hasty retreat than actually encircled and captured.

EDIT- but even that much would be a big win for Ukraine.  Russia would lose another round of it's best equipment, much of it captured.  Hope that's where this is going.

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Another reason you might see more of the 'full war' announcement is that it will allow Russia to start blaming some of the hardships of the economy on that as well as offer more control.

 

 

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12 hours ago, Darzin said:

Russia is not going to attack NATO for the same reason the US never invaded North Vietnam fear of escalation. They can't even beat Ukraine on it's own, broadening the war to NATO will just make them lose 100%. NATO is not going to just "let" Russian blow up supply dumps in Poland, if they do that there will be NATO boots on the ground and NATO planes in the sky all over Ukraine. 

Sorry, was this also the same source saying 'Russia is never going to invade Ukraine because they'll never be able to take it with the forces they have' energy?

So I think you're wrong, but I think you're interestingly wrong on several fronts:

- I don't believe Russia believes NATO will put boots on the ground over attacking supply lines and intel, especially if they're ranged missile attacks. Russia still sees the West as very much cowardly with respect to antagonizing Russia; if the West wasn't going to escalate massively after clear war crimes and clear attempts at a cultural genocide, they weren't gonna do much more in other cases too. 

- I don't believe that NATO will put boots on the ground any time soon, but especially not for something like this. They may start doing something like a No-Fly zone at best, but more likely they'll do some tit-for-tat targeting of Russian areas with massive ample warning to Russians to get their shit out of there like they did with Syria. 

- I don't think you understand the war drum beating and messaging coming from Russia; this is the same misunderstanding that led a lot of folks to think that Russia wouldn't be invading Ukraine despite them saying 'we're gonna invade Ukraine'. Russian media and politicians are talking about going to actual war against the West. Not Donbas, not Ukraine, the West. They're talking about putting their entire economy on a war footing. They're talking about doing a major conscription. They view NATO arming and intel of Ukraine as the West effectively joining the war. 

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20 minutes ago, Kalibuster said:

- I don't believe Russia believes NATO will put boots on the ground over attacking supply lines and intel, especially if they're ranged missile attacks. Russia still sees the West as very much cowardly with respect to antagonizing Russia; if the West wasn't going to escalate massively after clear war crimes and clear attempts at a cultural genocide, they weren't gonna do much more in other cases too. 

I feel like you have a bit of a warped understanding what "supply lines" mean. Russia has seen some successes targeting Ukrainian supply depots in Ukraine, which are vastly easier to hit than any trains or plains in NATO territory (and even then, some pictures show that they have become increasingly ineffective even at that, given that they are running out of their best missiles). So... why would Russia attack targets in NATO territory with a higher chance of missing them and a high chance of provoking WW3 when they can just wait until Ukrainians pick it up and bring it over the border where it is both within range and doesn't force NATO into a decision? It's delusional to think that hitting "supply lines" in Poland somehow doesn't qualify as hitting Poland. It is a form of escalation that must be responded to.

Also Russia still has several ways of escalation that doesn't involve shooting at NATO and gambling on nobody shooting back: Partial mobilization, full mobilization, chemical attacks, tactical or strategical nuclear strikes. All targeted against Ukraine and with a much, much, much, much higher rate of accomplishing at least something than trying to strike isolated transport vehicles. The first two come with high inward risks, the last three come with a high risk of NATO responding in some way, complete North Koreanization of Russia at the very least, quite probably an enforced No-Fly Zone or maybe some precision strikes like in Syria as you say. THAT is the tit-for-tat approach here. A direct attack on NATO is still a direct attack on NATO and it greatly confuses my why you think that some NATO targets wouldn't be treated as that, somehow.

 

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45 minutes ago, Kalibuster said:

- I don't think you understand the war drum beating and messaging coming from Russia; this is the same misunderstanding that led a lot of folks to think that Russia wouldn't be invading Ukraine despite them saying 'we're gonna invade Ukraine'. Russian media and politicians are talking about going to actual war against the West. Not Donbas, not Ukraine, the West. They're talking about putting their entire economy on a war footing. They're talking about doing a major conscription. They view NATO arming and intel of Ukraine as the West effectively joining the war. 

Russia has never in its modern history attacked a superior opponent, or even an inferior opponent they knew was capable of seriously hurting them. When Turkey shot down their plane and killed their ambassador, they threatened and blustered, and in the end did nothing. When the US bombed Assad's base, they threatened and blustered, and in the end did nothing. When Finland and Sweden applied to NATO, they threatened and blustered, and in the end did nothing.

The reason their usual bullying strategy failed this time with Ukraine has been a combination of a massive intelligence failure, and cultural stereotyping of a nation they consider to be their inferior dim-witted rural cousins. They know very well that they are weaker than NATO.

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Russia can't afford a war with NATO. It would be hopelessly outgunned. This isn't the Cold War anymore, when the Warsaw Pact had superior numbers. Russia has only one third of the WP's former population and it's aging. Those TV pundits calling for an escalation don't seem to understand that.

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It would seem in the 2020's a guided missile attack would be accurate enough to source a hit on a heat signature like a train. That Russia has difficulty even hitting a moving target seems like they have archaic capabilities?

At what point has this war on Ukraine made Russia so degraded they can just be conventionally toppled.

Maybe it's time for Putin to stop worrying about taking or holding Ukraine territory and start worrying about whether he can defend his motherland, which is becoming more and more depleted of arsenal and equipment?

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1 hour ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

At what point has this war on Ukraine made Russia so degraded they can just be conventionally toppled.

Maybe it's time for Putin to stop worrying about taking or holding Ukraine territory and start worrying about whether he can defend his motherland, which is becoming more and more depleted of arsenal and equipment?

Nobody is going to invade a country with that many nuclear weapons.

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1 hour ago, williamjm said:

Nobody is going to invade a country with that many nuclear weapons.

Recent revelations about the state of Russia's military make me wonder how many are actually operational.

Maintaining nukes in operational condition is really, really expensive, and maintenance budget for a weapon that no-one really expects to actually use and which never gets tested seems like a prime target for theft.

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3 hours ago, Gorn said:

Recent revelations about the state of Russia's military make me wonder how many are actually operational.

Maintaining nukes in operational condition is really, really expensive, and maintenance budget for a weapon that no-one really expects to actually use and which never gets tested seems like a prime target for theft.

True, but even if thousands of Russian nukes aren't actually operable right now all it takes is a few hundred. I certainly wouldn't gamble on none of them being available.

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7 hours ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

It would seem in the 2020's a guided missile attack would be accurate enough to source a hit on a heat signature like a train. That Russia has difficulty even hitting a moving target seems like they have archaic capabilities?

From what distance? The Russian air force doesn't get anywhere near targets in Western Ukraine, the attacks are all carried out from hundreds of km away.

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