Ukraine 22: Anyone else holding their breath?

[Werthead]

4 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

I wonder if he actually can climb down. With the official annexation of the occupied regions and declaring it Russian territory, how on Earth can he get out now. That's a genuine question. Ukraine insists on restoration of its territory (and rightly so), if concedes there, he will have some explaining to do. The official reason was/is still de-Nazification, but the Ukrainian Goverment is still in charge. So what did all those brave Russian men die for then? 

Denazification sailed when the Russians agreed to the prisoner swap with the Azov personnel. That's not going to convince anyone now.

There is the possibility of agreeing to give up Kherson and Zaporizhzhia in return for recognition of Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk, even though that means changing the Russian constitution (which does not allow for territorial concessions). However, as a maximalist, "Look how badass I am at negotiating, I am willing to extend this massive and magnanimous gesture," approach, it is very Putin.

The alternative is just refusing to climb down at all and running out the clock on Russia's military capacity to sustain the war, which may end even more badly for him, or escalate to some insanely dangerous level, which also could end very badly for him.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

4 minutes ago, Werthead said:

There is the possibility of agreeing to give up Kherson and Zaporizhzhia in return for recognition of Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk, even though that means changing the Russian constitution (which does not allow for territorial concessions). However, as a maximalist, "Look how badass I am at negotiating, I am willing to extend this massive and magnanimous gesture," approach, it is very Putin.

 

Ukraine would never sign up to that deal. Esp. Donetsk is vital for the economic survival of the country. That's the heavily industrialized part of Ukraine. 

 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

35 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

Sadly, only a week after erecting this excellent monument, the town in Russia where it stood decided to take it down for some reason

 

That is quite a monument to mourning…

[Maithanet]

4 minutes ago, Werthead said:

Denazification sailed when the Russians agreed to the prisoner swap with the Azov personnel. That's not going to convince anyone now.

There is the possibility of agreeing to give up Kherson and Zaporizhzhia in return for recognition of Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk, even though that means changing the Russian constitution (which does not allow for territorial concessions). However, as a maximalist, "Look how badass I am at negotiating, I am willing to extend this massive and magnanimous gesture," approach, it is very Putin.

I agree that does sound very Putin, but do you think that is even realistic anymore?  Ukraine is definitely not going to go for it, and Putin would need to get some of Ukraine's backers to start leaning on them to end the war.  That isn't impossible, but it feels pretty unlikely.  I could imagine Macron going for it, and quite possibly Italy, Germany, Turkey, Hungary, maybe a few others.  But definitely not Poland+Baltics and probably not the US, UK or much of Eastern Europe.  As long as Ukraine can rely on the latter allies, they can survive without the former.   

[A Horse Named Stranger]

Unlikely that Germany will lean on Ukraine. 

Most parties in parliament are rather firm in their support of Ukraine. 

It's mainly bits and pieces on the fringes. 

[Werthead]

6 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

Ukraine would never sign up to that deal. Esp. Donetsk is vital for the economic survival of the country. That's the heavily industrialized part of Ukraine. 

Yes. This is one of many problems with Putin's thinking.

[A Horse Named Stranger]

1 minute ago, Werthead said:

Yes. This is one of many problems with Putin's thinking.

That again leads back to my question, how on Earth can he realistically climb down and get diplomatic solution, that doesn't make him look like Loser Loserovich.

[Kalbear]

11 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

That again leads back to my question, how on Earth can he realistically climb down and get diplomatic solution, that doesn't make him look like Loser Loserovich.

I don't think that really matters; he can spin things happily however he wants it and there are reasonable things to spin out of this that show he's 'winning' even when he's not. Being able to say that Ukraine is now just a puppet government of the West and has no homegrown military capabilities (even if that's not actually true) is an example. You're doing the classic thing of looking at what is actually real and assuming that is what is going to be convincing for a totalitarian. 

What matters more than the perception of climbing down is whether or not Putin gets something out of stopping the war. And right now the argument can be made that the answer is no. Sanctions have not hurt Russia nearly as much as people have hoped. Losing the Russian military en masse sucks, but it also hasn't harmed Russia so far and there's no signs that they need it for some other reason. Russia is being able to sell oil to the rest of the world, and will be able to sell gas at some point too. Russia can sustain this war for a while yet, and may be able to even do well at some point in the future when they have defensive positions largely solidified. 

So then the question becomes - how long can the rest of the world deal? How long can Europe deal with double digit inflation and energy scarcity? How long can Africa deal with food shortages? How long can the US deal with paying for Ukrainian weaponry? Putin's calculus is that Russia can outlast these fickle democracies to get real concessions, but even if he doesn't he's still willing to cause problems for the West at a relatively cheap cost to Russia. 

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

48 minutes ago, A Horse Named Stranger said:

That again leads back to my question, how on Earth can he realistically climb down and get diplomatic solution, that doesn't make him look like Loser Loserovich.

Who knows? Maybe some "We survived as a nation in a war against Ukraine and NATO" bullshit. 

[kiko]

1 hour ago, Maithanet said:

I agree that does sound very Putin, but do you think that is even realistic anymore?  Ukraine is definitely not going to go for it, and Putin would need to get some of Ukraine's backers to start leaning on them to end the war.  That isn't impossible, but it feels pretty unlikely.  I could imagine Macron going for it, and quite possibly Italy, Germany, Turkey, Hungary, maybe a few others.  But definitely not Poland+Baltics and probably not the US, UK or much of Eastern Europe.  As long as Ukraine can rely on the latter allies, they can survive without the former.   

Seriously, you should pick your Twitter sources more carefully. This kind of wording is almost 1:1 of what several known PiS trolls are creating out of thin air. Not saying that west and south Europe did exceptionally great, but that's bickering over speed and quantity, not lack of resolve. 

[JGP]

Putin's next speech is going to be something.

[Werthead]

54 minutes ago, JGP said:

Putin's next speech is going to be something.

It needs to be ratified by all NATO states, which is going to be interesting with Turkey and Hungary.

However, their individual parliaments need to ratify the declaration, which is going to be interesting. The US, in particular, has resisted designating Russia as a terrorist state for fear of it shutting own diplomatic options.

[JGP]

Yeah well, once the world finally learns that soft diplomacy is wasted on fucks like Putin the better, imo.

The orbiting concern could be that Russia and China will get down deeper with each other, but frankly, that's inevitable.  

[Werthead]

16 minutes ago, JGP said:

Yeah well, once the world finally learns that soft diplomacy is wasted on fucks like Putin the better, imo.

The orbiting concern could be that Russia and China will get down deeper with each other, but frankly, that's inevitable.  

I think China's previous position was seeing Russia as a useful ally who could tie up western attention in Europe and let China get on with whatever shit it wanted to in Asia. Then it switched to seeing Russia as a useful idiot kind of doing the same thing but in a more bumbling way.

I think China's position is shifting away from that to seeing Russia as an active liability, potentially a dangerous one, in the same way that their view of North Korea seems to have drastically changed over the last decade from useful client state to either an instigator of a nuclear confrontation on China's very doorstep, or getting itself destroyed by the US and an expanded US-Korean presence way too close to China for its liking.

I also think Russia is willing to make itself China's ally/vassal but only up to a point, and it sees its own geostrategic possibilities in having China and the US facing off whilst it tries to dominate central Asia (although that also now seems to be an unmitigated failure as an idea).

I saw a good way of putting it a few weeks ago, that Russia wants to tear down the international rules-based order but China simply wants to supplant the US at the head of it. Otherwise the international order favouring a single hyperpower or a very small number of superpowers at the head of it is very much to China's advantage when they think they will be at the top of that tree.

[The Anti-Targ]

If the stated aim of the special military action is the Denazification of Ukraine, then since that was a total bollocks justification, then Putin can at any time proclaim that the Denazification effort succeeded beyond all expectations and Luhansk and Donetsk can be returned to Ukraine in the knowledge that the Russian people living there will no longer be subject to Nazi oppression. It was only meant to be a temporary annexation after all until the Nazi element could be expunged from Ukranian politics.

I think the only thing Ukraine really should do is agree to disband the Azov battalion, which they can do and then just shrug their shoulders and say its totally different when the A-hole battalion makes an appearance the next day.

Not sure how the Crimea thing can be resolved though. I don't see Russia giving that up since it was not part of this invasion. I think the US and Europe would probably try to convince Ukraine to accept the loss of Crimea if it would end hostilities.

[Werthead]

3 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Not sure how the Crimea thing can be resolved though. I don't see Russia giving that up since it was not part of this invasion. I think the US and Europe would probably try to convince Ukraine to accept the loss of Crimea if it would end hostilities.

It's something of an obvious move for Ukraine to play really hardball over Crimea but to give it up in negotiations as a massive concession in return for a massive concession from the Russian side (i.e. withdrawing from the rest of Ukraine).

Ukraine is keeping its powder dry until then because of either Russia collapsing, allowing Ukraine to snatch up Crimea as the country turns inwards, and simply to keep it as an ace in the hole as they know that Putin is so absurdly obsessed with it.

On that note, there's been a Ukrainian strike on Crimea tonight. Unclear if it was just a minor attack or a more major bombardment.

[mormont]

I don't see that it's obvious at all for Ukraine to trade away Crimea. There's a very strong argument that doing that in the first place created this situation.

[Werthead]

29 minutes ago, mormont said:

I don't see that it's obvious at all for Ukraine to trade away Crimea. There's a very strong argument that doing that in the first place created this situation.

Earlier in the conflict, a Ukrainian general said that retaking Crimea was almost impossible because the geography of the peninsula much more heavily favours the defender than almost anywhere else in the region (as the French and British can also attest, although there have been some moderate advances in technology since then), and retaking Crimea would require expending a colossal number of Ukrainian lives. Ukraine has so far fought in a way that minimises Ukrainian losses and avoids direct, full-scale assaults. They're going to need to switch away from that tactic to retake eastern Ukraine before the end of next year, let alone Crimea.

Of course, the general was saying that at a moment when it didn't look like Ukraine was going to get HIMARS and long-range missiles, which they now have, which may change the equation.

The question would come down to the belief that Putin might not use WMD anywhere else in Ukraine, even if Donetsk and Luhansk were retaken, but he would if Crimea was in danger of falling. In fact, the US military seems to regard a direct land assault on Crimea as being one of the most likely things to trigger use of nuclear weapons in the conflict (something allegedly said by Putin himself to Musk, although Musk denied it).

[Arakasi]

For as hard as taking Crimea is the question flips when you talk about blockade. Can a place really be defended when you can’t resupply it? Not to mention Ukraine would have total control over their water supply. Ships wouldn’t work because of being in range of missiles and artillery. 

[Werthead]

13 hours ago, Arakasi said:

For as hard as taking Crimea is the question flips when you talk about blockade. Can a place really be defended when you can’t resupply it? Not to mention Ukraine would have total control over their water supply. Ships wouldn’t work because of being in range of missiles and artillery. 

Yup, I think that's been a consideration as well. Having Crimea remain Russian when Ukraine can collapse the Kerch Strait bridge at will and starve it of resupply, preventing a repeat of how it was used to springboard the assault on Kherson in February and March, is another option.