Ukraine: Slava Ukraini!!!

[Fez]

21 hours ago, Kalnestk Oblast said:

So...your hypothesis is that the entire Kremlin staff, led by...no one in particular...will just decide to depose Putin in such a way that it requires zero detectable coordination and also has no actual successor. Also, this hypothesis requires that this general staff somehow all stop supporting Putin or actually care about something other than Putin despite them being Putin's absolute most loyal area and have been absurdly improved under Putin at the expense of virtually every other area of power. 

I mean, okay? That could happen, I guess. But it's exceedingly implausible and is significantly lower in the list of things Putin should worry about. 

...

No. My hypothesis is that events can move very quickly and without warning. And often times you don't know who the first mover will be until they act; because if they are known, the dictator almost certainly will remove them long before they can act.

Your assumption that Putin is untouchable is as wrong as your assumptions about the 2020 election were.

[Kalbear]

20 minutes ago, Fez said:

...

No. My hypothesis is that events can move very quickly and without warning. And often times you don't know who the first mover will be until they act; because if they are known, the dictator almost certainly will remove them long before they can act.

Your assumption that Putin is untouchable is as wrong as your assumptions about the 2020 election were.

Heh. The election where I guessed almost every state correctly, guessed that Trump would not accept a loss and that Trump would attempt to use violent force to stop the transition of power? Yeah, that tracks - I'm probably about as accurate about Putin as I am that election.

Events certainly can move quickly, but if your bet is 'and therefore they WILL do that' you're not particularly serious here. That's very wishful thinking. I'll grant you that IF Putin is deposed it'll be from some bizarre set of circumstances and people that no one could reasonably see coming, but that does not mean that it is likely to happen at all. The most likely outcome is that Putin will be in power for as long as he chooses to be in power given the current trends and behaviors. Can that change? Sure, that's theoretically possible. But none of the things that folks like yourself are naming appear to be capable of changing that. The Russian government is not under particular amounts of pressure, and even losing the Ukraine war completely is unlikely to change that significantly. Heck, in some ways ending the war would likely mean a major cessation of sanctions and would make Russia actually better off! Putin is not under duress from his elites in any meaningful way. He owes the ultranationalists very little and at this point they are more echoing his desires than the other way around. 

The other issue is that if Putin is deposed it is less likely to be by someone who is wanting to stop fighting in Ukraine; the most powerful people around in Russia are all fairly heavily wanting to crush Ukraine even more than they already have. They want further fighting against the Baltics and Poland and weirdly the 'Stans. 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

5 minutes ago, Kalnestk Oblast said:

Heh. The election where I guessed almost every state correctly, guessed that Trump would not accept a loss and that Trump would attempt to use violent force to stop the transition of power? Yeah, that tracks - I'm probably about as accurate about Putin as I am that election.

Events certainly can move quickly, but if your bet is 'and therefore they WILL do that' you're not particularly serious here. That's very wishful thinking. I'll grant you that IF Putin is deposed it'll be from some bizarre set of circumstances and people that no one could reasonably see coming, but that does not mean that it is likely to happen at all. The most likely outcome is that Putin will be in power for as long as he chooses to be in power given the current trends and behaviors. Can that change? Sure, that's theoretically possible. But none of the things that folks like yourself are naming appear to be capable of changing that. The Russian government is not under particular amounts of pressure, and even losing the Ukraine war completely is unlikely to change that significantly. Heck, in some ways ending the war would likely mean a major cessation of sanctions and would make Russia actually better off! Putin is not under duress from his elites in any meaningful way. He owes the ultranationalists very little and at this point they are more echoing his desires than the other way around. 

The other issue is that if Putin is deposed it is less likely to be by someone who is wanting to stop fighting in Ukraine; the most powerful people around in Russia are all fairly heavily wanting to crush Ukraine even more than they already have. They want further fighting against the Baltics and Poland and weirdly the 'Stans. 

In fairness when the Soviet Union collapsed it did so very quickly and with little warning.  This doesn’t mean it will happen… but that it is possible.

[Maithanet]

Here is the CNAS Russia Stability Tracker.  Which seems relevant to our discussion.  They have a detailed discussion of each of these items, which are the Pillar's of Putin's Stability/Rule.  I'll give the TLDR of whether it is increasing or decreasing as a result of the Ukraine war:

Absence of Putin Alternatives - No Change

Cohesive political elite - Weakening

Control of Information - Strengthening

Economic Wellbeing - Weakening

Exit of discontented Russians - Strengthening

Apolitical Military - Weakening

Loyal Security Services - Strengthening

Putin Popularity - No Change

Repression - Strengthening

Russia against the World narrative - Strengthening

 

So of that list, Putin is getting stronger in 5 categories and weaker in 3.  For now his position is reasonably strong. 

If theoretically the war in Ukraine were to go terribly this year, then I would expect a decline in Putin popularity, and possibly also the Control of Information, and Loyal Security Services (as well as further decline in the categories that are already weak).  That would definitely put Putin in a weaker relative position from today, although it is just a matter of speculation on whether that would really be enough to get the momentum necessary for his removal. 

[Kalbear]

43 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

In fairness when the Soviet Union collapsed it did so very quickly and with little warning.  This doesn’t mean it will happen… but that it is possible.

I guess? I mean, it took something like 2 years from the Berlin Wall to the actual USSR collapsing and other countries (like the Baltics) gaining independence, so 'quickly' is probably a bit misleading. In addition the writing was on the wall for a while - the USSR was looking weaker and weaker, had major economic issues, had Chernobyl, and Gorbachev was already pivoting that way for years. 

To give @Fez and others some credit I will say that Russia is probably capable of handling one major crisis without significant political turmoil, but probably cannot handle two. Ukraine is that current crisis and they're dealing with it and have reached a kind of equilibrium, but as the paper @Maithanet linked to above shows other things could cause a very fast failure - Iran changing regime, or another Chernobyl type situation, or a massive famine. In that case I could see things deteriorating fast, and in ways that are very hard to reasonably predict.

[Kalbear]

Heh. Looking at the wikipedia article it's really clear how 'not quickly' the fall of the USSR was. Some notable points:

- There were ethnic and nationalist parties protesting openly against USSR rule starting as early as 1986

- Yeltsin resigned in protest fairly early in Gorbachev's position and his letter was leaked

- Chernobyl happened

- multiple Republics announced their independence and were independent for years before USSR actually fell

- USSR did things that were unthinkable years earlier - things like allowing any non-USSR radio, allowing protests to continue and even supporting them with police

 

As far as I can tell I don't see anything like that even coming close to happening, and most of them couldn't happen in this environment without replacing Putin first.

[Derfel Cadarn]

Russia apparently targeting suicidal men for recruitment

https://news.sky.com/story/ukraine-war-latest-ukrainian-defences-in-bakhmut-under-severe-pressure-as-russia-makes-further-advances-crowds-laugh-at-sergei-lavrov-12541713?postid=5574492#liveblog-body

[Darzin]

On 3/7/2023 at 8:19 AM, Wilbur said:

Medium-term, I wonder about the relationship between China and Russia, and how the dynamic may suddenly change to Putin's disadvantage.

Right now, China is weakly supporting Russia, not because they love Putin, but they would like to continue to purchase cheap energy and they would also like to get back in the game for Lake Baikal water to supply the dry region around Beijing.  And of course, weak support for Russia has some opposition to the US as the other side of the coin.

And Xi is busy consolidating power in China, collecting all the strands of power in his own grasp, which must be nice.

But as Putin expends the limited supply of Russian military power on Ukraine, you can't tell me that Xi doesn't look at Manchuria and remember that it used to be part of China.  Wouldn't it be nice for China if they suddenly owned both banks of Amur and Ussuri Rivers, as well as Magadan and Vladivostok and Khavarosk?  It sure would be easier to supply water to Beijing if that were the case.  And crossing the Amur is a lot easier than crossing the Taiwan Straight, if you have a burgeoning military power, but maybe worry that it isn't quite enough to get the job done in the ROC.

So it wouldn't surprise me if Xi supports Putin right up until the point when he doesn't, say in 2028 or so, and then Putin finds the Chinese have pulled the rug out from under him, and he needs to worry about the Far East all of a sudden.

I strongly doubt this even though this idea comes up a lot. It would be throwing away decades of work by Chinese diplomats to repair Russo-Chinese relations after the Sino-Soviet split. It also isn't claimed by China, I realize most people here won't think much of Chinese claims but the Chinese do and they've been very very clear what they claim and what they don't. Plus they can exploit the resources of Siberia already through investment and trade without having to administer a vast territory of  millions of hostile Russians which would suddenly be grafted into China. All of this is meaningless anyway because even if the PRC did have ambitions to launch an eastern Barbarossa into Siberia, Russia has nukes, which means annexing even a little territory ,much less vast swaths of resource rich land, is off the table. 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

What’s going on in Georgia?

 

[Toth]

18 minutes ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

What’s going on in Georgia?

Something that makes zero headlines here for some reason... though I heard of it yesterday night.

Well from what I've gathered the government is trying to push through a law banning all kinds of news outlets and NGOs with more than 20% foreign funding as hostile foreign agents. The president and opposition regard it as awfully similar to a similar law Putin introduced to strangle independent press, with the president already saying she will refuse to sign the law and public protests turning into a storming of the parliament yesterday after said parliament voted in favor of the law.

I'm somewhat watching it anxiously. Many of the protestors interviewed seem to think that Moscow has pressured the government to draft that bill in order to drive Georgia away from the EU (you know, like the think preceding the first Ukraine invasion). Of course you'd think Russia is in no position to intervene if this backfires and another apparently more pro-Russian government gets ousted.

[Maithanet]

9 hours ago, Darzin said:

I strongly doubt this even though this idea comes up a lot. It would be throwing away decades of work by Chinese diplomats to repair Russo-Chinese relations after the Sino-Soviet split. It also isn't claimed by China, I realize most people here won't think much of Chinese claims but the Chinese do and they've been very very clear what they claim and what they don't. Plus they can exploit the resources of Siberia already through investment and trade without having to administer a vast territory of  millions of hostile Russians which would suddenly be grafted into China.

While this war has had some irritating blowback for the Chinese govt (NATO rearmament and increased EU unity), it still stands to benefit China in the long run.  Russia has lost access to the European markets, which means Russia's vast mineral and energy resources will now be diverted into China (and to a lesser extent India).  In order to exploit these resources, that will require investments in terms of equipment, pipelines, etc, and China is practically the only game in town for that investment money.  They will negotiate extremely hard with Russia for favorable contracts, cheaper energy, and the like.  More so than every before, the money from exploiting Russia's resources will be flowing outside the nation's borders.

Russia started this war with neo-imperialist dreams, but instead it is going to get a taste of neo-colonialism. 

[Maithanet]

Ukraine has made a smallish counterattack around Bakhmut to relieve pressure and avoid a full encirclement.  At this point both sides appear exhausted (at least locally).  People are speculating about why the Ukrainians are holding on so bitterly to Bakhmut, where troops run the risk of encirclement and supply lines are increasingly under Russian fire.  Since Ukraine could easily withdraw just a short distance to more favorable positions, why are they fighting on increasingly unfavorable ground?

Theories I've read include:

1.  Denying Russia the political/morale boost of capturing a city is meaningful.

2.  They know that Russia will keep attacking until Bakhmut is captured, and they want Russia to keep attacking to exhaust their reserves prior to the Ukrainian spring offensive. 

3.  The casualty ratios are still extremely favorable in Bakhmut so there is no reason to abandon their positions.  I've heard figures of 5 and 7 to 1 in Ukraine's favor, although it is hard to believe it could remain that lopsided as the position deteriorates.

4.  If Ukraine pulls back from Bakhmut, shelling will increase in Kramatorsk.  Ukraine would rather further destroy Bakhmut (which has only a few thousand people left anyway), rather than the far more important and populated Kramatorsk. 

[Kalbear]

ISW had some talk about that; their conclusion is that Russia does not have any reasonable way to use Bakhmut as a stepping stone to any realistic further gains, as whatever success they are having is largely predicated on urban environments and they are not operationally capable of mobile warfare. Ukraine has a risk of sustaining more casualties than they can realistically afford but right now the rate of casualties - even shitty ones like penal batallions - is massively in Ukraine's favor. And much like the gains in September, pinning a large chunk of the Russian forces there means opportunities for Ukrainian subterfuge and offensives in other places.

[Werthead]

Some reports that Zelensky wanted to hold Bakhmut after the generals advised to withdraw. However, he got grumpy over that rumour and stated he was following the generals' advice.

Militarily, it makes sense to convince your enemy to continue expending vast numbers of lives against your hardened defences. The 7:1 kill ratio in Bakhmut is absurd, but some are saying it's actually been much higher on some days and the Ukrainian military has not reported it because it sounds fantastical. But there were indications on the absolute horror days when Russia lost more than a thousand lives per day that Ukraine was losing less than 10% of that.

I think there's also a slither of doubt entering the equation that Russia can take Bakhmut. They probably still will, but it's gone from people on all sides being 95% certain that will happen within days (a few weeks ago) to maybe 80% certain that will happen this month. Prigozhin said that ammo supplies are so low that the Russian effort may culminate with the city centre still untaken, and Russia might not be able to take it until a refreshed offensive probably several months down the road.

[Maithanet]

The question of whether Russia can take Bakhmut is, like almost everything in this war, a matter of supply routes.  Russia has attempted for months to simply bludgeon their way into and through the city, with no success.  They have had some (costly, slow) progress in surrounding Bakhmut and putting Ukrainian supply lines under fire, first in the south and in the past month north and northwest of Bakhmut. 

As it gets harder and harder for Ukraine to supply, rotate and reinforce the troops in the city, it becomes just a matter of time before Ukraine must either retreat or be encircled.  But the counterattacks yesterday have bought Ukraine a bit more room in that regard, and it is becoming an open question whether Wagner or the army have the strength to keep pushing forward. 

It would be pretty awesome for morale if this turned out like Stalingrad where a portion of Bakhmut is still in Ukrainian hands and the big counteroffensive begins to completely change the strategic picture (not that I'm expecting a huge push to encircle Bakhmut/Donetsk).

[Matrim Fox Cauthon]

15 hours ago, Werthead said:

Some reports that Zelensky wanted to hold Bakhmut after the generals advised to withdraw. However, he got grumpy over that rumour and stated he was following the generals' advice.

Militarily, it makes sense to convince your enemy to continue expending vast numbers of lives against your hardened defences. The 7:1 kill ratio in Bakhmut is absurd, but some are saying it's actually been much higher on some days and the Ukrainian military has not reported it because it sounds fantastical. But there were indications on the absolute horror days when Russia lost more than a thousand lives per day that Ukraine was losing less than 10% of that.

I think there's also a slither of doubt entering the equation that Russia can take Bakhmut. They probably still will, but it's gone from people on all sides being 95% certain that will happen within days (a few weeks ago) to maybe 80% certain that will happen this month. Prigozhin said that ammo supplies are so low that the Russian effort may culminate with the city centre still untaken, and Russia might not be able to take it until a refreshed offensive probably several months down the road.

Even if Russia takes Bakhmut, holding it for a prolonged period is another matter. It may just be a pyrrhic victory. 

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Could the Ukrainian’s just be turning Bakhmut into a kill zone?  The Russians are so desperate for a win they keep funneling troops into Bakhmut and away from other areas.  Or is there some really strategic reason for the Russians to spend months and thousands of lives to take this one town?

[Derfel Cadarn]

2 hours ago, Ser Scot A Ellison said:

Could the Ukrainian’s just be turning Bakhmut into a kill zone?  The Russians are so desperate for a win they keep funneling troops into Bakhmut and away from other areas.  Or is there some really strategic reason for the Russians to spend months and thousands of lives to take this one town?

Probably. If they withdraw, they’ll just need to rinse and repeat at the next defence point. 

[karaddin]

I know that the military angle is going to be people's primary consideration, but when talking objectives that might be motivating Ukraine I don't think that should be the only angle. If the fighting can be kept in Bakhmut then that spares the next town(s) from getting utterly destroyed and almost certainly saves civilian lives as well. 

That's not going to decide the fate of the war, but it certainly seems something that could be weighing on Zelensky's mind. So if there are other reasons to keep fighting, such as bleeding the Russian army as much as possible and especially trying to kill off Wagner, then saving another town could be the deciding factor in a 50/50 call.

[Kalbear]

The other thing is that denying Putin a win in a place that they've been working so hard to get one is worth its own value. That's not particularly strategic or tactical, but sometimes denying the enemy what they want has its own rewards. And Putin being unable to even claim this as a win is kind of a big deal. 

Though weirdly making Wagner less powerful is probably not a great thing for Russian instability.