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Putin & Russia

New plan for defeating Russia.

How about we heavily discount Moscow holidays to gay couples, then watch Putin go sprinting back into his closet as fast as his tiny little legs will carry him?
 
braineclipse said:
How would you have backed Ukraine earlier?

I guess the sanctions aim to get Russia to back down at some point, promising lifted sanctions if Russia back down at some point. Putin can't accept anything that can't be spun as a victory, so would probably have to include other compromises too...

Difficult to see a swift return to peace for me at least.

I think there needs to be punitive sanctions well beyond any resolution to the current conflict. But at the same time if that delays peace, and mostly hurts the common person... That's not an easy decision.

Can only hope that the negative reaction to Putin in Russia grows, and quickly. But that seems like hoping for a lot.
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The first thing is to arm Ukraine quicker, and more forcefully. We sent them ATGMs (Javelins), some Stingers, and some other miscellaneous equipment, but what they lack,and badly, are longer-range air defenses (SAMs et al), MBRLs, electronic warfare equipment, and the ability to jam GLONASS and scramble Russian targeting. These are sall systems that impose disproportionate costs on opposing forces relative to their mobility and utility for a defending state. For those needs, our supplies were paltry to non-existent, and the pusillanimity of states like Germany didn't help.

That's the first thing I have argued for. The other thing we should have done is get Ukraine mobilized quicker - for some reason, Biden wasn't able to convince Zelensky of the impending threat until less than 24 hours before the invasion began. Putin waited until the end of the Olympics to make his move, and we knew before it began that he was planning this. We should have been more insistent, to help Zelensky stand his nation up quicker and pose more of a deterrent threat.

As it is, his emotional speech directly to Russians, imploring them not to invade, is spreading rapidly through Russian Telegram networks, WhatsApp and their equivalent of Facebook, VK. We've seen protests in St.Petersburg, Moscow and Krasnoyarsk, despite the heavy presence of state security.

Russian troops captured in Donbass from the 74th Motorized Rifle B.rigade are saying that neither they nor their unit expected to actually be shooting at Ukrainians. We had the chance to turn public opinion in Russia a lot earlier if we'd persuaded Zelensky to take this more seriously earlier - it might have prevented war or at least degraded Russian combat potential.

And, finally, we should have pushed Germany to show more of a united front, more quickly. Their pusillanimity, only cancelling NS2 after it was clear an invasion was now inevitable, will go down in history as utter cowardice.

All of us were too slow to appreciate that Putin was not bluffing.
 
DubaiSpur said:
The first thing is to arm Ukraine quicker, and more forcefully. We sent them ATGMs (Javelins), some Stingers, and some other miscellaneous equipment, but what they lack,and badly, are longer-range air defenses (SAMs et al), MBRLs, electronic warfare equipment, and the ability to jam GLONASS and scramble Russian targeting. These are sall systems that impose disproportionate costs on opposing forces relative to their mobility and utility for a defending state. For those needs, our supplies were paltry to non-existent, and the pusillanimity of states like Germany didn't help.

That's the first thing I have argued for. The other thing we should have done is get Ukraine mobilized quicker - for some reason, Biden wasn't able to convince Zelensky of the impending threat until less than 24 hours before the invasion began. Putin waited until the end of the Olympics to make his move, and we knew before it began that he was planning this. We should have been more insistent, to help Zelensky stand his nation up quicker and pose more of a deterrent threat.

As it is, his emotional speech directly to Russians, imploring them not to invade, is spreading rapidly through Russian Telegram networks, WhatsApp and their equivalent of Facebook, VK. We've seen protests in St.Petersburg, Moscow and Krasnoyarsk, despite the heavy presence of state security.

Russian troops captured in Donbass from the 74th Motorized Rifle B.rigade are saying that neither they nor their unit expected to actually be shooting at Ukrainians. We had the chance to turn public opinion in Russia a lot earlier if we'd persuaded Zelensky to take this more seriously earlier - it might have prevented war or at least degraded Russian combat potential.

And, finally, we should have pushed Germany to show more of a united front, more quickly. Their pusillanimity, only cancelling NS2 after it was clear an invasion was now inevitable, will go down in history as utter cowardice.

All of us were too slow to appreciate that Putin was not bluffing.
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I guess you are not aware of the history of Afghanistan.
 
Nations that spend huge amounts developing arms with a deeply embedded military infrastructure, tend to go to war intermittently. They have to justify all the billions of spending and use some of the hardware. The US also tends to flex its military and get its troops deployed from time to time. If it is left stagnating for too long, the military powers that be fear it will all be lost or cut. There is always pressure within these nations to flex their military from time to time.

Russia spends the highest % of GDP of anywhere pretty much on the military if I recall.
 
Also, I have my views on the strategic futility of Brexit as a Canadian, and have had spats with @Danishfurniturelover in the past on the topic.

But today, I have to admit - looking at the 'wets' in Europe who, even as they watch a nation be devoured by its neighbor,are reluctant to even do the bare minimum of disconnecting Russia from SWIFT...

...Brexit allowed the UK to make its own decisions free from Brussels, the pusillanimous Germans, and the quavering Italians. And unless the EU agrees on SWIFT sanctions at a bare minimum, it's hard to see how they are anything but useless and cowardly - stand up for your ideals, goddamnit.
 
DubaiSpur said:
Don't see the point here - what do you mean, exactly?
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If you knew the history of Afghanistan you would. Taken by the Soviets, the US did more or less what you outline for Afganistan. Gave them rockets that could take down Russian helicopter warships which could dominate with impunity. They trained up the local militia. Funded them. Gave them arms. A decade or so later the US were fighting the same people they trained and funded. They were called the Taliban.

Afghanistan would have been far better off staying Soviet tbh. Free education for girls as well as boys, and some stability. Now the country is a shell. It has been decimated by decades of funding insurgents and counter-insurgents. People don't know how to farm, they know how to load a Kalashnikov. It will take many more decades for Afghanistan to recover. Prior to the Russian empire invading, Afghanistan was one of the more progressive Islamic nations with mixed universities and a liberal stable nation.

When empires try to put their ore in, nothing positive comes of it.
 
SpurMeUp said:
Nations that spend huge amounts developing arms with a deeply embedded military infrastructure, tend to go to war intermittently. They have to justify all the billions of spending and use some of the hardware. The US also tends to flex its military and get its troops deployed from time to time. If it is left stagnating for too long, the military powers that be fear it will all be lost or cut. There is always pressure within these nations to flex their military from time to time.

Russia spends the highest % of GDP of anywhere pretty much on the military if I recall.
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I agree. It was a neoconservative in the US who came up with the strategy, pre-Iraq, to go to war once every ten years to 'beat up a random third-world country to keep our edge'. While typically callous, it summarizes why nations with large military-industrial complexes need occasional wars to sustain them. China, having not fought a state-on-state war since 1979, could face issues for precisely this reason - their military is completely 'green', for lack of a better word.

But that's about national interests. And at this time, it is clear that the national interests of the US, Canada, the UK, most of Western Europe,and most of the civilized world lie in either preserving, avenging or recreating a free Ukraine. Unfortunately for Moscow, they have come up against the national interests of both the most powerful nation in the world, and its numerous, significantly powerful partners.

And for once, national interests align with being on the right side of history on this. Moscow cannot bully its Near Abroad into submission, and the more it tries, the more we make them pay. This has to be the common approach among every democracy in this crisis.

If the quavering EU permits it, anyway.
 
SpurMeUp said:
If you knew the history of Afghanistan you would. Taken by the Soviets, the US did more or less what you outline for Afganistan. Gave them rockets that could take down Russian helicopter warships which could dominate with impunity. They trained up the local militia. Funded them. Gave them arms. A decade or so later the US were fighting the same people they trained and funded. They were called the Taliban.

Afghanistan would have been far better off staying Soviet tbh. Free education for girls as well as boys, and some stability. Now the country is a shell. It has been decimated by decades of funding insurgents and counter-insurgents. People don't know how to farm, they know how to load a Kalashnikov. It will take many more decades for Afghanistan to recover. Prior to the Russian empire invading, Afghanistan was one of the more progressive Islamic nations with mixed universities and a liberal stable nation.

When empires try to put their ore in, nothing positive comes of it.
Click to expand...

I know the history of Afghanistan - the Stingers didn't do much, and it's a myth that they were this Hind-killing menace. At best, they forced Soviet air operations higher, despite what Charlie Wilson's War would have you believe.

Most of why the Afghan fighters won lay in the fact that they could rest and recuperate in Pakistan before pushing back across the border.

And as for whether Afghanistan would have been better off, it has no relevance to Ukraine. Not every US intervention against a superpower ends up with a bombed-out wreck forevermore. The US decided to slap Japan out of its imperialism, and Germany out of its Nazism - today, both countries are free and prosperous democracies. The US stopped China and North Korea from overrunning the South - today, South Korea has transitioned from its military dictatorship of the past to a prosperous democracy that, every day, illustrates how terribly the people of North Korea suffer from their leaders having chosen the Chinese and Soviets in 1950. The US stared down the Soviet Union - post collapse, half the Warsaw Pact ended up prospering democracies under the NATO aegis.

In a geopolitical world, you look for the greatest good, not the absolute good. In this case, it happens to coincide - the greatest good and the best good is forcing Russia back out of Ukraine, by any means short of direct war, so Ukrainians can decide their own future.

And if they want weapons to do so, let's go crazy. Russians themselves deserve better than Putin, and being bogged down in a raging insurgency in Ukraine might hasten his end.
 
DubaiSpur said:
I agree. It was a neoconservative in the US who came up with the strategy, pre-Iraq, to go to war once every ten years to 'beat up a random third-world country to keep our edge'. While typically callous, it summarizes why nations with large military-industrial complexes need occasional wars to sustain them. China, having not fought a state-on-state war since 1979, could face issues for precisely this reason - their military is completely 'green', for lack of a better word.

But that's about national interests. And at this time, it is clear that the national interests of the US, Canada, the UK, most of Western Europe,and most of the civilized world lie in either preserving, avenging or recreating a free Ukraine. Unfortunately for Moscow, they have come up against the national interests of both the most powerful nation in the world, and its numerous, significantly powerful partners.

And for once, national interests align with being on the right side of history on this. Moscow cannot bully its Near Abroad into submission, and the more it tries, the more we make them pay. This has to be the common approach among every democracy in this crisis.

If the quavering EU permits it, anyway.
Click to expand...

It is more complex. Ukraine was Russia's puppet. But it wasn't a bad setup. A democratically elected pro-Russian president (who is now hated and his lavish former palace he built a symbol of the corruption). But in that setup, Ukraine got cheap energy from Russia in return. Which was probably worth billions. Ukraine was under the wing of Russia but most didn't really notice. A few did. And of course there was always the attraction of joining the EU and moving closer to the west. But there was genuine kinship between the two nations: Russians lived in Ukraine and many many Ukrainians lived in Russia. Families were often split between the two nations, or frequently traveling between the two say as with Ireland and England.

What happened to change this status quo? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/nov/26/ukraine.usa The billions of dollars spent destabilising Ukraine trying to move it away from Russia's grip are public record. It is not hidden.

Essentially when you have empires trying to play the Great Game, it is the indigenous people that suffer. Nothing good comes out of it. It isn't a 19th Century confined-to-history thing either. The horrors of Syria with hundreds of thousands killed, and millions displaced from homes, is a testament to that. It was a war funded and fuelled by external interests, the UK the US, Russia etc.
 
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DubaiSpur said:
The first thing is to arm Ukraine quicker, and more forcefully. We sent them ATGMs (Javelins), some Stingers, and some other miscellaneous equipment, but what they lack,and badly, are longer-range air defenses (SAMs et al), MBRLs, electronic warfare equipment, and the ability to jam GLONASS and scramble Russian targeting. These are sall systems that impose disproportionate costs on opposing forces relative to their mobility and utility for a defending state. For those needs, our supplies were paltry to non-existent, and the pusillanimity of states like Germany didn't help.

That's the first thing I have argued for. The other thing we should have done is get Ukraine mobilized quicker - for some reason, Biden wasn't able to convince Zelensky of the impending threat until less than 24 hours before the invasion began. Putin waited until the end of the Olympics to make his move, and we knew before it began that he was planning this. We should have been more insistent, to help Zelensky stand his nation up quicker and pose more of a deterrent threat.

As it is, his emotional speech directly to Russians, imploring them not to invade, is spreading rapidly through Russian Telegram networks, WhatsApp and their equivalent of Facebook, VK. We've seen protests in St.Petersburg, Moscow and Krasnoyarsk, despite the heavy presence of state security.

Russian troops captured in Donbass from the 74th Motorized Rifle B.rigade are saying that neither they nor their unit expected to actually be shooting at Ukrainians. We had the chance to turn public opinion in Russia a lot earlier if we'd persuaded Zelensky to take this more seriously earlier - it might have prevented war or at least degraded Russian combat potential.

And, finally, we should have pushed Germany to show more of a united front, more quickly. Their pusillanimity, only cancelling NS2 after it was clear an invasion was now inevitable, will go down in history as utter cowardice.

All of us were too slow to appreciate that Putin was not bluffing.
Click to expand...

Mostly agreed, but with the caveat that doing some of those things earlier could have been seen as further escalation. Particularly agreed with weapons.

Democratic systems often are slower than authoritarian. That's the reason why (iirc) the US president carries the nuclear football, can't have that decision go through Congress.

Wich sanctions did other countries put in place before the invasion actually happened? If I seen ignorant by asking it's because I am, I've been following the development, but not as closely as I could.

Let's see what sanctions are actually put in place.
 
SpurMeUp said:
It is more complex. Ukraine was Russia's puppet. But it wasn't a bad setup. A democratically elected pro-Russian president (who is now hated and his lavish former palace he build a symbol of the corruption). But Ukraine got cheap energy from Russia in return. It was under the wing of Russia but most didn't really notice. A few did. And of course there was always the attraction of joining the EU and moving closer to the west. But Russians lived in Ukraine and many many Ukrainians lived in Russia. Families were often split between the two nations, or frequently traveling between the two say as with Ireland and England.

What happened to change this status quo? https://www.theguardian.com/world/2004/nov/26/ukraine.usa The billions of dollars spent destabilising Ukraine trying to move it away from Russia's grip are public record. It is not hidden.

Essentially when you have empires trying to leverage and play the Great Game, it is the indigenous people that suffer. Nothing good comes out of it. It isn't a 19th Century confined-to-history thing either. The horrors of Syria with hundreds of thousands killed, and millions displaced from homes, is a testament to that. It was funded and fuelled by all the surrounding interests, the UK the US, Russia etc.
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I know the history of Ukraine with Yanukovych. I also know Ukraine has had a long and complex relationship with Russia, all the way back to the founding of Russia itself and the interplay between Muscovy and Kievan Rus.

I know about Euromaidan and the split that caused in Ukrainian society. I know the allegations about Victoria Nuland and mutterings about colour revolutions that Russia likes to whinge about. I saw it happen live in 2014,and watched the little green men take over Crimea and justify it with 'Khruschev gave Crimea to Ukraine', ignoring all the little bits of Russia that were given to them off other nations when they were the RFSFR. I know about the language laws, Svoboda, Praviy Sektor, and everything else Russia tries to justify themselves with.

Nothing - nothing - changes the fact that this is not the United States invading Ukraine, this is not the United States bombing Kiev, this is not the United States murdering Ukrainian soldiers, civilians, men, women and children. This is Russia. No one else. The imperialists here are Russia. No one else.

This is a 'brother country', a country of 'Slavic brethren', bombing a nation that dared to try and choose its own way, having already bombed them and stolen their land in 2014. If the United States influenced Euromaidan - so what? Ukrainians can elect their presidents, however corrupt they may be. They can choose to elect a pro-Russia politician if they want to return to Russia's loving embrace.

They have not. They have chosen us, they have chosen to turn to the West for a better life than they could get crumbling under Russia.

If you're opposed to imperialism, be consistent and recognize that this is not the US trying to play at imperialism this time, no matter its past crimes - this is Russia trying to reign in its Near Abroad with force against a nation which chose a different path.

And they have to be stopped by as many means we can muster, short of initiating nuclear war. Like I said, geopolitics is often a grey and uncomfortable area, but for once in the 30 years since the fall of the USSR, supporting Ukraine is both the greater good and the absolute good here. Time to act. We can argue about whether it was right to let Russia into NATO in the 1990s, or whatever else justifies Russian paranoia in the mind of Putin, later.
 
DubaiSpur said:
Also, I have my views on the strategic futility of Brexit as a Canadian, and have had spats with @Danishfurniturelover in the past on the topic.

But today, I have to admit - looking at the 'wets' in Europe who, even as they watch a nation be devoured by its neighbor,are reluctant to even do the bare minimum of disconnecting Russia from SWIFT...

...Brexit allowed the UK to make its own decisions free from Brussels, the pusillanimous Germans, and the quavering Italians. And unless the EU agrees on SWIFT sanctions at a bare minimum, it's hard to see how they are anything but useless and cowardly - stand up for your ideals, goddamnit.
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It's shameful and embarrassing how little is being done.

This is the point where the UK should be publicly shaming the EU into action. We've long held ourselves up as global supporters of democracy - even using it as part justification for our own military incursions. If we can't can't stand up and take a lead now then how do we expect anyone to take us seriously in future?
 
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DubaiSpur said:
Also, I have my views on the strategic futility of Brexit as a Canadian, and have had spats with @Danishfurniturelover in the past on the topic.

But today, I have to admit - looking at the 'wets' in Europe who, even as they watch a nation be devoured by its neighbor,are reluctant to even do the bare minimum of disconnecting Russia from SWIFT...

...Brexit allowed the UK to make its own decisions free from Brussels, the pusillanimous Germans, and the quavering Italians. And unless the EU agrees on SWIFT sanctions at a bare minimum, it's hard to see how they are anything but useless and cowardly - stand up for your ideals, goddamnit.
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No one ever said the EU is always right.
The vote was are we better in the EU, not is the EU competent.

You can understand reluctance is certain European countries, Germany, Hungary, Austria and Poland most notably (mainly because I understand the WWII impact on them most) to not be too interventionist and also generally being wary of Russia.
This is a point where the Western European countries need to lead the way a bit more, including the UK.
It's easy to forget how privileged we are to have no vulnerable Land borders in European wars - it creates a very different lasting impact.
 
braineclipse said:
Mostly agreed, but with the caveat that doing some of those things earlier could have been seen as further escalation. Particularly agreed with weapons.

Democratic systems often are slower than authoritarian. That's the reason why (iirc) the US president carries the nuclear football, can't have that decision go through Congress.

Wich sanctions did other countries put in place before the invasion actually happened? If I seen ignorant by asking it's because I am, I've been following the development, but not as closely as I could.

Let's see what sanctions are actually put in place.
Click to expand...

I agree on the escalatory aspect, but as we know, Putin waited until after the Olympics for this. Just as in 2008 with Georgia, when he waited until after the Summer Olympics to invade Georgia. Before that, in 2020 and 2021, Russia wasdealing with COVID as much as anyone else, and the strain of starting this buildup would have been impossible to maintain for Moscow at the height of the pandemic.

We had strategic spaces to act to support Ukraine and build up their capacity - during the pandemic, during the Olympics,etc. We've had many of them over the past 8 years since Crimea and the first war. We didn't.

I also agree that democracies move slowly, but we had ample warning - and the best we did was put sanctions specifically on individuals in the two republics (DPR and LPR), and prohibit trade just from those two areas. Those were the sanctions we imposed in response to the buildup + declaration of recognition, along with sanctions on a few individuals. We did nothing otherwise, when we could have done much more, faster, if we were truly united and ready on this. We weren't, and Ukrainians are paying for it, unfortunately.
 
DubaiSpur said:
And they have to be stopped by as many means we can muster, short of initiating nuclear war. Like I said, geopolitics is often a grey and uncomfortable area, but for once in the 30 years since the fall of the USSR, supporting Ukraine is both the greater good and the absolute good here. Time to act. We can argue about whether it was right to let Russia into NATO in the 1990s, or whatever else justifies Russian paranoia in the mind of Putin, later.
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"They must be stopped", even it means you kill many more innocent people? Study what occurred in Syria (or Libya for that matter). It is truly awful and Hilary Clinton really does have blood on her hands. Of course their intentions may have been noble. Just as they were in funding revolution in Ukraine. But what came of it? What were the outcomes?
 
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