Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-23 and Invasion

[Tamas]

It's a mystery what they'll do and how they'll survive.

There's lots of indirect and direct evidence that the Russian economy is breaking down. I see far fewer evidence (maybe they are just better hidden) that Ukraine is nearing collapse. Until then I'll keep assuming we are having a stalemate.

I meant the F16s not Ukraine overall.
Even with most down time being outside Ukraine they still need to refuel and de/re arm on the ground in Ukraine, and with current Russian spy drone successes and the fact they'll be desperate to hit these for propeganda purposes....

Ah I see, sorry.

[Tonitrus]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mX54GEqQAHs&ab_channel=UkraineNewsTV

look at about the 10 minute mark for a 'da fuq' moment.

It looks like their fists are clenched...so more of a "we who are about to die salute you" salute?

[Syt]

https://www.dw.com/en/germany-shrugs-off-putin-comments-on-us-missiles/a-69801608

Germany shrugs off Putin comments on US missiles
07/29/2024July 29, 2024

Germany's government said it had "taken note" of comments over the weekend from Vladimir Putin, saying Russia might take countermeasures if the US deployed more longer-range missiles in Germany as planned.

Germany's government on Monday downplayed comments from Russian President Vladimir Putin over the weekend, threatening to change Russia's military posture if the US installs more medium-range nuclear-capable cruise missiles on German soil in the coming years as planned.

"We will not allow ourselves to be intimidated by such comments," Foreign Ministry spokesman Sebastian Fischer told a Berlin press conference.

The government's deputy spokeswoman, Christiane Hoffmann, was also asked to respond.

She said "we have taken note" of the comments from Putin, but also said that the proposed changes would serve "solely" as a deterrent, and one that had been made necessary by recent Russian actions.

"Namely, because Russia has changed the strategic balance in Europe and is threatening Europe and Germany with cruise missiles — and we have to establish a deterrent," she said.

What had Putin said?

Putin said at a naval parade in St. Petersburg on Sunday that if the US went ahead with plans to station additional weaponry in Europe that could in theory target Russia, then Moscow would consider "mirror measures."

He evoked the arms race of the early 1980s, late in the Cold War, when a core Soviet grievance had been the deployment of Pershing missiles in then-West Germany. Putin alleged the US was risking a similar repeat phenomenon.

"If the US implements such plans, we will consider ourselves free from the previously imposed unilateral moratorium on the deployment of intermediate and shorter-range strike weapons, including increasing the capability of the coastal forces of our navy," Putin said.

Here, Putin was referring to the terms of the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty of 1987 — which the US and then Russia withdrew from in 2019.

Both sides blamed the other for violating the terms of the treaty.

But Putin also claimed that Russia had been keeping to its terms anyway since leaving the deal — an assessment the US and Germany would likely dispute — and warned that this might stop if more US weaponry was stationed in Germany.

These disputes were already taking shape prior to Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, but the tone and urgency from both sides has probably hardened since then.

What are the planned changes, and are they anything new?

According to a joint statement from Washington and Berlin, by 2026 the US will start to station weaponry including SM-6 missiles, improved Tomahawk cruise missiles, which can be nuclear-capable, and some "developmental hypersonic weapons" in Germany.

The US and Germany argue that the move is a response to developments such as Russia stationing comparable Iksander missiles in its Kaliningrad exclave bordering Poland and Lithuania.

"What we are now planning is a response to deter these weapons from being used against Germany or other targets," Foreign Ministry spokesman Sebastian Fischer said on Monday.

There are already a series of US military bases in Germany, a legacy of the aftermath of World War II and then of the Cold War.

There are various US missiles, albeit with shorter ranges, formally positioned in the country.

It's also an open secret — albeit one never formally acknowledged by either government — that the US still stations nuclear weapons at one of its bases in Germany, a reduction from two sites in the years and decades prior to 2005. 

The numbers that remain stationed in Germany and some other European countries are however drastically reduced when compared to the height of the Cold War.

msh/wmr (AFP, dpa, Reuters)

[Threviel]

You are a guy I respect, explain to me how that policy makes sense?

I am not a mind reader nor do I have the information that US decision-makers have, but I can see a rationale that explains their decision-making satisfactorily to me:  Joe Biden is the President of the United States, and his duty is to serve the interests of the citizens and nation of the US.  It is in the interests of the US to help its allies and frustrate its enemies, but only in such a way as to not jeopardize US interests.

It is not in the interest of the US to see the war in Ukraine escalate.  Escalation, though, is far more in the purview of Russia than Ukraine.  So US policy should be to deter escalation by punishing it when it happens, but only proportionately.  US escalation that exceeds Russian escalation merely prompts further Russian escalation in order to "level the playing field."  Moreover, every US escalation by definition reduces the number of escalatory steps the US has remaining.  So, the Biden administration is only reacting to Russian escalation in a way that relates directly to that escalation.  The Russians open a new front around Kharkiv?  The US allows its weapons to be used on Russian territory around Kharkiv.  The Russians launch SAMs as SSMs from around Belgorad, the US allows US weapons to be used to destroy SAM sites in the Belgorad region.

Joe Biden is a cautious politician.  More cautious than I wish he was, but my wishes don't matter in this.  What his administration is doing is keeping its escalatory arrows in the quiver as much as they can, so their existence can help deter Russian escalation.  If the US completely took the gloves off the firing team, it would have no more proportional responses to Russian escalation left.  All it would have is disproportionate escalation, which nobody wants.

I can't say that this is the Biden administration's thinking, but I've worked in that arena and I could certainly see his advisors thinking along these lines (on a hypothetical basis, I have seen that very reasoning presented to US high-level decisionmakers in a nuclear targeting scenario - "leave them something to lose").  I also can't say that I completely agree with this line of reasoning, nor that I agree that the US escalatory actions have truly been proportional.  But if you are looking for a reason more plausible than "they are all just idiots," then what I am describing meets your requirements.

I've been thinking about this. The decision itself seems to me to be idiocy, but the reasoning put forward here is very compelling. I have been trying to figure out the dissonance.

And then I read that Obama wanted a process to decide the replacement for Biden. That's the thing, Obama. Someone described him like la lawyer walking in to a knife fight and in foreign policy I found him very unimpressive. His humiliating failure in Syria goes a long way to describe why there's war in Ukraine for example. He just didn't seem to understand that his opponents did not think like him and that they were dishonest and not swayed by reasonable arguments.

In analogue to that the Biden administration and their stance on weapons in Ukraine. They think that their enemy thinks like them in some way. Escalatory ladders and so on, without seemingly understanding that their opponent is climbing that ladder as fast and as high as they dare and the only way to get them to stop is making them not dare, instead of a strongly worded letter.

Edit: The Obama/Biden way would be the correct way to handle an armed proxy conflict with a state with a peer government quality, say the UK, France or perhaps China or the Soviet Union. Russia is not a peer quality government, they are much more primitive and should be handled differently. I don't think the escalatory ladder thinking is properly groked by them or if groked cared about.

[Sheilbh]

I agree with a lot of that - but I'd also add that I think many in Europe don't appreciate that much of the American foreign establishment aren't think like them. There are lots in US foreign policy circles who do not think Russia is "their enemy". By that I don't mean pro-Russia or anti-Ukraine types but simply that there are an awful lot of people in the US who think that the challenger to the US and their position in the world is China.

It's a view from left to right and every President since Obama has been talking about the need to "pivot" and focus on China. It's been two decades more or less of trying to have fewer commitments in Europe and the Middle East in order to focus on the Pacific - and for all that time Europe has not really managed to step up.

This is where I think Europeans need to get our act together because I don't think it's just Trump. I think Biden in some ways is the last leader who thinks the US can do everything everywhere. His hero is FDR and he thinks the US can be fully committed in confronting China and Russia at once. I think more widely spread is the view that the US needs to prioritise and while that doesn't mean abandoning Ukraine it means the time, resources, energy being spent in Europe is not available in the Pacific. It's part of why the UK and France especially have made efforts in the Pacific recently - to prove the value of the Atlantic alliance even as the US feels it needs to focus more on the Pacific.

At some point I worry the American perception of the threat from China's rise will mean it sees remaining so heavily involved in Europe and the Middle East as actively harming its interests elsewhere - at which point I suspect things will move very quickly in re-orienting. Which could be quite destabilising for Europe if we're not able to handle the security order of our own continent and near neighbourhood. American security is one of the anchors of Europe - I think Trump is a huge risk, but I think it's broader than just him.

[Threviel]

Yeah, I agree with all of that, the failure of European governments since 2008 and especially since 2016 and Trump is gigantic and talked about far too litle.

In some ways perhaps we are lucky that Russia moved too fast and to incompetent on a too strong opponent, had they successfully invaded Ukraine in a day or two our electorate would presumably still have their heads in the sand and then we would most definitely not be ready when they would have gone for the next target.

[DGuller]

Someone described him like la lawyer walking in to a knife fight and in foreign policy I found him very unimpressive.

I just hope that today's Barrack Obama is different from the law professor who walked into a knife fight and kept thinking for 8 years that it's a debate club gathering.

[Threviel]

Someone described him like la lawyer walking in to a knife fight and in foreign policy I found him very unimpressive.

I just hope that today's Barrack Obama is different from the law professor who walked into a knife fight and kept thinking for 8 years that it's a debate club gathering.

  Busted.

Great description of Obamas presidency.

[Legbiter]

I've been thinking about this. The decision itself seems to me to be idiocy, but the reasoning put forward here is very compelling. I have been trying to figure out the dissonance.


In analogue to that the Biden administration and their stance on weapons in Ukraine. They think that their enemy thinks like them in some way. Escalatory ladders and so on, without seemingly understanding that their opponent is climbing that ladder as fast and as high as they dare and the only way to get them to stop is making them not dare, instead of a strongly worded letter.

Edit: The Obama/Biden way would be the correct way to handle an armed proxy conflict with a state with a peer government quality, say the UK, France or perhaps China or the Soviet Union. Russia is not a peer quality government, they are much more primitive and should be handled differently. I don't think the escalatory ladder thinking is properly groked by them or if groked cared about.

Yeah.

[The Minsky Moment]

In analogue to that the Biden administration and their stance on weapons in Ukraine. They think that their enemy thinks like them in some way. Escalatory ladders and so on, without seemingly understanding that their opponent is climbing that ladder as fast and as high as they dare and the only way to get them to stop is making them not dare, instead of a strongly worded letter.

I don't think that's an accurate description. Rather, it reflects an approach that focuses on capabilities rather than intentions. The problem with intentions and "how the enemy thinks" is that divining intentions is fraught with uncertainty and guesswork. And because human beings as thinking animals are not known for their consistency and for reliably following a single behavioral profile, even if you get it right, you can get it wrong.  What is knowable to a reasonable degree of precision is capabilities. Russia has dedicated a lot of resources to bulding and maintaining a large nuclear arsenal of varied sizes and potential uses. And there are many conceivable use cases in Ukraine where if Russia did so, NATO would struggle to find an appropriate and proportional response. You may subjectively apply a low probability to such an outcome, but that just raises the question of what probability of nuclear escalation is acceptable.  20%? 10%? 5%?  My sense is that Joe Biden has a very low threshold of risk in that respect.

The other element to consider is China. Although the PRC has continued to supply the Russian civilian economy, including with dual use tech, it does appear to have refrained from providing direct military assistance. To what extent is that restraint a quid pro quo for US restraint in helping Ukraine?  No way to know for sure until declassification.

To be clear, I concur that Biden has been too cautious, and paying too much attention to Sarajevo risk and not enough to Munich risk.  But its unfair to say that his approach is because US foreign policy is run by naive fools who just don't understand the Russian mind. That's not what is happening.

[Jacob]

Yeah, I think it's possible to disagree with how Biden is approaching this without having to conclude that the disagreement is because Biden and his teams are idiots/ cowards/ naive.

[Barrister]

Yeah, I think it's possible to disagree with how Biden is approaching this without having to conclude that the disagreement is because Biden and his teams are idiots/ cowards/ naive.

I think Joe Biden is treating Ukraine in good faith and does not want to see Ukraine defeated.

But I do think his administration has been vastly too cautious in supplying weaponry to Ukraine.  You might even call him cowardly.

We've just seen this time after time, in weapon system after weapon system - they say no a thousand times, but ultimately say yes.  From Abrams, to Patriot, to ATACMS, to F-16.  If the administration would have supplied those systems much earlier, and in much greater numbers, the situation on the ground would be significantly different, and it's hard to see what Putin would have done differently in response.

[crazy canuck]

Yeah, I think it's possible to disagree with how Biden is approaching this without having to conclude that the disagreement is because Biden and his teams are idiots/ cowards/ naive.

I think Joe Biden is treating Ukraine in good faith and does not want to see Ukraine defeated.

But I do think his administration has been vastly too cautious in supplying weaponry to Ukraine.  You might even call him cowardly.

We've just seen this time after time, in weapon system after weapon system - they say no a thousand times, but ultimately say yes.  From Abrams, to Patriot, to ATACMS, to F-16.  If the administration would have supplied those systems much earlier, and in much greater numbers, the situation on the ground would be significantly different, and it's hard to see what Putin would have done differently in response.

I think that is accurate on all points.

[Zoupa]

I think Joe Biden is treating Ukraine in good faith and does not want to see Ukraine defeated.

But I do think his administration has been vastly too cautious in supplying weaponry to Ukraine.  You might even call him cowardly.

We've just seen this time after time, in weapon system after weapon system - they say no a thousand times, but ultimately say yes.  From Abrams, to Patriot, to ATACMS, to F-16.  If the administration would have supplied those systems much earlier, and in much greater numbers, the situation on the ground would be significantly different, and it's hard to see what Putin would have done differently in response.

Yes. As a reminder, the US armed forces ordered 8100 Abrams tanks. 3450 of those are currently in storage.

They sent 31 to Ukraine.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

F16 was apparently spotted in the Lviv region...