Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-25

[The Minsky Moment]

I wonder what these difficult things are that the Russians are willing to do?

Talk to American diplomats while keeping a straight face.

[crazy canuck]

I wonder what these difficult things are that the Russians are willing to do?

Talk to American diplomats while keeping a straight face.

Naw, the bigger challenge is refraining from winking.

[The Minsky Moment]

Trump might croak tomorrow, but his whole coterie is bending over forwards to help Russia.

Unfortunately, this is true.  It's no accident Vance led the ambush.  A large chunk of Trump's team and his following are fundamentally sympathetic to the Putinist world view and frankly admire the effective way he suppressed liberalism in Russia.  Since Trump left office there has been a gradual but steady conversion of the GOP foreign policy perspective from trying to outflank the Democrats as Russia hawks to Russia doves.  Trump and Vance have accelerated it; those elements against it have either been driven out or are quietly falling in line.

This is WAD - Russia-Ukraine is rapidly devolving into a straight partisan issue in the US like everything else. 

[The Minsky Moment]

IMO the one consistent thing about Trump, in his whole life, is that if someone trusts him or relies on him he doesn't think twice about lighting that on fire to gain what he thinks is leverage in the moment. I'm not confident that this will change with regards to Russia.

But the one consistent thing about Trump the politician and President has been submissiveness to Putin.  I would be surprised if that changed.

[Jacob]

Trump might croak tomorrow, but his whole coterie is bending over forwards to help Russia.

True enough. But I think there are still some folks in the larger GOP sphere who are not pro-Russia, so it'll depend on how the post-Trump power struggle plays out.

And, I think, if Russia primarily see their engagement with the GOP as a destabilization play at some point the post-Trump GOP leadership may decide aligning with Russia is dangerous to them.

[Jacob]

But the one consistent thing about Trump the politician and President has been submissiveness to Putin.  I would be surprised if that changed.

Yeah... maybe that's just hopium on my part

[Razgovory]

My understanding is the much of the Aid Europe sends is financial aid.  While that is useful, it can't win the war. 

It's a war of attrition and endurance.  I think the emphasis placed in the press and on the reddits on high end military equipment is misplaced.  Yes, advanced systems like Himars and the Patriots are great and Ukraine will badly miss them. But the fundamental Russian challenge is that they have never deployed a force capable of subjugating Ukraine and it seems unlikely they will ever do so.  Strong financial backing can keep Ukraine in the fight, with or without the high-end US systems.  And yes there is still a market for all sorts of important military equipment like drones, RPGs etc. Ukraine has also used and can continue to use outside financial support to build out its own production.

I'm thinking of something much less advanced, shells.  There just aren't enough shells produced.

[Razgovory]

Didn't take much effort from Trump and co. to make this an Americans vs. Europeans argument even here, did it? A year more of him and the dismantling of the 80-years old alliance will be complete and irreversible.

Raz has tons of contempt for every country stupid enough to be friendly with his.

[Sheilbh]

My understanding is the much of the Aid Europe sends is financial aid.  While that is useful, it can't win the war.  What Ukraine needs is military equipment and supplies.  Much of this can't simply be bought, it requires the building of unprofitable factories, something that Europe has dragged it's feet on.  Building those factories would take time, and I don't know how much time Ukraine as left.

I don't think that's right - you can slightly slice and dice the aid numbers in various ways to get different answers.

However, broadly, the European and US military aid has been about the same. In the European case it's only a fraction of EU reasons (for internal EU reasons) and has primarily come from member states. That aid from member states has largely been through direct grants.

Europe has, I think, largely exhausted a lot of stocks so there's not much spare equipment or ammo to give at this point. So over the last year the European form of military aid has focused instead to procurement. It is exactly those large, multi-year commitments with arms manufacturers that Europe is increasingly providing to Ukraine (some of which include manufacturing in Ukraine - I think Rheinmetall are building for JV facilities in Ukraine, I think BAE has also set up facilities in Ukraine).

In addition there has been the various multi-lateral clubs to procure equipment that already exists. So the UK set one up that's spent decent money, the Czechs have set one up specifically for artillery shells. Again in part that's to avoid internal EU issues but get bang for your buck.

But you're right it will take time - that's not so much just arming Ukraine but re-arming the rest of Europe. Poland (who I admire a lot in this) have basically stopped providing equipment to Ukraine precisely because they believe they need to re-arm themselves - but have also got multiple new arms factories being built in country. Poland will end up like an Eastern European France or South Korea. The EU is now proposing €800 billion which should largely go on defence and there is a big push from France (v Poland and Germany) that it should prioritise European firms and European manufacturing.

In terms of how long Ukraine has left I think if Russia keeps its current pace it'll take about 100 years to gobble up Ukraine. I'm not convinced there'll be a step-change in Russian advances because they have their own war economy issues that would massively accelerate that - and I think Europe will be able to step up (if the will is there) in relatively short order. It's a case of aligning the rhetoric of urgency, crisis and priority with action - can't help but think of the line Churchill would write on his papers once he came in to office in WW2: "action this day". This is not the time for consultations and stakeholder management.

Anyway, Western Europe wants Ukraine to win, believes that current aid is insufficient, but sending more aid is quite unpopular.  That appears to be a conundrum. 

I don't think sending more aid is unpopular. I'd read that poll as everyone thinking their country is "doing their bit" not that they're opposed to sending more aid - in the UK it's uniformally popular for a PM to stand up in the Commons and announce we're sending more aid/a new weapons system etc to Ukraine.

But I think there is a conundrum of wanting Ukraine to win (or preventing Russia from winning), needing to send more arms, needing to re-arm and balance that fiscally. Bluntly balancing that or creating the space for their preferred solution is literally the job of political leaders - I agree they need to step up and haven't necessarily so far.

That story always stuck with me because I happened to visit the Oxford Union in 1990, where I saw Jacob Rees-Mogg speak. Of course I had no idea what his future would be, but the name "Rees-Mogg" stuck in my brain and proved impossible to dislodge.  It was precisely the kind of name one expects to encounter at Oxford and nowhere else.  The visit also happened to coincide with Thatcher's fall, so I got exposure to the lively tabloid scene as well.

Rees-Mogg's dad was editor of The Times during Thatcher's rise (I think he'd moved on pre-Murdoch so wasn't there for Thatcher's fall).

Interestingly and maybe to slightly soften your view of Jacob Rees-Mogg, his dad wrote the editorial on Enoch Powell's race-baiting "rivers of blood" speech which he described as "an evil speech". Recently a far right commntator on GBNews was interviewing Jacob Rees-Mogg and started basically saying "wasn't Enoch right?" Which Rees-Mogg strongly rejected. Then the commentator started reading out sections of the speech - Rees-Mogg interrupted and said you can't do that, you can't just pick out lines like that got out his phone and pulled up the speech and went to a section that was clearly particularly racist as he then handed his phone over to the commentator and basically challenged them to read that on air which they wouldn't. Thought it was interesting because it was a really effective way of handling that line of argument - but also a sign of where some currents are going that they're getting push back by Rees-Mogg (a bit like Farage's regular pushback on American commentators that Tommy Robinson is not, in fact, a working class hero silenced by the establishment but a common thug).

The big question here for me is whether this is an attempt at a more permanent realignment between Russia and the US - and if so, whether Russia will countenance it; or whether this is a semi-temporary aberration and the US will align itself against Russia again in the next however long - and if so, how much advantage Russia can take in the meanwhile.

I don't think it is an attempt at a more permanent realignment. There's some on the right who may want that (to peel away from China), but I just don't think Trump has that level of fixed views/ideas.

On Russia I'm not sure Putin would want it - I think his ambitions/world view are bigger than working with the US.

[Valmy]

Didn't take much effort from Trump and co. to make this an Americans vs. Europeans argument even here, did it? A year more of him and the dismantling of the 80-years old alliance will be complete and irreversible.

Raz has tons of contempt for every country stupid enough to be friendly with his.

Yeah well prove me wrong. Give credit to somebody. I'll wait.

I do appreciate you are an equal opportunity hater. If somebody is in favor of the American alliance, you have contempt for them. But if somebody is, on the other hand, in favor of distancing themselves you also have contempt for them.

[Razgovory]

Poland.  C'mon Valmy, we came from the Pdx boards, we've heard Euros tell us for 25 years that they want US intervention in global affair to decrease.  Now they are getting it, and they are still angry with us.

[crazy canuck]

More than 25 years. But you are conflating concerns over the US using their military as a sword instead of a shield.

[Jacob]

I don't think it is an attempt at a more permanent realignment. There's some on the right who may want that (to peel away from China), but I just don't think Trump has that level of fixed views/ideas.

On Russia I'm not sure Putin would want it - I think his ambitions/world view are bigger than working with the US.

Agreed on both counts. Fundamentally, I think that neither Trump nor the oligarchs are willing to see Russia as a peer, even if they want to leverage Russian political control mechanisms domestically and Russian aggression internationally.

Conversely, I think Putin and the Russian elite are wedded to the idea of the US as a peer rival that they must defeat. They may be realistic and recognize that they're in a weak position as a peer, but that just means they have to play the game with more cunning.

It's the same reason that I'm sure Russia will turn on China (or vice versa) if there's a long term advantage in doing so. Russia is still playing for dominance.

[Zoupa]

Ukraine produced (locally) 1 million FPV drones in 2024. The aim for 2025 is 4 millions drones. That's not counting other drones for long range strikes into russia or observation/intelligence. FPVs accounted for 70% of russian equipment losses in 2024.

FPVs are now re-orienting to strike individual russian soldiers, as they seem to have run out of armored vehicles.

Ukraine can sustain this for a long time. What they can't sustain is the loss of air defence capabilities.

[Sheilbh]

It's the same reason that I'm sure Russia will turn on China (or vice versa) if there's a long term advantage in doing so. Russia is still playing for dominance.

So on the Euro-angle - Zelensky had some positive comments about China recently and I've seen Chinese papers saying that the Ukrainian-Chinese relationship is improving. And recently heard an American China expert say their Chinese contacts are very strongly emphasising that there are very much limits to the "no limits" friendship - which I've heard a Chinese commentator echo.

I don't think China's necessarily on track to pivot or anything like that - but I think it does reflect the China's view of Russia (I think they were genuinely shocked by Russia's invasion and also Russia's nuclear threats). I think they're under no illusion that Russia would turn on them if it helped. So that relationship may not be quite as fixed as we perceive.