Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-23 and Invasion

[Barrister]

The Ukrainians are saying that they have pretty much neutralized the northern axis of the Russian advance.

Because Ukraine is allowing independent journalists to cover the war we can kind of trust what we're hearing more generally out of Ukraine.

But I don't necessarily trust the numbers or reports coming from the Ukrainian military.  I mean look at the example in the story itself:

As we were talking another missile exploded not far from the first one. The noise of the blast could be heard clearly in the war room. "Listen," said a junior officer, "that was our air defence bringing down another one."

But it did not take the missile out in mid-air. A trolley bus conductor was killed when it hit the ground with a big explosion that also wrecked a line of buildings.

[Legbiter]

Yeah grain of salt and all that, the Russians can certainly shoot long-range missiles at Kænugarðr but these results would be quite within their capabilities given how the Russians just YOLO'd down the road network to the capital without any secondary echelons to secure their rear.

[FunkMonk]

It is really interesting to see how much Putin's Russia sucks massive ass balls.

I mean, I knew they sucked, but this much? That's pretty good. Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty good.

[Admiral Yi]

Because Ukraine is allowing independent journalists to cover the war we can kind of trust what we're hearing more generally out of Ukraine.

There's also the fact that their motivation to lie would be to make it seem worse than it is, not better.

We're watching a country with 1/4 the population of the aggressor humiliate them militarily.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I generally trust the U.S. DoD analysis on Russian casualties and such because they are based on intelligence gathering, Ukraine MoD reports are difficult/impossible to really trust in that regard.

I think that if Putin agrees to some kind of mutually agreed settlement, at least some of the sanctions will end--but I think there is going to be a major push by the West's political leadership to try and maintain the path of "more permanent divergence" away from Russia. I think some number of individual businesses--particularly the ones who have only suspended operations, who might ease back into Russia. The way some of the Western businesses withdrew they don't have a lot to "go back to" though, and I suspect those relationships may just be gone.

Short/immediate term I think a reasonable Russian ask and something we probably have to do some day anyway--is releasing their foreign currency reserves. Like I approve of us seizing them, but it's basically like theft in any real sense, so if there is a peace deal, I can see those being released. I think the sanctions on Putin, top oligarchs, and many of the other broad economic sanctions are likely to be left in place. I have a suspicion that Russia will have to make right on the $10bn in planes it has stolen before the West agrees to let Russian airlines fly to Western airports again. I hope very strongly the plans to not do Nordstream II and make big structural changes away from Russian gas continue apace no matter what.

[The Brain]

It is really interesting to see how much Putin's Russia sucks massive ass balls.

I mean, I knew they sucked, but this much? That's pretty good. Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty good.

Yeah, should give Europeans some confidence to be firmer towards Russia.

[Barrister]

It is really interesting to see how much Putin's Russia sucks massive ass balls.

I mean, I knew they sucked, but this much? That's pretty good. Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty good.

Yeah, I mean I was in fear of the Soviet military for much of my childhood.  Even after they were defeated in Afghanistan that took years and years - and they did take the country at first with ease.

I didn't think they were the equal to western militaries, but never did I expect this level of disfunction.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Because Ukraine is allowing independent journalists to cover the war we can kind of trust what we're hearing more generally out of Ukraine.

There's also the fact that their motivation to lie would be to make it seem worse than it is, not better.

We're watching a country with 1/4 the population of the aggressor humiliate them militarily.

Just reminding--you still can't count the Russians out. Logistics are a bitch, big wars of conquest are a bitch, especially against a country that is tenaciously fighting like Ukraine. But to quote Shawshank, war ain't no fairy tale. Having a fuckton more men, material, and resources does actually mean a whole hell of a lot in a war. I don't think anyone considers current Russian progress good, especially not Putin or Russia's military leadership. But there is nothing intrinsically that has happened so far, that to me, says Russia can't keep loading more men and material and keep pushing. Nor is there much that tells me Ukraine can really hold them at bay forever if Russia does so.

The big question always comes back to--how long will Ukraine fight this hard and how high will Putin watch the butcher's bill go and the equipment bill go before deciding it is permanently damaging to his regime to keep going.

I did read one take that Ukraine is actually going to get more difficult to fight over the next couple months, apparently they actually have a decent number of military veterans from Western countries who have crossed over to volunteer, and they are expected to make a significant contribution once Ukraine can integrate them into their military structure (which will take time), and some of the West's best weapons that have been sent over will still take some time to get online and get trained on--but once that window of a couple months has passed, if Russia hasn't taken most of the country, its job actually may get even harder.

[OttoVonBismarck]

It is really interesting to see how much Putin's Russia sucks massive ass balls.

I mean, I knew they sucked, but this much? That's pretty good. Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty good.

Yeah, I mean I was in fear of the Soviet military for much of my childhood.  Even after they were defeated in Afghanistan that took years and years - and they did take the country at first with ease.

I didn't think they were the equal to western militaries, but never did I expect this level of disfunction.

The USSR's Army never abandoned the idea that "quantity is a quality all its own." The Soviet military was always far better funded and far larger than Russian Federation's has been since, even with Putin's investments. Soviet spending and GDP figures have always been a bit murky to work out perfectly, but I have seen some "revised estimates" that actually suggest the Soviets may have at points during the Cold War actually been spending 20% of GDP on their military budget. Russia spends like 4.5% of its GDP. The Soviet military was also simply massive--3.5m active duty and 4m reserve in 1990, for example. Russia runs a much smaller professional army supplemented with a system of nationally required military service/training for all males by age 27, and then that base of "military trained" males are used to draw in conscripts on short term contracts. A lot of Soviet military were career soldiers, it makes a big difference.

[The Brain]

Elephantine posters may remember that one of my grandfather's younger brothers was one of the Finnish Jägers, Finns who went to Germany during WW1 and formed the 27th Prussian Jäger Battalion. They fought on the Russian front before returning to Finland in time to help beat down the Red coup attempt (the Civil War). Spread out in different postions and units they formed the hard core of the Finnish army in the Winter War and Continuation War. In 1975 the surviving Jägers wrote their "testament". It closes like this (Google translate):

As a legacy to you, Finland's youth of today, and future generations, we wish to pass on what we consider most valuable of all:

• belief in Finland's future as an independent and free state,
• a firm reliance on the legitimacy of this and its final victory, even when the situation seems hopeless;
• the will and courage to fight for this goal in all situations.

Russian performance in Ukraine, and Ukraine's valiant stand, has hopefully demonstrated to current Europeans what the Jägers knew: resistance is NOT futile.

[Berkut]

Because Ukraine is allowing independent journalists to cover the war we can kind of trust what we're hearing more generally out of Ukraine.

There's also the fact that their motivation to lie would be to make it seem worse than it is, not better.

We're watching a country with 1/4 the population of the aggressor humiliate them militarily.

Just reminding--you still can't count the Russians out. Logistics are a bitch, big wars of conquest are a bitch, especially against a country that is tenaciously fighting like Ukraine. But to quote Shawshank, war ain't no fairy tale. Having a fuckton more men, material, and resources does actually mean a whole hell of a lot in a war. I don't think anyone considers current Russian progress good, especially not Putin or Russia's military leadership. But there is nothing intrinsically that has happened so far, that to me, says Russia can't keep loading more men and material and keep pushing. Nor is there much that tells me Ukraine can really hold them at bay forever if Russia does so.

The big question always comes back to--how long will Ukraine fight this hard and how high will Putin watch the butcher's bill go and the equipment bill go before deciding it is permanently damaging to his regime to keep going.

I did read one take that Ukraine is actually going to get more difficult to fight over the next couple months, apparently they actually have a decent number of military veterans from Western countries who have crossed over to volunteer, and they are expected to make a significant contribution once Ukraine can integrate them into their military structure (which will take time), and some of the West's best weapons that have been sent over will still take some time to get online and get trained on--but once that window of a couple months has passed, if Russia hasn't taken most of the country, its job actually may get even harder.

This analysis forgets one rather critical piece - morale.

I don't see how Russian morale gets better, and while I can imagine Ukrainian morale getting worse, I could also imagine (and actually expect) that it is going up, not down. 

The US had basically infinite resources  in men and material in Vietnam, and that was worth....well, it was worth a lot. But not enough.

I think Russia is fucked, and I don't think it is a problem that is solvable by shoving more conscripts into battle, without regard to how they feel about that. Even if Putin is willing to pay that butchers bill, I don't think the cattle are going to go along with it. In fact...I don't think they are going along with it right now.

[Jacob]

On Soviet vs Russian military budgets, I wonder how much graft, theft and other inefficiencies were part of the Soviet costs. My impression is that a good amount of Russian military spending is diverted into the pockets of various kleptocrats - I wonder how that percentage compares to Soviet times.

[Barrister]

Just reminding--you still can't count the Russians out. Logistics are a bitch, big wars of conquest are a bitch, especially against a country that is tenaciously fighting like Ukraine. But to quote Shawshank, war ain't no fairy tale. Having a fuckton more men, material, and resources does actually mean a whole hell of a lot in a war. I don't think anyone considers current Russian progress good, especially not Putin or Russia's military leadership. But there is nothing intrinsically that has happened so far, that to me, says Russia can't keep loading more men and material and keep pushing. Nor is there much that tells me Ukraine can really hold them at bay forever if Russia does so.

I thought though the size of the forces was a lot more comparable when you look at the number of troops actually deployed to Ukraine by Russia.  The estimates I've seen are around 200,000.  Ukraine has approximately 200,000 soldiers in its entire armed forces, although that includes air and naval soldiers as well.  Plus throw in the Territorial Defence units that have been raised by Ukraine.

Russia, at lest on paper, had far more tanks, SAMs, planes, missiles and the like which is why everyone gave the Russians a much better chance of it.  But it's going to be hard for Russia to get more men into Ukraine without doing a more general mobilization.

[Sheilbh]

On morale, I saw this earlier about Belarus:

Dmitri Alperovitch
@DAlperovitch
Lukashenko says Belarus forces will not join the war:
"I want to emphasize once again that we are not going to get involved in this operation that Russia is conducting in Ukraine. The most important thing, as I tell those of you in the military, is that there is no need for that"

My first thought was on how weirdly see-sawing the power relationship has been between Putin and Lukashenko and that Belarus still hasn't got its forces directly involved. But someone pointed out that the bit addressed directly at the military may have been motivated by a need to quell unrest/mutinous talk - which is an interesting thought

[Barrister]

Well Lukashenko for years and years kept to an arms-length relationship with Russia and would not allow Russia troops to be stationed in Belarus.  Putin and Lukashenko may be ideological brothers, but Lukashenko has no intention of his country being swallowed up into Greater Russia.

But then there were the massive protests over the 2020 election.  Lukashenko had to invite Russian troops into the country to quell the uprising. But now that Russian troops were there Putin wasn't going to just pack them up and leave.  Lukashenko was now under his thumb, and Lukashenko knew it.

So now Belarus became a launch point for the invasion.

But now that Putin's troops are tied up in Ukraine Putin is in no shape to interfere / depose Lukashenko.  So he can adopt a more independent tone again.