Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-23 and Invasion

[Crazy_Ivan80]

Big pro-Russia demo with a car convoy in Berlin. Disgusting fucking people.

potentially the russian community, but who knows.

[FunkMonk]

How the hell are we going to fix Russia.

"Shock therapy"

[alfred russel]

Agreed, but past a certain point (like, for example, when Russia is threatening with nukes at every slight and insult received), the only way to contain the risk of nuclear war is to make a stand despite the risk of being nuked.

I agree on that point, but there needs to dispassionate analysis on the places to make a stand.

Earlier there was some discussion of how the hard line of Kennedy in the Cuban Missile Crisis led to a successful conclusion. Some people argue that the hard line of Reagan contributed to the collapse of the Warsaw Pact regime. That is our western perspective. I could be missing a name somewhere, but I think khrushchev and gorbachev were the only two russian/soviet leaders to be deposed since nicholas II. The cuban missile crisis probably contributed to khrushchev being pushed out and gorbachev is seen as being exploited by the west and weak. If you are looking at this from the russian perspective, it is very easy to see that the ultimate risk to rule is compromising with the west or giving ground when challenged.

This isn't the 1960s when there was an ideological state and khruschev could retire within the regime with the state continuing. Putin's russia doesn't really have an ideology. Deposing Putin is going to be extremely tricky without it going the way of Nicholas II. Which is all fine and dandy but Putin knows this.

[celedhring]

On the hopeful side, I think probably many people in 1945 were also asking themselves "how are we going to fix Germany?", and that turned out alright. On the hopeless side, that required a world war.

[Sheilbh]

"Shock therapy"

"No, it never does. I mean, these people somehow delude themselves into thinking it might, but... but it might work for us."

[DGuller]

Is there a point where aggressive neutrality becomes untenable for countries like India?

[grumbler]

Never interrupt your enemy while they are losing.

As an aside, the actual quote is from Napoleon I, who said "never interrupt an enemy while he is making a mistake."  Your paraphrase works, but I like his wording better.

[viper37]

Is there a point where aggressive neutrality becomes untenable for countries like India?

The point where they lose economic opportunities or support against Pakistan.  Otherwise, I don't really see India changing its attitude.

[Sheilbh]

Apparently Britain did Bucha - very much big, if true (via the BBC Monitoring guy - who is well worth a follow):
https://twitter.com/francska1/status/1510993878018670595?s=20&t=Cre6zylKHgM2KTZN3iceVA

Francis Scarr
@francska1
Pundit Gevorg Mirzayan on Bucha:

"This was done by professionals, probably British. They're the best in the area of information operations. [They know how] to place the bodies correctly, do everything correctly, create a nice picture for the necrophilic Western consciousness"

I feel like if this is the level Russian propaganda is at now they're really plunging into new depths to explain the obvious.

[Jacob]

So at the same time it's "Ukrainian civilians ought to experience all the horrors of war as punishment for rejecting Russia" and "the horrors of war are all staged by the West".

Very on brand, I suppose.

[Sheilbh]

Exactly, they deserve it and it isn't happening.

[OttoVonBismarck]

I don't really think it is productive to "go after" India, they have very rational and understandable reasons for their relationship with Russia. The right approach with India is for America to build closer trade and defense ties, not to put pressure on them. We have just started to ink some deals with India where we are getting some defense trade with them, which is big, and setting up local Indian manufacturers to manufacture local versions of American weapons.

Russia has benefited a lot from being fully open to the West for some 30 years. The Soviet Union was not completely walled off from world trade, and it is not realistic to expect Russia will be either. However what is true is we can step back all that we have done in the West to embrace Russia and integrate our economies with Russia. It won't have the satisfaction of dropping a bomb on Putin's house, and it won't have as immediate impact, but a steady push to sever those ties, roll back those integrations, will long term set Russia back tremendously. Remember that even before all of this the Russian economy was showing relative signs of slowing down, particularly in its non-petro resources.

The people tut-tutting that Russia can always make money off of oil...okay, so what? The USSR always made money off of oil too. A Russia isolated from the West is absolutely going to suffer from long term economic regression and lack of growth, and that is what Russia needs. As years pass by, year after year of stunted or event reversed growth move their economy back tick by tick to a worse state. It is already estimated that by the end of this year Russia will have suffered GDP regression equal to like 15 years of growth. Being able to push them to more years of decline after that will have good results.

It also needs to be clear--none of this is likely to topple Russia's regime or make them "behave", you stop Russian aggression with military force, it's that simple. In Ukraine we can't reasonably use military force against Russia because Ukraine is not in NATO, and it is a country that borders Russia, it will simply be too escalatory for us to go in and fight there. But we are waging a proxy war there now, and that proxy war is working quite fine. Because we now understand that the only thing that will stop Russian military aggression is military force of our own, we need to continue to beef up NATO presence in the eastern border countries. We have doubled our battle groups there, and it's a good start, but we probably need 3-4x that to get to a good footing in Eastern Europe.

Russia has shown its weak and poorly run military could not overrun Ukraine, so I genuinely think a NATO force in the 75-100k range across the Eastern Countries would likely push a Russian force back into Russia pretty easily given general Russian incompetence (and the obvious fact that based on what we have seen the NATO force would likely establish air supremacy very quickly in the war.)

Ultimately economic separatism from Russia isn't about "winning" in Ukraine or removing Putin, it is about a long term severing with Russia, which will make them develop slower economically and technologically. It puts them back in the same situation the USSR was--where year after year they steadily fall behind the West and become weaker and weaker. Economic and technological weakness become long term strategic weakness.

[DGuller]

Apparently Britain did Bucha - very much big, if true (via the BBC Monitoring guy - who is well worth a follow):
https://twitter.com/francska1/status/1510993878018670595?s=20&t=Cre6zylKHgM2KTZN3iceVA

Francis Scarr
@francska1
Pundit Gevorg Mirzayan on Bucha:

"This was done by professionals, probably British. They're the best in the area of information operations. [They know how] to place the bodies correctly, do everything correctly, create a nice picture for the necrophilic Western consciousness"

I feel like if this is the level Russian propaganda is at now they're really plunging into new depths to explain the obvious.

The silver lining is that their atrocities are discussed on Russian TV.

[Berkut]

Never interrupt your enemy while they are losing.

As an aside, the actual quote is from Napoleon I, who said "never interrupt an enemy while he is making a mistake."  Your paraphrase works, but I like his wording better.

Yes, I am aware of the original quote, it is one of my favorites.

I just didn't think Russia is really making a mistake per se - the mistake was already made and now they are just simply losing.

Why give Putin an out? Right now he has to explain to his citizens how Russia is getting their ass kicked by a 2nd world power that is like 1/4th their size, and supposedly was eager to rejoin Mother Russia.

The moment NATO intervenes, the nature of the conflict changes instantly, both politically and militarily. Maybe that new conflict he loses as well, but why risk it?

[DGuller]

You can make several counterarguments, not that I necessarily think they're sufficient:

• Putin can convince his people of whatever he wants anyway.  It's not like his current story has much connection with reality, and it's not like Russians care.
• Ukraine may not continue winning the war.  Their situation in the east can become very dire logistically.
• Every day of Putin continuing to make his mistakes is a day that more Ukrainians in occupied lands get raped, pillaged, and executed.