The EU thread

[Tonitrus]

Straight up numbers of aircraft is also a bit misleading. 

1. In a Russian/NATO fight...there is a lot more/longer stretches of border to cover with those air assets.
2. They cannot operate all at once...they'll be working in shifts/maintenance downtime, etc (that is where SAMs pick up a lot of slack).
3. Limits in ordinance...just like artillery shells, air-to-air/air-to-ground/HARM missiles will get used up real fast.  Likely much faster than initial replacement.

[Tonitrus]

Also, I would say that in any theoretical Russian/NATO conflict, you need to add in Belarus to the Russian side (even if that is not much, I know).

[Razgovory]

I'd think that if Russia attacks NATO, whoever responds would be okay with targeting assets inside Russia proper.

I guess the question is how well the EU + UK would be able to take out those SAM and IADS assets.

Well, I lose my apartment in 6 weeks and I don't yet have another place to to go, so WW3 isn't the worst possible scenario.

[Crazy_Ivan80]

I'd think that if Russia attacks NATO, whoever responds would be okay with targeting assets inside Russia proper.

I guess the question is how well the EU + UK would be able to take out those SAM and IADS assets.

Russian anti-air assets have gotten a wollop the last 3 years though, given that they're prime targets for UAF drone strikes

[Josquius]

Ukraine are becoming steadily braver with how they operate their planes, sometimes flying over Russia even.

[Valmy]

I'd think that if Russia attacks NATO, whoever responds would be okay with targeting assets inside Russia proper.

I guess the question is how well the EU + UK would be able to take out those SAM and IADS assets.

Well, I lose my apartment in 6 weeks and I don't yet have another place to to go, so WW3 isn't the worst possible scenario.

Jesus Christ. Stop it. The Russian paper tiger isn't going to nuke anybody. All that is going to happen is the Russians will grind to a halt somewhere due to exhaustion and everybody will stare at each other across some armistice line for awhile.

[Zoupa]

russian SAMs do not cover all of Ukraine, as evidenced by the fact the Ukrainians fly over their own country every single day, including high altitude missions, close air support missions, etc.

As for the possibility of a russian collapse, Prigozhin came within 100 km of the Kremlin and was shooting down planes and helicopters on the way, vatnik-on-vatnik violence. It was glorious, and will happen again.

Stop recreating the fucking meme, raz

[Zoupa]

[Zoupa]

[Jacob]

Hey Zoupa, I edited your post to clean up the link - because it didn't show. But now it does.

[Zoupa]

Doh, thanks and sorry about the triple post. Not sure what happened there.

[Razgovory]

Sorry Zoupa, I don't really think in memes.

[Zanza]

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidaxe/2025/05/01/at-the-current-rate-it-would-take-russia-centuries-and-tens-of-millions-of-casualties-to-capture-ukraine/

(...)

Russian forces managed to capture around 68 square miles of Ukraine in April. But it cost them 4,800 vehicles and more than 36,600 dead and wounded troops, according to one statistician who collects data mostly from official Ukrainian sources including the general staff in Kyiv.

(...)

Incredibly, staggering losses in people and equipment haven't yet crippled the Russian military in Ukraine. The Kremlin is equipping its forces with thousands of civilian vehicles, including scooters, compact cars and even at least one bus.

Meanwhile, it's recruiting 30,000 troops per month, Gen. Christopher Cavoli, commander of U.S. Army forces in Europe, told U.S. lawmakers on April 3. Since many of the wounded eventually return to the front line, the Russian armed forces recruit more people every month than they lose.

As a result, Cavoli said, the Russian force in Ukraine is actually growing. It now numbers no fewer than 600,000 troops, "the highest level over the course of the war and almost double the size of the initial invasion force" in February 2022, Cavoli said.

How the Kremlin has managed to sustain and even expand its recruitment effort comes down to two things: money and mood. Record enlistments are "driven by high sign-on bonuses and speculation that the war will soon be over," explained Janis Kluge, deputy head of the Eastern Europe and Eurasia Division at the German Institute for International and Security Affairs.

(...)

According to Cavoli, Putin and his ministers and generals are committed to a long war—one that could widen beyond Ukraine. "The Russian regime has refashioned its military, economic and social structures to sustain what it describes as a long-term confrontation with the West—systemic changes that illustrate Russia's intention to confront us into the foreseeable future," Cavoli warned.

[Zoupa]

Sorry Zoupa, I don't really think in memes.

Sure, little buddy.

[Sheilbh]

I don't think Russia's about to collapse.

From my understanding/what I've read next year will become far more difficult from a material perspective because the Soviet stocks are likely to run out by the end of this year and current Russian production is not matching their consumption on the battlefield. That will further distort an economy that's already out of shape.

There will be options which is absolutely, as Raz says, further mobilisation into a war economy (possibly expanded Central Asian migration to alleviate labour shortages - though I think Russian boys dying on the front while Central Asian immigrants get well paid jobs in arms factories may have consequences). They can also re-orient the state even more towards war but as I say we're already seeing consequences of that.

One other point which I've mentioned before is that there is still a level of graft and profit-making in the system. Putin appointed a defence minister who has technocratic experience who can manage the system as it is - he could appoint more of an operator with political cover who could take on the graft and possibly reduce the profits in war industries. That would, however, be a pretty big move within Putin's system and how it operates.

A lot will depend on what Putin is aware of - information flow is controlled by the Presidential Administration and the Security Council but the figures there like Kiriyenko and Shoigu seem to me realists not like Patrushev (who Shoigu replaced). So I suspect Putin may be getting pretty decent information. He seems to have been complaining about the technocrats recently who have successfully got Russia's economy reoriented this far. It will also depend on the risks he's willing to take but also he is "in blood stepped in so far" - I don't know that there is an alternative for Putin but to keep going and intensify.

Having said all of that - those are challenges next year. My view is that Putin considers that Russia is winning and there is no incentive to do a deal at this point. That may change next year. But even then a lot will depend on European attitudes as ultimately what Russia wants/needs is to get the Nordstreams back up and running and be selling gas into Europe, plus Western investment and expertise on Arctic exploitation (interesting stat from the Economist and I'm sure they're tiny facilities - but Russia's build over 400 military facilities on its Arctic coast in the last decade).

Having said all of that assuming the gas pipelines stay switched off and having built this war economy once there is some form of peace with Ukraine - then your economy is built to re-arm and go again (it feels very "deep battle" take the big swing back). If that's the case (and I think it's at least a reasonable possibility) I don't think Europe alone right now would win - and that's even assuming there aren't political challenges (Hungary, Austria - maybe after upcoming elections Romania and France).