Russo-Ukrainian War 2014-23 and Invasion

[Berkut]

Striking from Jen Psaki to set out the risk of a chemical weapon false flag by Russia (and that the conspiracy theory is being endorsed by China):
https://twitter.com/PressSec/status/1501676230617321480?s=20&t=Lq3Jmd81QSh_srkhhEIi8g

Full thread is worth a read and there's been a few comments from Russian officials suggesting they're looking at something like this. If China's backing them on this (i.e. Russia's security concerns about the rogue state Ukraine are clearly valid after this use of chemical weapons) which seems to be the direction of travel with the officials endorsing this risk, then it feels we're looking at a far more dangerous situation.

Many people flag the risk of doing something that leads to things spinning out of control (I suspect that's behind the fighers debacle), which is entirely correct. But the scariest possibility is that we're already on the track of things spinning out of control and kind of have been from the start.

THat is what I said!

If this ends with WMDs being deployed, the path to that end state began a while back - we are already on it.

It's fascinating to watch people in real time go through the mental rationalization for why that just can't be, just like it was fascinating to watch people (AHEM SHELF!) go through the rationalizations several weeks ago about why Russia is not really going to invade Ukraine, and how any idea of an actual invasion "just doesn't make sense".

[Berkut]

Glenn Greenwald appears to be helping spread Russian/Chinese propaganda that the U.S. has hundreds of "biological research centers" it funds in countries all around the world (including Ukraine), which should be "investigated" to see if they manufacture bioweapons. I seem to remember a bunch of libs loving ole Glenn back in the early W. Bush era, is there any significant chance he isn't a Russian asset at this point?

I was going to ask that question myself.  Seems very likely to me that he's either compromised by the Russians or outright owned by them.

I hate to say I told you so....

but fuck, that shit was obvious a decade ago.

[Berkut]

We literally just went through this, with people stating that this was all a bluff by Putin, because actually invading would just be, well, stupid and does not make any sense.

Actually, I think that was just Gaiijin de Moscou.

Not just him at all, and there were plenty of people responding to him with "Yeah, that makes sense..." in some flavor or another.

[OttoVonBismarck]

Striking from Jen Psaki to set out the risk of a chemical weapon false flag by Russia (and that the conspiracy theory is being endorsed by China):
https://twitter.com/PressSec/status/1501676230617321480?s=20&t=Lq3Jmd81QSh_srkhhEIi8g

Full thread is worth a read and there's been a few comments from Russian officials suggesting they're looking at something like this. If China's backing them on this (i.e. Russia's security concerns about the rogue state Ukraine are clearly valid after this use of chemical weapons) which seems to be the direction of travel with the officials endorsing this risk, then it feels we're looking at a far more dangerous situation.

Many people flag the risk of doing something that leads to things spinning out of control (I suspect that's behind the fighers debacle), which is entirely correct. But the scariest possibility is that we're already on the track of things spinning out of control and kind of have been from the start.

THat is what I said!

If this ends with WMDs being deployed, the path to that end state began a while back - we are already on it.

It's fascinating to watch people in real time go through the mental rationalization for why that just can't be, just like it was fascinating to watch people (AHEM SHELF!) go through the rationalizations several weeks ago about why Russia is not really going to invade Ukraine, and how any idea of an actual invasion "just doesn't make sense".

I'll have to admit to assuming the odds of an invasion were maybe 25%--and mostly because I saw the invasion being a quagmire exactly as it is, and once "won" would simply result in Putin possessing a destroyed country that has widespread insurgencies and etc., along with crushing international sanctions. My assumption was Putin understood military matters better than I think he actually does, in fact that's one of my major lessons from the invasion--the ex-KGB agent appears to not have a good mind for real military conflict, and I suspect also either gets bad military advice or doesn't listen to military advice from anyone who is willing to give him honest assessments.

Note that I was fairly certain Putin was going to do "something", my guess was moving Russian troops "formally" into Donbas/Luhansk and annex them, and potentially try to annex a land strip between Crimea and those regions. I frankly did think he just wasn't stupid enough to try a wholesale invasion of all these major cities.

[Berkut]

Russian tank column ambushed by Ukrainans in Brovary. Getting close to the capital from that direction.

https://twitter.com/RALee85/status/1501873146818969610

Jesus, that is just fucking nuts to watch.

When I see stuff like that, it makes me think I would make a terrible soldier. Because the thought of being in one of those vehicles while my buddies around me are getting blown away - I doubt I could function under those circumstances, and I wonder how anyone does.

[Berkut]

Striking from Jen Psaki to set out the risk of a chemical weapon false flag by Russia (and that the conspiracy theory is being endorsed by China):
https://twitter.com/PressSec/status/1501676230617321480?s=20&t=Lq3Jmd81QSh_srkhhEIi8g

Full thread is worth a read and there's been a few comments from Russian officials suggesting they're looking at something like this. If China's backing them on this (i.e. Russia's security concerns about the rogue state Ukraine are clearly valid after this use of chemical weapons) which seems to be the direction of travel with the officials endorsing this risk, then it feels we're looking at a far more dangerous situation.

Many people flag the risk of doing something that leads to things spinning out of control (I suspect that's behind the fighers debacle), which is entirely correct. But the scariest possibility is that we're already on the track of things spinning out of control and kind of have been from the start.

THat is what I said!

If this ends with WMDs being deployed, the path to that end state began a while back - we are already on it.

It's fascinating to watch people in real time go through the mental rationalization for why that just can't be, just like it was fascinating to watch people (AHEM SHELF!) go through the rationalizations several weeks ago about why Russia is not really going to invade Ukraine, and how any idea of an actual invasion "just doesn't make sense".

I'll have to admit to assuming the odds of an invasion were maybe 25%--and mostly because I saw the invasion being a quagmire exactly as it is, and once "won" would simply result in Putin possessing a destroyed country that has widespread insurgencies and etc., along with crushing international sanctions. My assumption was Putin understood military matters better than I think he actually does, in fact that's one of my major lessons from the invasion--the ex-KGB agent appears to not have a good mind for real military conflict, and I suspect also either gets bad military advice or doesn't listen to military advice from anyone who is willing to give him honest assessments.

Note that I was fairly certain Putin was going to do "something", my guess was moving Russian troops "formally" into Donbas/Luhansk and annex them, and potentially try to annex a land strip between Crimea and those regions. I frankly did think he just wasn't stupid enough to try a wholesale invasion of all these major cities.

I agree completely in the *rational* evaluation of the circumstances at the time, even from Putin's standpoint.

I just always had this asterisk on that evaluation, that said "Well, of course, authoritirians without checks on their power act irrationally all the god damned time, so who fucking knows????"

It came as no surprise to me that he invaded, and I think I was the only one amongst my friend group who seemed to not be surprised that it turned into an immediate disaster. I've been saying for a long time that Russia is like a textbook example for an army that history should tell us will be absolutely incompetent.

[crazy canuck]

I see the Lavrov-Kuleba meeting went well: "We are not planning to attack other countries. We also didn't attack Ukraine."

Time for other countries to expect an attack

[Berkut]

Just to be clear, and to back off from sucking my own dick, I did not predict that Russia WOULD invade the Ukraine. I would not have bet my next paycheck on it or anything.

Only that I don't buy the idea that this was all some bluff, and Putin would not invade, or invade in some very limited fashion like sending troops into the newly "independent" areas.

My view is that this probably all started with Putin deciding to ramp up the pressure, and see what he could get. The way to do that is to get ready to invade. I suspect that he figured the West would fold long before an invasion was necessary, or he Ukraine would fold, but was serious about his preparations if necessary.

And once he started down that path, there was no off ramp. There was nothing in his plan that ever said "OK, if it gets to this point, we back down". So he never backed down, and then things just have a momentum of their own.

The analogy to Japan is spot on, and I absolutely disagree that Japan made a rational, if mis-informed, decision to go to war with the US and Great Britain and the Netherlands and Australia. 

The men with the power to make the decision to go to war lacked the power to make the decision to NOT go to war once they had gone far enough down the path that started with their invasion and escalation in China. They also had no "off ramp", so once they were committed, they just followed the path straight to entirely predictable destruction.

And even THEN had to struggle mightily to take the ultimate "off ramp" to save their civilization.

Same thing with Germany - why did the Germans keep fighting in late 1943? 1944? Did they lack any rational people who could see that the war was lost? Of course not. They had LOTS of perfectly rational people who knew EXACTLY what the next couple of years was going to look like. But the war went on and on and on and did not end until Russians had physically conquered damn near every inch of Germany.

Someone tell me how THAT was a rational choice that was a mistake. 

Someone tell me that Lee ordering Picket to make that attack on the third day made rational sense, "it was just risky". I call bullshit. That was not a high risk gamble, that was Lee not knowing how to admit he had lost, not knowing how to put aside his ego and engage his rational brain, even while trusted advisors who knew *exactly* what was being ordered told him it could never work.

"General, I have been a soldier all my life. I have been with soldiers engaged in fights by couples, by squads, companies, regiments, divisions, and armies, and should know, as well as any one, what soldiers can do. It is my opinion that no fifteen thousand men ever arranged for battle can take that position."

And yet the attack went in anyway, and the result was completely predictable.

[Grey Fox]

https://twitter.com/oryxspioenkop/status/1501938378878558220?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1501938378878558220%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_c10&ref_url=

This is Igor.

Every morning Igor goes for a stroll through the nearby forest.

Today, Igor found a Russian Army 9K330 Tor SAM system abandoned in the forest.

Now Igor owns a $20 million SAM system.

Congratulations Igor.

[Zanza]

Gerhard Schröder is traveling to Moscow to meet with Vladimir Putin to mediate. Without consulting the German government beforehand, but apparently on suggestion of the Ukrainian ambassador in Berlin. Bizarre. Not sure if useful idiot, traitor or a worthy ambassador as one of the few "friends" Putin supposedly has... 

Or he just needs to meet his KGB contact person...

[PJL]

I see the Lavrov-Kuleba meeting went well: "We are not planning to attack other countries. We also didn't attack Ukraine."

Time for other countries to expect an attack

If I were in Moldova right now I would be very very nervous about what might happen next.

[Habbaku]

I see the Lavrov-Kuleba meeting went well: "We are not planning to attack other countries. We also didn't attack Ukraine."

Time for other countries to expect an attack

If I were in Moldova right now I would be very very nervous about what might happen next.

How strong is the Transnistrian military these days?

[Duque de Bragança]

Gerhard Schröder is traveling to Moscow to meet with Vladimir Putin to mediate. Without consulting the German government beforehand, but apparently on suggestion of the Ukrainian ambassador in Berlin. Bizarre. Not sure if useful idiot, traitor or a worthy ambassador as one of the few "friends" Putin supposedly has... 

Or he just needs to meet his KGB contact person...

Post-modern tribute to Rudolf Hess? 

[Jacob]

Gerhard Schröder is traveling to Moscow to meet with Vladimir Putin to mediate. Without consulting the German government beforehand, but apparently on suggestion of the Ukrainian ambassador in Berlin. Bizarre. Not sure if useful idiot, traitor or a worthy ambassador as one of the few "friends" Putin supposedly has... 

Or he just needs to meet his KGB contact person...

I guess he feels he has years worth of relationship-building with Putin and he contribute constructively to the current situation. He's probably convinced that he's not a useful idiot who's been played by Putin.

[Sheilbh]

Gerhard Schröder is traveling to Moscow to meet with Vladimir Putin to mediate. Without consulting the German government beforehand, but apparently on suggestion of the Ukrainian ambassador in Berlin. Bizarre. Not sure if useful idiot, traitor or a worthy ambassador as one of the few "friends" Putin supposedly has... 

Or he just needs to meet his KGB contact person...

I mean it's a choice.

Interesting that the Ukrainian ambassador suggested it, but extraordinary that he didn't tell the German government