Sad to read the replies of clueless people agreeing with this stooge. I wonder how many are real and how many are Russian trolls.
-
Want to remove ads? Register an account and login to see fewer ads, and become a Supporting Member to remove almost all ads.
Russia/Ukraine conflict
- Thread starter amolina
- Start date
Apologies - when I posted this, it showed the embedded tweet, but now it has dropped. The article was from Mark Hertling, ditto the quote.
Perhaps I missed the explanation, but does anyone know why copy/pasting tweets is not working well anymore. Is it a limitation of twitter or an issue with TMC? Any ideas on how to get around it?
The discussion here is more signal than on Twitter, but Twitter does have very good individual posts; the replies to tweets on Twitter degrade quickly. I consider this forum to the best place to stay balanced on what is happening. Even the periodic trolling is a factor.
Here is the Threadreader link to the thread
Thread by @MarkHertling on Thread Reader App
Those tend to be more reliable.
It's probably time for Switzerland to rethink their stance on strict neutrality, much like Sweden did. During the 19th and first half of the 20th century, Switzerland was surrounded by countries that were at odds with one another and their population speaks the languages of their neighbors and have affinity for one or the other.
That started to change in 1945 and changed completely after the break up of the USSR. Today all their immediate neighbors are allies who occasionally have political squabbles, but the chances they are going to go to war are pretty much zero. Especially any time soon. Any war developing between France and Germany say would be proceeded with one or both partners going through some significant political changes along with major changes in their militaries. In other words any nearby countries who just wanted to stay out of the way would have years of warning.
Switzerland could stay out of NATO, but takes steps in that direction without destabilizing their own internal balance between different sub-cultures or putting themselves at any international risk. Cozying up to NATO would enhance their national security.
Ukraine just needs vehicles with some armor and the ability to take out fortifications. They don't need the latest, sexiest tanks. A Leopard 2 is just as effective in this role as a Leo 1, an M60, or a Merkava. Why throw the USS New Jersey into a fight that can be done with the USS California (New Jersey was one of the newest battleships in the USN by the end of WW II while the California was one of the old, slow battleships built around WW I and a Pearl Harbor survivor).
I've seen speculation all over the place that some European power is buying Merkavas so they can send their other tanks to Ukraine, or someone is buying them to send to Ukraine. One possible scenario is Greece is getting the Merkavas so they can send some of their older tanks. A lot of people are looking at old Soviet tanks left in Europe, but I think if some non-Israeli tank is going to Ukraine with the Merkavas as back-fill it could also be M60s.
M60s are a good option for Ukraine. There are a lot of them left and many countries in NATO can maintain them. They are out of frontline service in most NATO armies except Greece and Turkey (who both have a lot of them), but they are still used as engineering and armor recovery vehicles by a lot of NATO armies. The support infrastructure to keep these things going exists in many NATO countries.
The Russians are going to try and make a propaganda coup out of each Leo 2 that loses a track in combat, but less high profile tanks can go about their business in anonymity.
A plan that was purportedly put together by the Kremlin was leaked a few months ago. It showed that Russia has been on a long term plan to absorb Belarus back into Russia. They are about halfway through the plan though the war is likely going to derail the last phases of it.
The US PBS program Frontline published on Youtube complete interviews done for some episodes on Putin and Russia. Some of the people interviewed were people we have seen prominently in the last year like Timothy Snyder, but some others were people I didn't know before seeing their interviews. Each had a different perspective on Russia, its relations with the west, and its capabilities.
I don't remember which interview it was, but someone who was very familiar with the cyber capabilities of Russia and the US was interviewed. They pointed out that Russia did try to interfere in the 2008 and 2012 elections, but were very poor at it. They had agents in the US trying to gather information that could have been gathered with a Google search.
Then suddenly in 2016 they had revolutionized their game and were operating on a completely different level. It wasn't because the Russian government had figured out how to do hacking, the FSB was still just as old school as they were in 2008. What Putin did was farm out the cyber attacks on PMCs. Prigozhin ran one of them.
These were not coordinated attacks from the top, but more hacking groups telling the Kremlin what they think they could do and then the Kremlin telling them to go for it and see if they could. They had competing efforts that didn't know the other groups were in the game.
Russia kept these groups on a leash by allowing them to run any con they want as long as they didn't attack anything Russian, they didn't do anything big enough to cause an international incident, and that the Kremlin would ask them to do things for Russia at any time. Most of these groups were running ransomware attacks around the world.
According to this person, the US conducted a targeted cyberattack on most of these groups early in the war and knocked them offline for more than a year. It looks like at least one of them may have recovered enough to go back to their old ways.
I wish I could remember who it was. It was a great interview.
The interviews are here, posted 3-4 months ago
https://www.youtube.com/@frontline/videos
Full episodes of the program are posted here as well as other material too.
Buckminster
Well-Known Member
Sacks is a businessman and war is bad for business. Many on the left have a different relationship with money and struggle to see that reality. Sacks is political but:
He is also human and seeing fellow humans dying for what will likely be very little land exchange over many years may trouble him in ways he cannot fully process without a decent therapist. Okay, maybe he just likes making money...
None appear to be Russian trolls that I can see. Middle American (and perhaps gun lovers?) mostly I would say, which is indeed ironic.
Exhibit A:
https://twitter.com/yodera14/with_replies
Keeps pushing Indiana Humanities which would make him a pretty sophisticated Russian troll.
I hope to be wrong and indeed recognise you all know more about this stuff than I. Ukraine regaining their land and the Russians behaving themselves for the next 20+ years would be great outcome - just to state the obvious.
You do not understand the Merkava. First the ones in question are nowhere near the “latest and sexiest’, they are ones no longer in use by Israel. They also are nit like any other tank in that the can and do serve multiple roles, including medevac, and are much more versatile in large part because of the front engine. None of the others, none, can serve multiple roles. Besides they are cheaper to operate. How up to date they will be depends on what more modern features will be retrofitted. In fact the first version of 1982 has some clear deficiencies that were improved in later versions. Remember that all Israeli-origin equipment has been regularly updated in service, much faster than any of the others.
I wonder if the merkava
It's also scale- something all other donations lack.
I could not agree more that these will be quite useful. Pulling mothballed m60s out is a terrible idea. Russia is pulling old tanks out to use as SPG because they actually designed them to be used at times as SPG. Not really moving much, not subject to CV90 with 40mm bushmasters (well if they are they are in the wrong spot) or BMPs or even a Javlin. Merkava is a great tool for this conflict and would be great for the urban battles to come.
It's also scale- something all other donations lack.
Bet TSLA
Active Member
Well, I think Elon is real. Sacks is apparently one of his most trusted advisors.
There are times where just isolating a dictator is the best call, and there are times when a dictator needs to be put out of business. A dictator that does not appear to have ambitions for taking territory outside their country and especially have no means to make much in the way of military hardware can be cut off and left to rot.
A dictator who has shown territorial ambitions beyond their borders and the means to make their own military hardware is the most dangerous to world peace. That is the combination with Hitler that led to WW II.
Russia has that same combination, which is why they need to be stopped in such a way they will never come back.
I think you may have misunderstood me. The Merkava would be fine for Ukraine. The Merkava 4 would be a high profile tank like the Leo 2, but older Merkavas will be just as low profile as Leo 1s.
The Merkava 3 is somewhat more capable than most of the M60s out there, though some M60s have been heavily modernized. There are quite a few countries that are still operating the M60s in front line service. Egypt has 2300, with about half in storage, though I'm sure Israel is not selling Merkavas to Egypt. Saudi Arabia has about 600 active, Turkey has about 1300 in service, Spain has around 400 in service, and a number of countries operate smaller numbers.
I thought Greece was still operating M60s, but they have about 600 retired. I don't know what the condition of them are, but they probably would require rehabilitation before going into combat.
Anyway, it's possible whoever is buying the Merkavas might have a plan to upgrade their tank fleet a tick and give up their M60s. That was essentially my speculation.
An interesting site about Russian fortifications and the money wasted. Some other interesting articles on the same site if you dig around. I found it originally while reading in Russian and then found the English version to share here.
theins.ru
Main site: The Insider — reports, analytics, investigations
The Russian version is here: Расследования, аналитика, последние новости в России и мире: узнайте сегодня то, что другие узнают завтра — The Insider
The translated in English version is not 100% accurate but pretty good. Actually the Russian version is a lot more colorful. Some Russian idioms don't translate well into English.
Pyramid builders: Russia spends billions on useless defense fortifications
In spite of all the official assertions regarding “red lines,” the Kremlin has proven itself impotent against the infiltration of pro-Ukrainian groups crossing the border in the Belgorod region. This is despite the fact that at least 10 billion rubles ($119,800,000) was dedicated solely to the...
theins.ru
Main site: The Insider — reports, analytics, investigations
The Russian version is here: Расследования, аналитика, последние новости в России и мире: узнайте сегодня то, что другие узнают завтра — The Insider
The translated in English version is not 100% accurate but pretty good. Actually the Russian version is a lot more colorful. Some Russian idioms don't translate well into English.
Buckminster
Well-Known Member
The west have been fighting this country for 70 years. For all we know there are far worse inside the Kremlin, FSB etc. Putin hasn't been this bad for most of his tenure and should not be compared to Hitler. Besides what he is now is the very definition of isolated.
What is the cost per 20 year old Ukrainian/Russian in acres? Prime arable land in UK is just £10k. If you value each life at $10m that is 1000 acres per soldier - more considering that this is now just toxic rubble strewn with mines and huge cleanup bill. This calculation should be run going forwards, writing off previous gains or losses.
Give these guys an off ramp and they can be brought back into the tent so the world can worry about the next systemic challenge.
The number of tiny 5% risks is on the increase. We now have nukes in the hands of a second dictator. Twice as many countries/systems to be concerned about during and post their tenure. Chances of them actually being used increases to 100% if they fall into the hands of numerous terrorist organisations.
Also 3 out of 4 of the next likely US presidents will not support Ukraine to this level in just 18 months making this the time to negotiate.
We also have the Poles (aka NATO) looking to invade...
Also:
The countries that have shown interest in joining BRICS are:
Algeria
Argentina
Bahrain
Egypt
Indonesia
Iran
Saudi Arabia
United Arab Emirates
Afghanistan,
Bangladesh
Belarus
Kazakhstan
Mexico
Nicaragua
Nigeria
Pakistan
Senegal
Sudan
Syria
Thailand
Tunisia
Turkey
Uruguay
Venezuela, and
Zimbabwe
Last edited:
stopcrazypp
Well-Known Member
Or we can give Ukraine what is necessary for them to take back their territory before the next presidency, so there is not need to negotiate with someone who has shown they will not stand by whatever they promised during negotiations (remember the negotiations that happened since 2014)?
You have to be very naïve to believe Russia will not just use any negotiation as a chance to stall until the western supports wanes and then they will just go right back to an offensive.
BitJam
Active Member
This video by Anders Puck Nielsen just showed up on YouTube.
Peace is not an option for Ukraine (as long as Putin is in power)
- Putin won't cede annexed territory to Ukraine
- Putin won't accept prosecution of war crimes
- Putin won't agree to pay reparations
The war cannot stop as long as Putin is in power.
IMO he was already offered many "off ramps". He refused them all and chose to double down on conquering Ukraine. For instance, when Russia was forced to withdraw from the Kiev area, Putin had a perfect off ramp to end the war. Likewise after Ukraine's successful one two punch in Kharkiv and Kherson. Of course the best off ramp would have been for Putin to keep his word and not invade.
His doubling down is the essence of the problem and why the only choices for the West are a Ukrainian victory or capitulation to Putin's bullying and nuclear blackmail. A reasonable compromise between reasonable parties is, unfortunately, not one of the available options. Getting yet another promise from Putin to not invade Ukraine would be meaningless if he still had the power to do it. He was telling us he would not invade Ukraine while his troops were invading Ukraine!
Of course the long list of war crimes and acts of genocide committed by Russia including: torture, rape, mass kidnapping of children, and murder of civilians makes it difficult for Ukrainians to agree to capitulate to the war criminals and to those who want to wipe Ukraine off the face of the Earth. Even if the West cut off support to Ukraine they would keep fighting. They know all too well what life is like for Ukrainians under Russian occupation. The idea of ceding Crimea to Russia became a no-go after the Russian atrocities at Bucha were discovered. Russia burned down many off ramps with war crimes and acts of genocide. Continuing to bombard Ukrainian cities and civilian infrastructure is not a good way to build trust and bring Ukraine to the negotiating table for some kind of reasonable compromise.
When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time. -- Maya Angelou
Are there risks in pursuing a Ukrainian victory? Of course! There are risks to almost all endeavors in life. But the risks created by capitulating to Putin's nuclear blackmail are far greater. If you don't punish bad behavior you will get more of it. Rewarding bad behavior is much worse.
The mess we are in now is the result of the West refusing to stand up to Putin's previous transgressions of international law. Rewarding Putin with large chunks of resource rich areas of Ukraine will encourage further bad behavior from him and will encourage other countries to bully and blackmail the West to get what they want. We've already tried the route of appeasement, capitulation, looking the other way, and hoping for the best. It did not work. Repeating the same behavior and expecting different results is insane.
An interesting site about Russian fortifications and the money wasted. Some other interesting articles on the same site if you dig around. I found it originally while reading in Russian and then found the English version to share here.
Pyramid builders: Russia spends billions on useless defense fortifications
In spite of all the official assertions regarding “red lines,” the Kremlin has proven itself impotent against the infiltration of pro-Ukrainian groups crossing the border in the Belgorod region. This is despite the fact that at least 10 billion rubles ($119,800,000) was dedicated solely to the...
Main site: The Insider — reports, analytics, investigations
The Russian version is here: Расследования, аналитика, последние новости в России и мире: узнайте сегодня то, что другие узнают завтра — The Insider
The translated in English version is not 100% accurate but pretty good. Actually the Russian version is a lot more colorful. Some Russian idioms don't translate well into English.
Good write up. I have seen evidence of the poor design of a lot of their fortifications. The dragon's teeth are not installed correctly so pushing them out of the way is very easy and in Kherson the Russians installed a lot of pre-cast cement fortifications that were easily breached.
A weapon that can penetrate the walls of a fortification is going to cause spalling on the inside which leads to a high number of fragments flying around an enclosed space at high speed. The Bushmaster on the Bradley and a number of other vehicles has ammunition designed to cause spalling of fortification walls.
Yes there are people worse than Putin in Russia. Which is why Russia's ability to invade their neighbors has to be ended.
The argument you make here would be very recognizable to the French and British diplomats of the late 1930s trying to put off war with Hitler minus the nuclear weapon part. In all the 71 years of his life Nevillle Chamberlain is only remembered for the treaty he signed with Hitler at the Munich conference over the disposition of Czechoslovakia and his pronouncement upon returning of "peace in our time".
History has shown was a mistake that was.
A lot of lives are being lost in Ukraine today, as well as a lot of damage to the countryside, but it's to prevent something worse later. It's also the enforce the post WW II world order that borders are set and trying to change them with violence can't be rewarded. Russia can't be allowed to make any gain from this war. That might encourage others to try and take what isn't theirs by military means.
Among other things, the west is sending a message to China about Taiwan. Russia never really had the resources to take and hold Ukraine as long as Ukraine was going to put up a fight. Russia doesn't have the ability to draft enough men into their military and equip them well enough to occupy and hold Ukraine.
To stop an insurgency, an invading power needs to station 20 troops per 1000 population in the occupied country. Occupations that were smaller than that all failed except Japan after WW II, which was an exceptional situation. Russia doesn't have the basics to fit out 900,000 troops so it was never going to happen.
Russia lost this war on the first day, just like Japan lost the Pacific War on Dec 7, 1941 when they attacked the United States as well as the Commonwealth. In the case of Japan, it took 4 years to make them admit they lost, but they couldn't win as long as the allies had the will to fight.
China does have the resources to occupy Taiwan if they managed to overcome Taiwan's military and the rest of the world didn't back Taiwan to the hilt. Pulling off an amphibious invasion would be very difficult for China to do. They have zero experience with that and it's an area that requires a lot of institutional knowledge to do correctly. However, China could make the attempt and they actually do have a chance of succeeding.
I also wouldn't be writing off the US presidential election just yet. The election is 17 months off and a lot can change between now and then. Traditionally the Republican party has been the party that is strong on defense and despite some very noisy Republicans who are pro-Putin, there are still quite a few Republicans who are on Ukraine's side including a lot in Congress.
Except for incumbent presidents, the person who is the pack leader for the nomination at this point in the presidential race rarely gets the nomination and the last time the leader a year before the election did get the nomination (2016) she lost the general election.
And 17 months is a long time for this war. The war is 16 months old now. The lines will likely be very different by the fall of 2024, if Russia is holding on to any Ukrainian territory at all. There are signs that the war is destabilizing Russia and could lead to civil war which would most likely end the war in Ukraine.
There are risks to civil war including rebel groups getting nuclear weapons. And the risk of dirty bombs from that is there, though the risk of actual nuclear war is somewhat lower. We know Russia is terribly corrupt and we also know they are terrible at maintaining their military hardware. Chances are high that a lot of the nuclear weapons maintenance budget was stolen and the maintenance was never done. That would make most of the Russian arsenal pretty much useless as nuclear weapons.
Russia is also more paranoid than the United States about someone going rogue with a nuclear weapon and there are many safeguards. Ukraine and Kazakhstan inherited a lot of nuclear weapons from the USSR, but they had no means to use them. They didn't have the keys to enable them. Given time they could have reworked them to get around the locks, but it would have taken time. Ukraine has the technical expertise to do that work, but Kazakhstan didn't really have it. A lot of the Russian republics that would inherit nuclear weapons on their territory in a Russian breakup would not have the skills to do much with their weapons either, though these days it's easier to hire in the help. In that scenario a lot of outside powers (both China and the US among them) would be lining up to help those republics in exchange for securing those nuclear weapons.
A breakup of Russia has its dangers, but also has its benefits. A balkanized Russia is not going to be coming back and trying to take Ukraine.
There is no perfect solution.
I had not checked in there in a long while. Man they do some good work. I will be sending a few $. Thanks for the link!An interesting site about Russian fortifications and the money wasted. Some other interesting articles on the same site if you dig around. I found it originally while reading in Russian and then found the English version to share here.
Pyramid builders: Russia spends billions on useless defense fortifications
In spite of all the official assertions regarding “red lines,” the Kremlin has proven itself impotent against the infiltration of pro-Ukrainian groups crossing the border in the Belgorod region. This is despite the fact that at least 10 billion rubles ($119,800,000) was dedicated solely to the...
Main site: The Insider — reports, analytics, investigations
The Russian version is here: Расследования, аналитика, последние новости в России и мире: узнайте сегодня то, что другие узнают завтра — The Insider
The translated in English version is not 100% accurate but pretty good. Actually the Russian version is a lot more colorful. Some Russian idioms don't translate well into English.
Cautionary note on Russian morale
petit_bateau
Active Member
Tell you what lets give the Russians all your property, land, machinery etc and that of all your closest relatives. Oh and they can keep any of your children they've already kidnapped.
All the Russians need to do in return is stop where they are for a year, regroup, then they can kick off again.
Sounds fair ?
lolachampcar
Well-Known Member
I was heading right were pitit ended up above this post; I'm just nowhere near as eloquent.
BTW, the position does not make the task any easier but most of the time the right thing is not the easiest path.
BTW, the position does not make the task any easier but most of the time the right thing is not the easiest path.
Unilateral aggression against neighbors is bad for business just like shoplifting is.
The rule of law, including international law is good for business. Enforcing laws, including international laws, is good for business.
It is amazing that Musk and Sacks etc. have a blind spot on this point.
SageBrush
REJECT Fascism
I'm not sure what your point is. Are you giving Putin a discount for past performance, even though he is a mass murderer now ?
There is a difference between mass murder (Putin) and genocide (Hitler, Ukraine, Turkey etc) but the lines get blurry pretty quickly
Actually Putin has a consistent track record of being this bad, the west just turned a blind eye. Grozny Aleppo etc- Horrible mass destruction and murder.
Buckminster
Well-Known Member
Well you all seem very confident that you're right. I would love to live in that world but in reality this is a percentages game.
Anyway, I'm not going to convince you but I wanted the many (like me) that read this thread and have an opposing view and stay silent that it is not just confined to Twitter users.
I hope you are right. Of course, if I'm right, I won't get to say I told you so.
And no, I wouldn't want people dying to regain my lost property.
Similar threads
