If I had broken into the Russian military communications I'd be sure to have lots of stories about getting the plans from inside the KGB,GRU ,etc. TRUST NOTHING. We clearly do have intel. How we get it...who knows. I wouldn't guess. Clearly now the "secure" phone systems are down. The NSA must be having a field day. Finally tracking down real generals and not a guy with 6 bodyguards moving by donkey at night. This is why the NSA was built. Well that and to spy on my choice of adult movies of course.
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Russia/Ukraine conflict
- Thread starter amolina
- Start date
Well that had been a long time in coming, one of the highlights of my life. Sort of changed my focus very quickly.
EVNow
Well-Known Member
So, as usual, the only winners in a war are arms manufacturers.
Speaking of generals, another just bit the dust:
Fourth Russian general killed in Ukraine - Zelensky
It is no wonder Russia wants the Azov Battalion disbanded...
Well Europeans have become unified ... sadly a crisis is sometimes required. Its a very good thing, it puts pressure on them to actually address fossil fuel dependency. the defense of of Western Democracy was and is also at stake.
Sometimes some historical perspective is required or is useful. I view a few tens of billion in arms as small change against the cost of dictatorship, fascism, and xenophobic nationalism. What's the cost of the Magna Carta? a few sets of plate mail and some swords and some thousands of lives. Small change when viewed over the course of centuries that followed. Slavery has ended. Women have rights. Fundamental civil liberties built on the backs of a few sets of armor and a few lives. Worth it?
Europe spent 55 years hiding from the true costs of building society, except for the UK. Now Europe is finally waking up. They ignored events in Yugoslavia's breakup, they ignored Chechnya ...thank goodness they finally wake up. Not the place for a long dive into humanities weakness and sins, of which the USA has and had plenty. Just glad Europe is waking up, Democracy needs a more robust defense and I mean that in every sense of the word.
This is signals intelligence at work. Not an accident and the Azov battaltion just happens to be there. It has nothing to do with them. The generals are being tracked and killed. I'd buy someone a beer if they showed up at my favorite Pizza place on Saturday for lunch...if you're reading this you know which one.
Oh sorry to quote a news article here it is again
Russia turns east: Three countries undermine West sanction with Putin
AS WESTERN powers come down hard on Russian energy, Putin has turned to countries in Asia to sell his oil and gas.
www.express.co.uk
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Tiger
Active Member
Sorry to sound pessimistic, but I think Russia is just pulling a fast one on Ukraine. It will request peaceful retreat, regroup with Syrian and Chechen fighters and their weaponry, and attack again. Ukraine should finish the invading army (before negotiations are over) while they have the opportunity and attack even if they start retreating before truce. Don't want another Mao - When pressure from KMT troops became too great, Mao abandoned Maoping and withdrew up the mountain to Wang Zuo's stronghold at Dajing (Big Well), from which they could control the mountain passes. That winter the Communists drilled with the local bandits and the next year incorporated them into their regular army. In February a battalion from the KMT's Jiangxi Army occupied Xincheng, a town north of Maoping. During the night of February 17, Mao surrounded them with three battalions of his own and routed them the next day. ROC troops mostly fled to Taiwan from provinces in southern China, in particular Sichuan Province, where the last stand of the ROC's main army took place.
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No, nuclear weapons for Russia include many tactical nuclear devices that are not anything like the ICBM sites of fifty years ago, although those are still around, antiquated maybe rusting just lke the US ones. The ones of today are small and versatile, not withstanding their horrible consequences. I am not discing nuclear weapons.
Four (4) Russian General officers were killed in action in Ukraine as of yesterday, as was reported. Are General officers ever deployed in field actions?
Is that presence a sign of severe disarray? How many General officers are ever killed in combat? As any person you know who has ever served on combat if that is a sign of success or even minimal preparedness.
Numerous Russian aircraft have been shot down by ground forces. Think about that. Are those aircraft properly prepared for serious combat?
Several thousand Russian soldiers have surrendered to Ukrainian forces. Is that likely with good support?
This list goes on. Russian logistics support is so overstretched that tanks, missile launchers, troop carriers and supply trucks have stopped from lack of fuel. Many surrendering Russian soldiers have no food.
Forget about the 800 Russian marines in mutiny in the Black Sea, and the plea to Syria, Russian Far East and Georgia troops to come to be deployed in Ukraine.
Is that a sign of good preparedness?
Yes, nuclear arms are a major and perhaps increasing threat. Russian protests in cities all over Russia, from Vladivostok to Saint Petersburg, are happening publicly and flamboyantly. When did that happen before in Russia. Cities and countries all over eastern Europe and former SSR's are being inundated with fleeing Russians (No, you will not see that on CNN. Check out news from Istanbul, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan. Check any country that allows Russians to enter without visa. Then check the ones that have large numbers of people who have dual citizenship from Russia. To be specific, look at recent arrivals in Israel of Israelis with Russian citxenhip (hint! think oligarch).
If you still think it is going smoothly with the Russian war effort then no evidence will convince you.Don't take my word for it. Everything I said is publicly documented, I did NOT interject my opinion, apart from realizing that military experts forecast fighting capacity of Russian forces to have serious decline in less than one week from yesterday, as stated on multiple broadcast news (Don't bother with CNN, Fox, or the US press, there're too preoccupied with human interest stories so don't really look at the fundamentals.
The primary question is whether there are Russian people with sufficient access and determination to change decision making. Just remember the Afghanistan rout ended with Gorbachev ending his rule. Russia lost fewer soldiers there than they have already lost in Ukraine. Check the numbers, don't take my word for it.
I firmly believe this will end somehow with the next two weeks. The aftermath will last decades. If this ended with nuclear weapons usage the end time will probably change little but the consequences will be incalculable.
Regroup just to give Ukrainian time to load up that 800M dollars worth of weapons from the U.S. Time is not a friend of Russia. Millions of dollars are pouring into Ukraine every hour while millions are being spent by the Russians every hour. Putin can fight this war until the soldiers burn rubles to make a fire.
The Chinese story also had an idealistic, popular Mao and a deeply corrupt not very popular but US backed KMT. Really, I don't think there is a strong parallel between the two. In full disclosure, I had my formative years with a former KMT Major General and an exiled former Russian General both living near me. I was a silent, completely overwhelmed observers as the two debated WWII and WWI from their own rigid positions. Neither dared to return to their onetime homes so the both ended out in Thailand with me.
From that time until this I'm acutely aware of the common threads between them but I see nearly zero equivalency.
FWIW, Mao and Ho Chi Minh knew. Chiang Kai-Shek and Putin believe. Knowledge beats Belief. Belief cannot cope with changing facts. I understand that both my examples of knowledge had public positioning as pure believers. Excellent pragmatists know how to exploit beliefs.
None of that suggests you might be wrong, except that I think Putin began to 'drink the Kool-Aid' a few years ago and has turned himself into a purely self-promoting figure. He's flailing and failing now.
EVNow
Well-Known Member
Not buying it. Are there any reports in Indian media ?Not unexpected, will take years for the pipelines but India’s deal will take the edge off for Putin.
Russia turns east: Three countries undermine West sanction with Putin
AS WESTERN powers come down hard on Russian energy, Putin has turned to countries in Asia to sell his oil and gas.
Ofcourse India is very dependent on Russia for arms - ever since US decided to back Pakistani dictators over Democratic India in the 1971 war. One of the reasons, even when I was a kid, this whole propaganda about "US supporting democracy" made zero sense to me.
_Redshift_
Member
India has not committed. However, there are reports they are considering it.
India used to be very dependent on Russia for their military hardware, but now they have diversified. Their assessment is that while Russian hardware is cheaper by 50-70% compared to western hardware, the downtime alone makes it a bad choice. Not to speak of the money that needs to be spent on repairs.
Their assessment that the downtime of Su 30 MKI was so high, their squadrons were without double digit percentage of planes at any given time.
Thus, they went for the French Rafale for their latest acquisition. Best US could offer when they were considering the new fighter was the F-16 IN (built for Indian conditions and specs). Next was the F-18.
F-35 was offered, reportedly. However, it’s cost, and compatibility with existing communication hardware (some Russian) was the reason why India did not go for it.
Regarding US support of Pakistan during the 1971 war - it was the proclivity of the Nixon administration to use it as an aid in China diplomatic relations. They were also purportedly misled by Pakistan regarding granting independence to what eventually became Bangladesh. Whatever, their action of sending a US aircraft carrier (Enterprise) into the Bay of Bengal at the height of the war was what hardened India’s stance against the US. Russia sent one of its own Aircraft carriers in response to help India.
Nixon and Kissinger were rash in their moves during this time. Pakistan was committing genocide and rape in Bangladesh, and eventually had to surrender with over 90K of its troops surrendering as POWs. India should have gotten more in terms of reparations from Pakistan but India’s Prime Minister, India Gandhi chose to let it go, released all prisoners of war, many of whom committed war crimes on a large scale.
EVNow
Well-Known Member
They have been trying to diversify from sometime. Not sure why they can’t go back to building most of the arms … I guess not much money for Modi’s cronies.
In any case - India‘s votes were neutral, but all statements have been indirectly critical of Russia.
Anyway, gas pipelines to India have been talked about for ever. From Iran, for eg. If the pipeline has to come through Pakistan, it just won’t happen. And you can’t get it over Himalayas.
Iran-Pakistan-India Pipeline
Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) Gas Pipeline, also known as the Peace Pipeline, was a proposed gas pipeline which was cancelled after India withdrew from the trilateral deal.[1][2] India withdrew from the plan in 2009 due to pressure from the USA.[3] Iran and Pakistan later went ahead with a new...
www.gem.wiki
ps : Apparently being considered since ‘16.
India, Russia Discuss US$25 Billion Gas Pipeline | OilPrice.com
India and Russia are studying the construction of a gas pipeline to transport Russian gas from Siberia to India, over 2,800-3,700 miles
oilprice.com
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This analogy isn't good because the tides turned after the Soviets started openly supporting Mao and the Communists at the same time the public turned against KMT and Western support for KMT started to dry up because they turned resources to rebuilding Europe. It would be more accurate to say that Ukraine was actually the Communists and Russia the KMT in this analogy.
scottf200
Well-Known Member
Good listen and personal stories that will be shared wide and far
(already has it seems "154.7K Retweets; 22.2K Quote Tweets; 435.6K Likes" )
(already has it seems "154.7K Retweets; 22.2K Quote Tweets; 435.6K Likes" )
I would interpret that rather as spending proposal that was designed to give reason for the USA to pull out, it was DOA. The USA has done a fine job of dramatically increasing useless spending programs and military spending at the same time. I am actually of the view that education budgets are grossly bloated and in the world of the internet things could be done so much more efficiently all across govt. I've walked, in the DC suburbs, through the financial regulators offices and just been floored...heartbroken even by the reams of paper and paper oriented processes as recently as 2017. Entire floors of attorneys that I could have replaced with an App but then FINRA and the SEC and FTC would employ very few people and have strict audit able processes. So...so much waste.I suggest reading War & Peace.
But he did want NATO countries to spend more i.e. he wanted Europeans to spend more on defense so that they would spend less on useless stuff like Education.
Trump Wants NATO to Spend More – a Lot More – on Defense
President Trump wasted no time Wednesday morning criticizing NATO allies for their military spending, calling fowww.thefiscaltimes.com
