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Russia/Ukraine conflict
- Thread starter amolina
- Start date
Clark retired from the Army in 2000. His thinking is very out of date and he doesn't seem to understand the Psychology of Ukraine. Mark Hertling and Ben Hodges are also retired generals, but they were both involved in training up the Ukrainians in NATO tactics.
Clark seems to think that Ukrainian people are suddenly going to pivot and demand peace when they have done nothing but give Russia the rudest salutes in 9 months of war. Ukraine is like the poorer spouse after a messy divorce when asked by the wealthy ex if they would come back and the poorer ex replies that they would rather live in a dumpster than spend one more minute with the rich jerk.
Ukraine is completely and utterly done with Russia. It doesn't matter how much damage Russia does, Ukraine is not going to quit. Any damage Russia inflicts at this point just makes Ukraine more determined to finish the divorce.
The entire world that has been adversarial to Russia for some time sees that this is the opportunity to neuter them pretty much forever. Russia lacks the domestic industries to rebuild their military to anything close to what it was before the war. It's chemical industry is much weaker than the USSR (a lot of their chemical making capability is now in other countries). They can only make a fraction of the building blocks needed to make ammunition and rocket fuel. They can make some (though their biggest chemical factor burned down six months ago), they can't make ammunition anywhere close to the current burn rate.
They lack the electronics industry to make the ICs they would need to control their smart munitions. The critical electronics they need to make smart weapons came from Germany. They can get some on the black market, and apparently one of the microprocessors they need are commonly used in washing machines, but those are limited sources. Removing surface mount chips from circuit boards to install on another board is risky. The part can be damaged removing it. Those parts are not made to be removed.
They have a small class of trained engineers, programmers, and technicians. A large chunk of that group left the country when the war started and they aren't going home anytime soon.
Russian military isn't as good as Soviet metallurgy (and the Soviets were behind the west). The can't make good quality, new gun barrels. As their artillery wears out barrels, the guns are tossed aside and the newly manufactured guns (very small quantities) have softer barrels than the guns they replaced. So they will wear out even faster.
Sanctions are beginning to bite. There are many parts for industry that are only available from western suppliers. The Chinese don't make equivalents for a lot of these things. As that tech wears out, they can't get spares. They move their oil and gas in very long pipelines with many pumping stations. As those pumps fail, they will lose the ability to get oil and gas to world markets.
Their oil industry is also very dependent on western oil company expertise to keep the fields in working order. Any work needed to drill new wells, turn fields into secondary production as they get older, etc. are not happening. Back in the mid-90s my sister's Geology company got a sub-contract from a US company helping the Russians rehab the fields the Soviets had run into the ground. Her company was digitizing a lot of well log data, but she talked a lot with the people who had been in the ground in Russia. Nobody was impressed with the quality of Russian oil professionals.
That was 30 years ago and maybe they improved, but there are a lot of western oil people who were working in Russia before the war and many have left.
If the sanctions remain on Russia the country is going to slip into 3rd world status. They have had a massive brain drain and they son't have the domestic industries to recover. China is still doing business with them, but China doesn't make a lot of the technologies they need. China is an industrial giant, but they don't produce many cutting edge technologies like the most modern integrated circuits, and their advanced metallurgy is limited too. China was only able to figure out how to make the balls for ball point pens about 10 years ago. They are just now beginning to be able to produce some jet engines that are on par with what the leading aircraft manufacturers can make.
China also doesn't want to put their biggest markets at risk. Russia is a tiny market for them while Europe and the US are the bulk of their trade. If they have to choose one to drop it will be Russia.
China also doesn't want to see Russia succeed. If Russia falls apart, China can indirectly control all the new countries in eastern Russia, which will be a huge economic boon for them.
I'm not so sure. There's political synergy between China and Russia. Russian shares China's anti-West mission, and economics might not drive decision making.
SageBrush
REJECT Fascism
I think that at best only has a grain of truth. China gets uppity when countries disagree with their nationalistic agenda towards Taiwan and Honk Kong, but overall I think China views the West as a premier market ripe to sell industrial output. Russia, on the other hand holds eastern lands that China wants to dominate for natural resources.
China will happily play Russia against the West, but is much closer to being an outright enemy of Russia
Yup. People ask which side China is on. China is on China's side. They will do what is best for China. Russia messing politically with western democracies helps China in their quest to be the dominant world power. Russia selling oil at a deep discount helps their economy.
But Russia doing things that destabilize the world's economy, threatening to set off nuclear weapons upwind of China, and binding the western democracies together better than they have been in 80 years is no so good for China and they will oppose it.
China as well as most of the west would like to see Russia broken up into many smaller countries. For the west it makes Russia less of a threat and for China it opens up opportunities in central and northern Asia for China as you point out. Mostly win-win for everybody but the current ruling class in Russia.
I don't think that the West has any interest in breaking up Russia, just clipping its wings. For my part, I would not wish there to be multiple unstable nuclear-armed states issued from Mother Russia.
That is the downside. Though the Kremlin is even more paranoid about unauthorized use than the western countries so being able to use any weapons acquired would at least initially, be very difficult. With some engineering the safe guards could eventually be bypassed.
That was one of the issues with the nuclear weapons Ukraine inherited in 1991. They physically had possession of them but Moscow had the keys.
The violation of the Budapest agreement by Russia does make future Russian breakaway states less comfortable in giving up their nuclear weapons. However I think various countries with their own nuclear umbrellas could step up with mutual defense agreements of even basing their troops in those countries to prevent the rump of the Russian empire from trying anything in the future in exchange for surrendering nuclear weapons. Poland got entry into NATO when they told NATO that they would start their own nuclear program if they were denied entry.
There are no perfect solutions, but at this point I don't think it's safe for Moscow to have nuclear weapons. Putin is respecting the sabre rattling about nuclear weapons from the west and China, but someone less world savvy who replaced him might not.
In the US the neo-cons thought the US could do whatever it wanted militarily because nobody could really stand against the US military. They found out that it doesn't matter how strong your military is in conventional warfare, it's always vulnerable to an insurgency. They learned the hard way what more careful politicians like George HW Bush had figured out on their own. Bush didn't finish off Saddam Hussein in 1991 because there was no viable after Hussein scenario.
Putin has made a massive miscalculation invading Ukraine, but he is savvy enough to know there are limits he can't cross and survive. There are people gunning for him within Russia like Pergozhin who are blind to those limits.
SageBrush
REJECT Fascism
I view Russia as having many of the ills and malice of any of the European empires of last century. The solution is to take away the empire through independence.
Artful Dodger
"Neko no me"
GLSDB backgrounder from the manufacturers Boeing/SAAB. The "glide bomb" feature is remarkable. Not only does its winged-flight regime extend range vs a traditional ballistic arc (160km vs 80km for MLRS-style rockets), glide-mode also allows terrain following, and novel attack profiles/trajectories. All from an off-the-shelf mix of existing, declassified, cheap and pentiful components. Winning. 
GLSDB: A gamechanger in ground artillery | (7 yrs ago)
GLSDB: A gamechanger in ground artillery | (7 yrs ago)
Thanks @Artful Dodger . I am actually curious as to the holdup in providing the longer range artillery/rockets. At this point that would seem the most efficient way to destroy the logistical requirements of the russians. Ukraine can clearly attack into russia today with just howitzers across a few hundred KM.
Agreed. It's very frustrating seeing the death and destruction Russia can still inflict going largely unchallenged.
There's going to be nothing left of the country and the amount of money and time it's going to take to rebuild is going to be unimaginable.
There are signs yet another large-scale missile attack is imminent. Even if air defence shoots down most of them there will still be enough getting through to cause more deaths and damage to energy plants and civilian infrastructure.
As Howard Buffet says, "we are watching it, we are allowing it!"
“What I do not understand about Ukraine is how the world is watching... the attempt to destroy a complete society”. A letter from Howard Buffet to Andrey Stavnitser
Foreword from Andrey Stavnitser
www.pravda.com.ua
lolachampcar
Well-Known Member
If I were Russia, I'd be looking for any way possible to make this about Russia versus NATO.
If I were NATO, I'd be looking for any way possible to keep this about Russia invading Ukraine.
If you are Ukraine and you face annihilation, you will fire into Russia if you could even if you have promised not to.
Given the above, I can understand the care that is being taken WRT weapons provided. The whole situation sucks but I can at least understand some of the logic being applied.
If I were NATO, I'd be looking for any way possible to keep this about Russia invading Ukraine.
If you are Ukraine and you face annihilation, you will fire into Russia if you could even if you have promised not to.
Given the above, I can understand the care that is being taken WRT weapons provided. The whole situation sucks but I can at least understand some of the logic being applied.
Why does NATO give a fig? russia is trying to blame nato because it is embarrassing to lose so badly to country cousins so it is for domestic consumption. They are blaming NATO in any case, who cares.
WRT the prospects of Ukraine accepting any less than total excision of all Russian influence in Ukraine:
First, Read Bloodlands by Snyder. It is not well written but is packed with fact, nauseously.
Second, Read either Dugin's 'The Fourth Political Theory' or 'Putin vs Putin' preferably both.
Third, think of how much Ukraine and the Ukraine have endured from the Russian Empire, Soviet Union, Russia and the Nazi's. People in Ukraine remember. People in Ukraine all understand that any form of 'negotiation' presents annihilation.
Fourth, reflect a little on current dominant Russian political theory. Then it becomes bloody well apparent that the Ukrainian's of the Third Step clearly understand that total annihilation will inevitably follow unless Russia is STOPPED.
Understanding all of this does present the inescapable conclusion that the only NATO course possible is prevention of Russian success in any way.
In my opinion we are now revisiting Stalin's approach, but from a much more devious and absolutist Putin/Prigozhin perspective aided by Zhuravlov, who practices annihilation as the only path to success. He destroyed Aleppo, one of the greatest ancient cities. This really means that none of these three care in least how many people they destroy on any side at all. Factually, they're all happy to send misfits, criminals and minorities to death in this war. That just reduces the cleansing they will do after they take the Ukraine. Remember, they do not think the Ukraine is a country, Ukrainian is a language ro that Ukrainians have a right to life at all.
The worst part of this is that those realities were obvious in 1990 and before, but we were all enamored by the urbane, collegial Putin. I personally spent nearly a decade helping promote that fantasy and helped establish new businesses there. I was an idiot! I did not even read Dugin or examine Putin's history. I ignored the lessons of Afghanistan and Syria, even though I was in both places at the same time.
Now I am ashamed of my own willful ignorance cultivated by generous money. Once I realized all that I have begun contributing that money to World Central Kitchen and several Ukrainian support groups.
The personal rancor I have left is for things such as Elon Musk's entirely ignorant and arrogant proposal. I am trying to keep that from tainting my Tesla and SpaceX optimism. That's is a stretch since I cannot help from thing about Ferdinand and Ferry Porsche and so many others. Then Bill Boeing. That all leads me to a conundrum that soon of you might help to solve. What responsibility do we have when our leading lights begin to advocate or assist morally reprehensible things?
That is a serious question.
First, Read Bloodlands by Snyder. It is not well written but is packed with fact, nauseously.
Second, Read either Dugin's 'The Fourth Political Theory' or 'Putin vs Putin' preferably both.
Third, think of how much Ukraine and the Ukraine have endured from the Russian Empire, Soviet Union, Russia and the Nazi's. People in Ukraine remember. People in Ukraine all understand that any form of 'negotiation' presents annihilation.
Fourth, reflect a little on current dominant Russian political theory. Then it becomes bloody well apparent that the Ukrainian's of the Third Step clearly understand that total annihilation will inevitably follow unless Russia is STOPPED.
Understanding all of this does present the inescapable conclusion that the only NATO course possible is prevention of Russian success in any way.
In my opinion we are now revisiting Stalin's approach, but from a much more devious and absolutist Putin/Prigozhin perspective aided by Zhuravlov, who practices annihilation as the only path to success. He destroyed Aleppo, one of the greatest ancient cities. This really means that none of these three care in least how many people they destroy on any side at all. Factually, they're all happy to send misfits, criminals and minorities to death in this war. That just reduces the cleansing they will do after they take the Ukraine. Remember, they do not think the Ukraine is a country, Ukrainian is a language ro that Ukrainians have a right to life at all.
The worst part of this is that those realities were obvious in 1990 and before, but we were all enamored by the urbane, collegial Putin. I personally spent nearly a decade helping promote that fantasy and helped establish new businesses there. I was an idiot! I did not even read Dugin or examine Putin's history. I ignored the lessons of Afghanistan and Syria, even though I was in both places at the same time.
Now I am ashamed of my own willful ignorance cultivated by generous money. Once I realized all that I have begun contributing that money to World Central Kitchen and several Ukrainian support groups.
The personal rancor I have left is for things such as Elon Musk's entirely ignorant and arrogant proposal. I am trying to keep that from tainting my Tesla and SpaceX optimism. That's is a stretch since I cannot help from thing about Ferdinand and Ferry Porsche and so many others. Then Bill Boeing. That all leads me to a conundrum that soon of you might help to solve. What responsibility do we have when our leading lights begin to advocate or assist morally reprehensible things?
That is a serious question.
JRP3
Hyperactive Member
Indeed, it's something which we each have to gauge for ourselves, there is no right answer.
A British volunteer's account of his time in Ukraine. Compulsive viewing IMO.
SwedishAdvocate
Active Member
Allegedly:
Credit goes to (in Swedish):
USA överväger skicka Patriot och terroriststämpla Wagner - fortsatt stora ryska förluster
Ryssland fortsätter ta stora förluster, men uppges ha intagit några ruiner i en by söder om Bakhmut. USA överväger att terroriststämpla terroristorganisationen Wagner. Man är också öppna för att skicka det högkvalificerade luftvärnssystemet Patriot till Ukraina.
cornucopia.se
bkp_duke
Well-Known Member
Allegedly:
Credit goes to (in Swedish):
USA överväger skicka Patriot och terroriststämpla Wagner - fortsatt stora ryska förluster
Ryssland fortsätter ta stora förluster, men uppges ha intagit några ruiner i en by söder om Bakhmut. USA överväger att terroriststämpla terroristorganisationen Wagner. Man är också öppna för att skicka det högkvalificerade luftvärnssystemet Patriot till Ukraina.
That would be a 10:1 rate Russia:Ukraine. I think that has to be bit optimistic there.
