Russia-Ukrainian War

[changegonnacome]

Wow - are the ‘Mothers of Russia’ going to stand for this………the domestic regime in Russia is going to get very interesting over the coming months……..I wonder at what point does Xi suggest to Putin that this all really has to end for everybody’s sake……..China’s domestic economy is going to be at the receiving end of a global recession……what usefulness has this distraction got left for Xi/China I wonder?…..the West’s ‘Taiwan invasion sanctions playbook’ has been revealed to punish Russia…..China can spend the next 5-10 years building a Russia-eque sanctions proof regime based of off this information……sure it distracts the US from where their head should be which is Asia that the only upside left…..but what else now is to be gained.

[nwoodman]

On 9/22/2022 at 11:26 AM, james22 said:

Russia is already crashing demographically, and the main cohort of this war is coming from the men who should be fathering children. “This is a potentially a country killer. Before I thought that this was Russia’s last war. Now I’m certain of it.”

 

https://www.battleswarmblog.com/?p=52709

Great read.  The definition of insanity springs to mind.  Watching the news this morning there appears to be a  “run on Russia” with many young men fleeing across the border.  Hopefully this plays out rapidly from here….in a good way

Edited September 23, 2022 by nwoodman

[Spekulatius]

Pretty much everything that Putin says in his speech about the mobilization is BS. It also seems that his claim that he is mobilizing reserves and those with military expire he only, There are countless videos of transcripts getting drafted that look like they are 18 years old. it‘s not just the 32 year old IT guy.

Putin probably intend to draft more than 300k soldiers or expects huge losses (through desertion or people being unfit or maybe on the frontline). This is going to be the Russian meatgrinder all over again and I expect huge losses. I don’t think these recruits will get winter uniforms either.

The West really needs to support Ukraine with material for winter and offensive weapons that allows them to conduct offensive operations. I think a lot of the units formed from these Volksturm soldiers wills shatter on first contact. It‘s going to be a target rich environment, to use investment lingo.

 

Also to keep in mind that revolutions in Russia were started with Soldiers getting unruly due to a senseless war and bad leadership. Minorities from Siberia are bearing the brunt of this. If they wake up (maybe unlikely but not impossible)  then the Russian federation could fall apart. Even Belarus looks shaky as an ally because the opposition is emboldened and people seem unhappy with Lukaschenko and being allied with Putin. There is a reason they mobilized the army and it’s not to attack Ukraine (Belarus army is tiny).

 

As for material, Russia is not pulling T62 tanks out of storage. Apparently they are running out of T72/80, not that those proved to be all that great, T62 is a 1960‘s tank, so those machines are 60 years old.

 

If that’s not scrapping the bottomed the barrel , i don’t know what is.

Edited September 23, 2022 by Spekulatius

[changegonnacome]

1 hour ago, Spekulatius said:

If that’s not scrapping the bottomed the barrel , i don’t know what is.

 

Sounds like it - its a dangerous game the West is playing however....big picture I mean for everybody on the planet, however tiny the chances are this escalates into a nuclear threat....conducting a proxy war with a nuclear power not in some far flung jurisdiction in the Middle East or Asia where the stakes are low....... but rather right on that nuclear powers doorstep.......when you think about doomsday scenarios which would trigger the use of nukes.......existential regime threats against a nuclear power are one.......coming right up to the doorstep of a nuclear power is one (see Cuban Missile crisis).........whatever happens next in terms of arming Ukraine, any hint that West is interested in regime change or providing military hardware that might find itself hitting pre-Feb 2022 Russian territory has to be avoided at all costs.

 

I support Ukraine's right to sovereignty & to exist.......but in the nuclear age.....world leaders have to be respectful of everybody else on planets right to EXIST too.......good guys/bad guys......democracy vs autocracy.......I get it......sounds like a Hollywood movie....but it aint real life.....at some point getting to an imperfect peace is the right answer for the 8bn people in the World not just 40m Ukranian's.....Ukraine has to win a little, Putin has to win a little for this to end....your momma never told you this but sometimes good things happen too bad people.

[Spekulatius]

Just now, changegonnacome said:

 

Sounds like it - its a dangerous game the West is playing however....big picture I mean for everybody on the planet, however tiny the chances are this escalates into a nuclear threat....conducting a proxy war with a nuclear power not in some far flung jurisdiction in the Middle East or Asia where the stakes are low....... but rather right on that nuclear powers doorstep.......when you think about doomsday scenarios which would trigger the use of nukes.......existential regime threats against a nuclear power are one.......coming right up to the doorstep of a nuclear power is one (see Cuban Missile crisis).........whatever happens next in terms of arming Ukraine, any hint that West is interested in regime change or providing military hardware that might find itself hitting pre-Feb 2022 Russian territory has to be avoided at all costs.

 

I support Ukraine's right to sovereignty & to exist.......but in the nuclear age.....world leaders have to be respectful of everybody else on planets right to EXIST too.......good guys/bad guys......democracy vs autocracy.......I get it......sounds like a Hollywood movie....but it aint real life.....at some point getting to an imperfect peace is the right answer for the 8bn people in the World not just 40m Ukranian's.....Ukraine has to win a little, Putin has to win a little for this to end....your momma never told you this but sometimes good things happen too bad people.

Think about logically - he is trying the "Volksturm surge" now. Risk of nuclear escalation is very very low for the time being.

Negotiating with Putin is as pointless as negotiating with Hitler back then.

 

The people who should be most interested in regime change are the Russians. Only Putin can end this or the Russians can end Putin.

[changegonnacome]

3 hours ago, Spekulatius said:

Negotiating with Putin is as pointless as negotiating with Hitler back then.

 

Hitler didnt have the whole destruction of the planet....about an arms reach away from him. The math has changed.

[Xerxes]

Putin may have been 'shocked' by West's reaction function as well as his own military's deficienies in the early months of the war and the weeks leading to it, so whatever came out of his mouth (output) was based on very faulty inputs (wrong presumptions and faulty chain of command).

 

Now, whatever is coming out of his month (output) is based on relatively more correct inputs.

 

Just to say that if what he said back in early weeks/months of the war didn't matter that much and dismissed, today they do matter, so we should at least take note.

 

[Spekulatius]

Read Putins speech and tell me where he learned anything. He is as boxed in his ideological box just as much as he was at the beginning of the war.

 

Let's assume the west think we need to negotiate and decide we give him the Donbas, Crimean Luhansk area and his $350B back, bcause of nuclear threats. Happy days for everyone - Oh wait!

Of course he still has his nuclear weapons. So he is going to ask for me - he would be stupid if he didn't. So now you have a Putin who is richer, has more land and has been vindicated. Why would he not ask for more fondling with his nuclear trigger.

 

The only reason to negotiate is if you can eliminate the threat posed and we can't. So giving in to Putin in a negotiation is going to make things worse.

 

The only way to counter the nuclear threat if Putin threatens with nuclear weapon use is to give Ukraine Nukes if they decide they take them. Then Putin can decide to nuke it out or go home.

 

[Xerxes]

45 minutes ago, changegonnacome said:

 

Hitler didnt have the whole destruction of the planet....about an arms reach away from him. The math has changed.

 

Stalin and Mao, while did not have the overwheling nuclear superiorty that Russia has today, were at the helm of nuclear-armed nations. And they both have their hands tainted by tens of millions of death. So in other words, genocidal characters armed with nukes. Yet, West was happy to talk and negotiate with them and to dine and wine with them. There is no morality involved here (i.e. the Hitler comment, whose name gets thrown alongside Munich everything we take the moral highground; yet, we never talk about Stalin and Mao, because they do not fit our current narrative).

 

Kissinger and Nixon had no problem dumping Repulic of China (Taiwan) out of UN, and recognizing PRC as "China" because it made sense at the time as a counter-weight against the Soviet Union. We didnt seem to have a problem of working with Stalin, eventhough Stalin just two years earlier participitated in the rape of Poland hand in hand with the Nazi (the famed Molotov-Ribberntrop pact). It is just business of geopolitics and deciding to which direction we think the world should go. And once we decide, we built narrative around it. Everyone loves a 1938 Munich comment.

 

Posturing and positioning of both sides tell you all you need to know:

 

West has positioned themselves as "this is our chance to ruin Russia". 

Russia has positioned itself as "we will not back down; we told you not get close to us; now we will scorch earth ("Ukraine") if we have to". 

 

Poor Ukrainian are stuck in between, neither here nor there. Obvisouly, with such huge gap in terms of "posturing" on the two side, are we really surprised. Both sides have dug their heels.

 

[Xerxes]

10 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

Read Putins speech and tell me where he learned anything. He is as boxed in his ideological box just as much as he was at the beginning of the war.

 

Let's assume the west think we need to negotiate and decide we give him the Donbas, Crimean Luhansk area and his $350B back, bcause of nuclear threats. Happy days for everyone - Oh wait!

Of course he still has his nuclear weapons. So he is going to ask for me - he would be stupid if he didn't. So now you have a Putin who is richer, has more land and has been vindicated. Why would he not ask for more fondling with his nuclear trigger.

 

The only reason to negotiate is if you can eliminate the threat posed and we can't. So giving in to Putin in a negotiation is going to make things worse.

 

The only way to counter the nuclear threat if Putin threatens with nuclear weapon use is to give Ukraine Nukes if they decide they take them. Then Putin can decide to nuke it out or go home.

 

 

I have said some pages ago, that negotication with him at this point are unlikely to yield any results. So I dont disagree with your comment.

 

But I do know that at the very least, he needs to do something to offset the Ukrainian advance in summer, to regain leverage.

 

The worse thing the West can do is to give in into his nuclear blackmail.

 

All I am saying is that what he says today is more consequential than what he was saying six months ago.

 

 

 

Edited September 23, 2022 by Xerxes

[Dinar]

15 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

Read Putins speech and tell me where he learned anything. He is as boxed in his ideological box just as much as he was at the beginning of the war.

 

Let's assume the west think we need to negotiate and decide we give him the Donbas, Crimean Luhansk area and his $350B back, bcause of nuclear threats. Happy days for everyone - Oh wait!

Of course he still has his nuclear weapons. So he is going to ask for me - he would be stupid if he didn't. So now you have a Putin who is richer, has more land and has been vindicated. Why would he not ask for more fondling with his nuclear trigger.

 

The only reason to negotiate is if you can eliminate the threat posed and we can't. So giving in to Putin in a negotiation is going to make things worse.

 

The only way to counter the nuclear threat if Putin threatens with nuclear weapon use is to give Ukraine Nukes if they decide they take them. Then Putin can decide to nuke it out or go home.

 

I would not give Ukraine nukes.  Ukraine is an insanely corrupt country, what makes you think they will not sell them to....

[Spekulatius]

One thing that’s clear already from the news is that this is not a partial mobilization it is more or less a full mobilization. It’s much more than 300k for sure, maybe 2-3x that. You can find picks where they are loading up men that are around 18 year old in buses. No military experience required. They probably go straight to the front after one week of training. Some get rusty AK-47 (you can find the videos on Reddit/Tiktok. Those weapons will never shoot.

 

So this is now Special operation V3.0:

V1.0 - Kyiv bum rush. Lost, had to retreat.

V2.0 - Donbas creeping artillery barrage - stopped by HIMARS and Ukrainian counteroffensive into soft spot.

V3.0 - Volksturm, Hold the line? Human wave attack? Plug holes in frontline? Not sure what the plan is.

 

Likely result is hundred thousands of Russian dead. War is going to take for a while until these “reserves” are chewed up. Then we wait for Putin‘s next move.

[nwoodman]

48 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

Then we wait for Putin‘s (next move) removal.

Fixed it for ya.  I think this is the last roll of the dice for the nutjob.  Watching the news tonight with the solitary voluntary conscript being interviewed as he departs….even my kids said “but that bus is so empty”

[Spekulatius]

1 hour ago, nwoodman said:

Fixed it for ya.  I think this is the last roll of the dice for the nutjob.  Watching the news tonight with the solitary voluntary conscript being interviewed as he departs….even my kids said “but that bus is so empty”

Unfortunately  we cannot count on Putins removal. We have no insight on what’s going on, the autocratic regimes are brittle - they seem hard and impenetrable from the outside, but they are likely all rotten on the inside. Anything could happen or nothing.
This guy has a decent podcast and shows how the mobilization is going. Unbelievable…

 

Edited September 24, 2022 by Spekulatius

[james22]

1 hour ago, nwoodman said:

I think this is the last roll of the dice for the nutjob.

 

Never know.

 

Putin may be strengthened as his troublesome ethnic minorities are fed to the meat grinder.

[nwoodman]

1 minute ago, james22 said:

 

Never know.

 

Putin may be strengthened as his troublesome ethnic minorities are fed to the meat grinder.

Perhaps, while it is hardly an original thought, arming the these minorities has the potential for unintended consequences.  Perhaps I am being overly optimistic but there is a chance for a levered outcome here.  The underbelly is showing.

[nwoodman]

@Spekulatius Thanks for the vid, what a train wreck

[james22]

6 hours ago, nwoodman said:

...arming the these minorities has the potential for unintended consequences.

 

Untrained men don't pose much of a threat to anyone.

[tnp20]

At this point huge losses on Russia side is to Putins advantage.

 

He will use nuclear weapons and is itching to do so. His next move is to move his nuclear command force status is RED and lay out in clear term his red lines. Cross that and Kyiv is gone.

 

People see this as a bluff. I do not. He has certain red lines, cross that and once again nuclear weapons are used in the world. 

 

Its in the interest of the West to get a cease fire here. Putin likely has another 5 years at most with his health issues.

[Xerxes]

Ukraine is the aggrieved party. They are the ones doing the fighting (and dying) and frankly doing so as the first line of defence (while we chill). So they need to consent .. not West. 
 

Ukrainian have established some leverage via their most recent offensive, which in turn means Russia has lost leverage. So I don’t think we are going to see much talking until Kremlin re-establish back some sort of leverage. (Whatever that means)
 

West’s role here is to bleed dry a historical geopolitical foe that has always cast a wary eye on the West, to clear its own arsenal of the old inventory, to test new weapons …. …. Keep doing that until that opportunity exists (politically correct of saying the same-thing for those who see things in a black and white cartoonish way:   help the Rebel-Alliance-Ukrainian defend Soviet Union II)

 

On nuking Kiev, I don’t think the man is itching to do so. He has grown reckless but not that stupid. That said given the stupidity we have seen so far coming from Kremlin there is a non zero chance of something happening with the nuclear reactors and that would be less direct, more Kremlin-like (ambiguity) and accomplish the samething, which is to add a fresh dose of complexity and terror. 

 

On a different note, anyone has any comparison case study of this episode of Kremlin doubling down … to the “Surge” in 2007, when Bush & Co doubled down as part their de-nazification campaign of Ay-Raq.
 

Or is that something we don’t want to remember !! And prefer not pointing out. 

 

 

[tnp20]

Ukraine has the upper hand in morale, equipment and momentum. Where does Ukraine stop and declare a ceasefire ? Is Crimea also included in that plan to liberate ?

 

Will Russia just sit back and take the losses and  say oh, we are done, we are going to just withdraw with tail between our legs ?

 

Outside of a coupe and Putin being forced from power, it only escalates from here. No way a cornered rat like Putin not bring nuclear weapons into the conflict. The referendum is just a way to expand the boundaries for what is officially Russia and when mother Russia is threatened, they will legitimize the use of nuclear weapons. Initially it will be via warnings and threats and red lines and some point when those red lines are over run - they will make escalate nuclear posture and use it - and say we told you so and you crossed our red line and we had no option but to use nuclear weapons.

 

We need an exit plan for both sides. We need a face saving way to get Putin off the ledge and end this. In negotiations no one is happy. Everyone has to give a little.

 

 

 

 

[aws]

Cutting territory deals with Putin in Georgia and Crimea is exactly what emboldened him to keep trying to grab new land. There doesn't need to be an offramp to end the war, there needs to be a defeat. It's nobody's fault but Putin if the situation appears more and more difficult to extricate from, and backing down to nuclear saber rattling sets a horrible precedent. We don't need to blame the defenders for winning or their allies for helping them win.

 

Putin hopes the mobilization will be enough to win a conventional war, and that Russians will put up with the costs longer than Ukraine's allies will. Since everything else they have done in this war has underperformed expectations, I wouldn't expect the mobilization to go well, but who knows. If it goes badly for Russia, and the social unrest and economic costs of the war become too much to bear, then the safer option is just invent some new definition of victory and end the war. Maybe some type of deal where the people who identify themselves as Russians will be allowed to voluntarily relocate en masse to Russia and escape Ukrainian oppression.

 

It would be a politically risky decision to end the war on terms that appear to be like a defeat, but mobilization was also risky and something Putin didn't do until he felt like he had no choice. It's better that than letting the pressure build until there is a coup. And the nuclear threat doesn't solve everything. If Russia is so badly weakened that they cannot continue the war, how does dropping a nuke get them out of that? I'm sure there are already planned responses in place for such an attack that can be swiftly imposed, the pain from which will surely be more severe than the pain of simply losing the war, so Putin's problems at home will only get worse. Even allies like China who have similar goals as Russia (ending western hegemony) cannot possibly condone a first strike nuclear attack as the way to achieve it, so I doubt they would be willing to jump into the war in a big way to save Russia after they just broke the nuclear taboo.

 

 

 

[Dinar]

4 hours ago, Xerxes said:

Ukraine is the aggrieved party. They are the ones doing the fighting (and dying) and frankly doing so as the first line of defence (while we chill). So they need to consent .. not West. 
 

Ukrainian have established some leverage via their most recent offensive, which in turn means Russia has lost leverage. So I don’t think we are going to see much talking until Kremlin re-establish back some sort of leverage. (Whatever that means)
 

West’s role here is to bleed dry a historical geopolitical foe that has always cast a wary eye on the West, to clear its own arsenal of the old inventory, to test new weapons …. …. Keep doing that until that opportunity exists (politically correct of saying the same-thing for those who see things in a black and white cartoonish way:   help the Rebel-Alliance-Ukrainian defend Soviet Union II)

 

On nuking Kiev, I don’t think the man is itching to do so. He has grown reckless but not that stupid. That said given the stupidity we have seen so far coming from Kremlin there is a non zero chance of something happening with the nuclear reactors and that would be less direct, more Kremlin-like (ambiguity) and accomplish the samething, which is to add a fresh dose of complexity and terror. 

 

On a different note, anyone has any comparison case study of this episode of Kremlin doubling down … to the “Surge” in 2007, when Bush & Co doubled down as part their de-nazification campaign of Ay-Raq.
 

Or is that something we don’t want to remember !! And prefer not pointing out. 

 

 

Ukraine would have lost without Western support, and given the sacrifices already made by the West - tens of billions in aid, refugees, skyrocketing nat gas prices, collapsing industry caused by higher nat gas prices, Ukraine asking for hundreds of billions of dollars in aid to rebuilt, the West certainly ought to have a very important seat at the table.  But there has to be an off-ramp.  The has to be a face saving way for Putin to exit in order to have a chance to avoid tens of thousands of more deaths.

[Xerxes]

@Dinar

 

Back in Feb-March, I argued for exit ramp, fortunately for Kiev (and unfortunately for the Kremlin) the conflict unfolded in a way that exit ramp is looking more and more remote. The sinking of the flagship in the Black Sea didn’t help either. 
 

We have for all intent and purposes linked ourselves as the “weapon supplier of last resort”. Kiev pretty much owns the narrative. 

[Xerxes]

2 hours ago, aws said:

Cutting territory deals with Putin in Georgia and Crimea is exactly what emboldened him to keep trying to grab new land. There doesn't need to be an offramp to end the war, there needs to be a defeat. It's nobody's fault but Putin if the situation appears more and more difficult to extricate from, and backing down to nuclear saber rattling sets a horrible precedent. We don't need to blame the defenders for winning or their allies for helping them win.

 

Putin hopes the mobilization will be enough to win a conventional war, and that Russians will put up with the costs longer than Ukraine's allies will. Since everything else they have done in this war has underperformed expectations, I wouldn't expect the mobilization to go well, but who knows. If it goes badly for Russia, and the social unrest and economic costs of the war become too much to bear, then the safer option is just invent some new definition of victory and end the war. Maybe some type of deal where the people who identify themselves as Russians will be allowed to voluntarily relocate en masse to Russia and escape Ukrainian oppression.

 

It would be a politically risky decision to end the war on terms that appear to be like a defeat, but mobilization was also risky and something Putin didn't do until he felt like he had no choice. It's better that than letting the pressure build until there is a coup. And the nuclear threat doesn't solve everything. If Russia is so badly weakened that they cannot continue the war, how does dropping a nuke get them out of that? I'm sure there are already planned responses in place for such an attack that can be swiftly imposed, the pain from which will surely be more severe than the pain of simply losing the war, so Putin's problems at home will only get worse. Even allies like China who have similar goals as Russia (ending western hegemony) cannot possibly condone a first strike nuclear attack as the way to achieve it, so I doubt they would be willing to jump into the war in a big way to save Russia after they just broke the nuclear taboo.

 

 

 

 

The West should not give in to nuclear blackmail. Period.

 

That said with Kiev in the driving seat, they should be aware that there is a non-zero (however small) chance of a mushroom cloud, either as a test or an actual tactical attack, or a conventional attack on a nuclear reactor etc. all it takes is a hypersonic missile.
 

A major problem that Russia has, there is a huge gap in terms of capabilities between its antiquated/used-up conventional weaponry and its world-ending arsenals. So going from one to another is a big leap on the escalation ladder.