Russia-Ukrainian War

[Xerxes]

3 hours ago, John Hjorth said:

@Xerxes,

 

The whole thing going on since February this year is just pure play madness - and very grim, indeed.

 

You are in Canada, I'm living [basically - on surface - still in calm and peace] - in the distance of about 1,200 km from Kyiv, about 20½ hours by car - in the northern part of Europe.

 

Mentally it's tangible [if something even can be mental and tangible at the same time].

we are blessed with two large bodies of water protecting our western and eastern flanks.
 

a southern neighbour that is culturally, economically, politically aligned with us and a northern frontier guarded by polar bears and one or two CF-188s.

Edited November 25, 2022 by Xerxes

[Cigarbutt]

2 hours ago, John Hjorth said:

@Xerxes,

 

It has actually happened in Russia before. 1998 Russian miners' strike . 

 

I think it was @Cigarbutt who posted about it in some relevant and related context some years ago here on CoBF.

i'm not planning to get 'involved' here.

It wasn't me; the closest possible post was about Gorbachev's biography by Taubman, in 2018.

But it's been said that societies are potentially only (#) meals away from revolution/anarchy.

For #, historically, people have used 3,4 or 9 using a similar figure of style (Hemingway, The Sun also Rises) as for bankruptcy, gradually then suddenly.

Edited November 25, 2022 by Cigarbutt
minor correction

[Blugolds]

On 11/21/2022 at 8:42 AM, Spekulatius said:

He is clearly wrong. Got to move on.

 

Agreed, own it, this behavior is actually a classic out of the Putin playbook 

 

Admit nothing, deny everything, make counteraccusations

[UK]

Yesterday I heard Oleksiy Arestovych interview on a radio and I understand that a lot of it was one sided and propaganda etc, but I think he also provided some interesting speculations about how this could end. So, as Xerxes suggest, he also sees a possible move by a "system", but is very skeptical, that the outcome of changing Putin would be any different and more likely even worse. So then he said the confidence in Russia's army and Putin is almost broken, but to end everything you have to break confidence in Russia itself and for that you have to make some more breakthroughs as in Kharkiv and better yet to take Crimea back. Then you would hope and watch for some regional fission in Russia itself. These were only speculations and for now all they want is, like no_free_lunch suggests, to Russian army from Ukraine (not negotiating until then) and the only thing they need for that is more western weapons arriving faster, because currently they are still delivered too slowly, forcing them to stop/accumulate before major moves ant allowing Russians to take a breath/regroup. And on possible use of tactical nuclear weapons, he said that Russians recently were informed very clearly about possible consequences of doing this, and said that one of them is that Putin himself then would become a target and therefore he thinks that he clearly got the message on this subject. 

 

Edited November 25, 2022 by UK

[Xerxes]

7 hours ago, UK said:

So, as Xerxes suggest, he also sees a possible move by a "system", but is very skeptical, that the outcome of changing Putin would be any different and more likely even worse. 

Just to clarify my comment.
 

A possible move by the “system” against its patriarch is not meant to please the West or end of the war. But to save the whole complex from being toppled, if pressure goes up really high internally to the point of no return. The outcome will be whatever it will be but the complex will be preserved at all cost.
 

Where we are in that “pressure gauge” we have no idea. 
 

@no_free_lunch

 

On your comment about peace, I would argue that (1) Ukraine can re-arm and heal much much faster than Russia while it has the goodwill of the West and a flow of aid. But that goodwill will not last forever (war fatigue is a real thing) (2) Russia is at the point of not being able to try again anything for a very long time (3) the real political change/consequences and backlash in Moscow will happen AFTER the war ends and Russian troops are back in their base and homes. Not before. It will be a political shitstorm, which the system cannot deal with because there is a war. Once that ends the internal squabbling will really start. 
 

A peace may cost Ukraine some territories. Not the first time an aggressor takes another one’ territory nor will be the last time.
 

Zelensky’ call to make, and happily not mine. 

Edited November 25, 2022 by Xerxes

[Xerxes]

 

convicts/criminals in front, followed by freshly drafted conscripts, followed by regular season forces holding the rear and shooting deserters. 

[UK]

https://apnews.com/article/russia-ukraine-europe-moscow-fa5db922708b22b212f546b2f84a7cfb

 

“We must understand that the whole world is watching us. We are the largest state and when we do not have socks, shorts, doctors, intelligence, communications, or simply care for our children, questions arise that will be very difficult to answer,” he said.

[no_free_lunch]

On 11/25/2022 at 11:17 PM, Xerxes said:

 

convicts/criminals in front, followed by freshly drafted conscripts, followed by regular season forces holding the rear and shooting deserters. 

 

I wonder how much of this is western propaganda, from what I can tell the Russians are still very slowly advancing in the Donbas.  I also keep reading that RU artillery is 3-4x what Ukraine can put out.  I really don't know what is happening but I think it is somewhere in the middle between western and russian propaganda.  It's only when you get large scale changes, Kiev/Kharkiv/Kherson that both sides will admit to, that you can really discern the truth.

Edited November 27, 2022 by no_free_lunch

[Xerxes]

Yeap, we really don't know much. We have few random datapoints from different sources.

I want my books now !

 

And to your point only when a major milestone is achieved (a fall of a city) that goes toward tangible book value. 

Everything else is Goodwill till then  

[UK]

https://www.reuters.com/world/russia-us-have-ways-manage-nuclear-risks-ria-cites-us-diplomat-2022-11-28/

 

"The United States has channels for managing risk with the Russian Federation, particularly nuclear risks and that was the purpose of CIA director Burns' meeting with his Russian counterpart," Rood said in a video on RIA's Telegram channel.

[Spekulatius]

We know that in the Donbas, the Russians (Wagner mostly) are focusing on Bakhmut which is sort of becoming a modern day Verdun for them.

I always find Michael Clarks assessment interesting:

 

[Xerxes]

What I heard (don’t know where I think Economist), Surovikin’ condition to accept the top job as military commander was that there would a withdraw and consolidation east for the river by pulling out from Kherson. 
 

On Bakhmut, Wagner is actually working to gain political market share in Kremlin by bloodying itself at Bakhmut. How twisted is that 

[Xerxes]

Hell in Bakhmut

 

 

[Spekulatius]

 

 

[UK]

 

[UK]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-moves-to-bolster-defenses-after-airfield-strikes-11670415197

 

Igor Girkin, a former Russian militant commander and an influential voice among Russian hard-liners, also visited troops in Donbas recently, he wrote Tuesday on Telegram. He said that what he found there was a poorly motivated Russian army, especially compared with Ukrainian forces. “The troops are fighting ‘by inertia,’ not having the slightest idea of the ultimate strategic goals of the current military campaign,” he wrote, adding that fighters from Luhansk and Donetsk were better motivated. Efforts to break Ukrainian will, he added, weren’t working. “‘Ukraine’ will NOT freeze in winter, will NOT rebel and will NOT fight worse. Vice versa. Its soldiers, who have already believed in their strength as a result of the autumn victories…will only fight angrier and more stubbornly,” he wrote. “And they will be met only by apathetic performance of duty, behind which many fighters and commanders have long been [asking] the unresolved question: ‘What are we doing here?’”

[Xerxes]

I didn't know Imperial War Museam made documentary.

Here is a good one misuse of T-72 tanks by the Russians.

 

 

 

[Xerxes]

I don't think the nice (but distracted) CNN lady here understands what the good Colonel is explaining about the dummy warheads on the cruise missiles.

 

 

[Xerxes]

I have not read. But i think it deserve printing and reading back to back. I am planning to do so myself. Looking fast, there are some passage in relation to the post occupation plans, had it come to pass. 

 

https://static.rusi.org/359-SR-Ukraine-Preliminary-Lessons-Feb-July-2022-web-final.pdf

 

[UK]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/russians-march-on-foot-to-advance-yards-in-bloody-eastern-ukraine-battle-11670406883?mod=hp_trending_now_article_pos3

 

“We shoot at them, they send more. It doesn’t end,” said Lt. Matviyenko, 26, a yellow-and-blue Ukrainian flag patched onto his olive-green uniform. “There’s so many of them.” The battle for Bakhmut has become a bloodbath for both sides as Russia steps up its attempts to take what used to be a quaint, tree-lined city. Ukrainian defense officials said Moscow is losing around 50 soldiers a day to maintain a slow, bruising advance to reach the city’s easternmost gates. If the Russians break through to take control of Bakhmut, it would open a path to the political and economic centers of Slovyansk and Kramatorsk in the Ukrainian-held portions of the Donbas area, once one of the country’s main industrial regions. Moscow tried to seize the area in a pincer movement in the early days of the war and into the summer. After a lightning offensive, Ukraine regained much of the lost ground. Now, as Russia slowly burns through its artillery stockpiles, defense analysts said, its troops are advancing once again but on tank and foot. This time it is so President Vladimir Putin can tout a rare victory to the Russian people after a succession of withdrawals, most recently in Kherson, giving it outsize importance to the Kremlin, analysts said. “The costs associated with six months of brutal, grinding, and attrition-based combat around Bakhmut far outweigh any operational advantage that the Russians can obtain from taking Bakhmut,” wrote the Institute for the Study of War, a U.S. defense think tank based in Washington, D.C.
Serhiy Cherevaty, spokesman for the Ukrainian military’s Eastern Group of Forces, said 50-70 Russians were dying a day in the battle.

 

Russia has already redeployed troops from the southern region around Kherson to the front in Bakhmut, while Ukraine is similarly trying to get more forces to the area, a task that some analysts said could have been complicated by a recent missile strike on the railway network in Kryvyi Rih in the center of the country. Earlier this week new Ukrainian troops were arriving. A staggered column of T-72 tanks with reactive armor drove into the city. Units of the 58th Brigade, which has been in the city for weeks, were rotating out, and fresher units were coming in from the 71st Brigade.  As the tanks drove in, some residents waved. Others kept their heads down. Of the several thousand residents still left in the city, many said their nerves had been shot by constant shelling, shooting and missile fire that has pummeled the city’s center. Bakhmut’s central covered market has been reduced to a jumble of aluminum. Streets are littered with broken glass, telephone and electric cable dangle and window frames lie randomly on street corners. Dogs with collars sniffed at piles of trash that lay in piles of small shopping bags.

 

Edited December 9, 2022 by UK

[UK]

https://www.wsj.com/articles/ukraine-says-western-allies-shouldnt-fear-russia-falling-apart-11670505120?mod=hp_lead_pos7

 

Some of these allies worry that such an outcome could profoundly destabilize the nuclear-armed Russian state, potentially leading to its fragmentation and wide-scale unrest, with unpredictable consequences for the rest of the world. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday that Washington’s focus is on supporting Ukraine to take back territory seized by Russia since launching its invasion on Feb. 24. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, who expressed confidence in continuing U.S. backing for Kyiv, said fears about preserving Russia reminded him of the so-called “Chicken Kiev” speech of 1991. Then, President George H.W. Bush in a speech to Ukrainian lawmakers warned against “suicidal nationalism,” urging Ukrainians to preserve the Soviet Union and abandon their quest for independence from Moscow. “I’m calling on the world not to be afraid of Russia falling apart. If the wheels of history begin to turn, no human will change it,” Mr. Kuleba said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal in Kyiv. “Instead of thinking of how to help Russia survive and become a normal member of the international community, it’s time to accept the fact that this Russia cannot be a normal member of the international community,” he said. “I don’t think the world will fall apart if Russia falls apart. But it will be the people of Russia who will make their country fall apart, as it happened with the Russian Empire” in 1917.

 

“We are first and foremost focused on striking targets in the occupied territories of Ukraine, on liberating our own territory. But of course the notion that Russia can do whatever it can technically afford doing in Ukraine while Ukraine doesn’t have the same right is conceptually, morally and militarily wrong,” Mr. Kuleba said. “Ukraine should not be endlessly victimized. We are a country that is fighting on all fronts for its survival, for its territorial integrity,” he added. “The most important thing is that no one treats Ukraine’s behavior—as long as it complies with international laws of warfare—from the perspective that Russia can do everything it wants while Ukraine has to respect certain red lines in defending itself.” Ukraine has pledged to the U.S. not to use American-supplied weapons to strike Russian soil. That agreement, Mr. Kuleba said, doesn’t apply to Crimea, which is internationally recognized as Ukrainian territory. The U.S. has also refrained from supplying Ukraine with the Army Tactical Missile System, or ATACMS, which has a range of some 200 miles, and has modified the Himars artillery systems that it has provided to Ukraine so that they couldn’t fire ATACMS missiles into Russia should Ukraine obtain them from another source.

 

Mr. Kuleba said Russia’s behavior suggests Moscow still seeks a military victory, including the conquest of all of Ukraine. “Putin and his closest entourage are hoping for a miracle that will happen and turn the tables,” he said, reiterating Ukraine’s call on allies to provide it with more weapons, including Western-made tanks, jet fighters and ATACMS missiles. In the past, Mr. Kuleba said, the U.S. and allies lifted longstanding taboos and supplied Ukraine with the weapons that they refused to provide in the past, such as 155 mm howitzers or Himars, when the tide of the fighting turned against Kyiv. Mr. Kuleba said that at a North Atlantic Treaty Organization foreign-ministers meeting in Bucharest late last month he urged his counterparts to “completely change the optics: Instead of waiting for a crisis in order for them to make a decision, they have to make decisions now in order to avoid a crisis.” Asked about the response to the proposal, Mr. Kuleba said the NATO governments need time to reflect.

 

Edited December 9, 2022 by UK

[Blugolds]

I dont know how many people watch/listen to Lex, but he is of Ukranian/Russian heritage, moved to states around 13, father is professor, speaks Russian/English fluently. He recently went to Ukraine to interview there but hasnt published those interviews yet, he has interviewing Putin himself as a goal. Has some pretty good guests, all very interesting and does a good job asking questions and discussing a variety of topics.

 

I thought this episode was interesting, getting the take on the situation of an ex-CIA agent. Viewpoint on Ukraine starts at 13:50. 

 

 

 

Agree with him or not, his take is interesting and I like hearing alternative viewpoints. 

Edited December 9, 2022 by Blugolds11

[Parsad]

Russia will win this thing if the U.S. and allies concede to dumbass deals like this:

 

https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/dea-agent-who-helped-put-viktor-bout-behind-bars-slams-brittney-griner-swap-we-couldnt-even-get-two-people-for-the-worlds-most-notorious-weapons-trafficker-220232108.html

 

Why they did this deal I'll never understand!  Cheers!

[Dinar]

1 hour ago, Parsad said:

Russia will win this thing if the U.S. and allies concede to dumbass deals like this:

 

https://ca.sports.yahoo.com/dea-agent-who-helped-put-viktor-bout-behind-bars-slams-brittney-griner-swap-we-couldnt-even-get-two-people-for-the-worlds-most-notorious-weapons-trafficker-220232108.html

 

Why they did this deal I'll never understand!  Cheers!

You are 100% right, this is insanely stupid!  Apparently Trump turned down the offer for Whelan before.

[no_free_lunch]

18 hours ago, Dinar said:

You are 100% right, this is insanely stupid!  Apparently Trump turned down the offer for Whelan before.

On this one thing we all agree.  Obviously this was done for the most simple minded political perspective, I think and hope it has backfired.

 

Xerxes, I am curious about that PDF you linked but am afraid to click on the link!   If possible could you attach the pdf or let us know the summary?

 

Bluegolds, I did watch the first 10 minutes or so of your link but I find it hard to take this analyst seriously.  I am not sure when it was filmed but he said point blank that all of south Ukraine (to Odessa) would be taken by Russia by fall.  He says this would be in part due to Europe folding on winter / energy supplies.  Quite the underperformance on that prediction.  Why believe anything else he has to say when he is so confidently wrong?

Edited December 10, 2022 by no_free_lunch