Posts: 4651
Threads: 13
Joined: September 27, 2018
Reputation:
16
RE: Russia and Ukraine
March 31, 2025 at 3:38 pm
(March 31, 2025 at 10:18 am)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: (March 31, 2025 at 7:51 am)Belacqua Wrote: Detailed article here from the NYTimes, detailing the extent to which the US participated in the war. They weren't just shipping weapons, they were picking targets, planning strategy.
https://web.archive.org/web/202503300809...baden.html
It was the US fighting Russia, with Ukrainians doing the dying part.
The reporters have clearly talked to some high-level people. Now that the war is winding down, they will be looking to assign blame.
It's a shame we didn't do more.
Thank you for this temperate response.
I suppose the US generals were concerned about going from a proxy war, with the US pulling strings, into a more direct superpower conflict. Once it's Americans shooting from American bases, then Russia sees the US as a legitimate target.
I get the sense from the article that nobody was ready for WWIII.
Posts: 11848
Threads: 30
Joined: December 8, 2019
Reputation:
14
RE: Russia and Ukraine
March 31, 2025 at 3:53 pm
This wasn't a proxy war it was the US aiding Ukraine by giving material and strategic help and the only one whose start WW3 is Russia
"Change was inevitable"
Nemo sicut deus debet esse!
![[Image: Canada_Flag.jpg?v=1646203843]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=cdn.shopify.com%2Fs%2Ffiles%2F1%2F0630%2F5310%2F3332%2Fproducts%2FCanada_Flag.jpg%3Fv%3D1646203843)
“No matter what men think, abortion is a fact of life. Women have always had them; they always have and they always will. Are they going to have good ones or bad ones? Will the good ones be reserved for the rich, while the poor women go to quacks?”
–SHIRLEY CHISHOLM
Posts: 23717
Threads: 26
Joined: February 2, 2010
Reputation:
105
RE: Russia and Ukraine
March 31, 2025 at 4:54 pm
(March 31, 2025 at 3:38 pm)Belacqua Wrote: (March 31, 2025 at 10:18 am)Thumpalumpacus Wrote: It's a shame we didn't do more.
Thank you for this temperate response.
I suppose the US generals were concerned about going from a proxy war, with the US pulling strings, into a more direct superpower conflict. Once it's Americans shooting from American bases, then Russia sees the US as a legitimate target.
I get the sense from the article that nobody was ready for WWIII.
I don't think the generals were too worried about a widening war, myself. Support for Ukraine has been widespread in the American military, at all ranks, since Russia widened its low-intensity war in the Donbas into a full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Posts: 67730
Threads: 140
Joined: June 28, 2011
Reputation:
161
RE: Russia and Ukraine
March 31, 2025 at 11:07 pm
(This post was last modified: March 31, 2025 at 11:08 pm by The Grand Nudger.)
All this proxy war nonsense. No, it's super simple. Ukranians weren't interested in getting Bucha'd. The us kept trying to tie their hands..but they said fuck that - and now they're heroes...to our continued frustration.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
Posts: 30910
Threads: 117
Joined: February 22, 2011
Reputation:
159
RE: Russia and Ukraine
April 4, 2025 at 9:47 am
Vlad is missing a golden opportunity to withdraw and regroup, while at the same time consolidating some gains, restoring economic order, and saving face.
Posts: 67730
Threads: 140
Joined: June 28, 2011
Reputation:
161
RE: Russia and Ukraine
April 4, 2025 at 11:08 am
(This post was last modified: April 4, 2025 at 11:10 am by The Grand Nudger.)
I don't think the opportunity is there anymore. Russia struggles mightily to maintain their current churn on personnel. They manage, but density of force on the drone line means that massing soldiers is a suboptimal course of action if trickling them out can achieve their limited aims. They would likely focus on more drones, themselves, leading to an even more restrictive density.
They have no gains to consolidate. Their economy needs the war to maintain at it's current levels to function. They've lost more of ukraine since the invasion began.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
Posts: 2923
Threads: 5
Joined: September 21, 2018
Reputation:
33
RE: Russia and Ukraine
April 4, 2025 at 12:11 pm
Yes, it seems very much like their current offensive was stalled just outside of Pokrovsk. No more gains, anywhere, but Sudsha (russian territory!).
Cetero censeo religionem delendam esse
Posts: 23717
Threads: 26
Joined: February 2, 2010
Reputation:
105
RE: Russia and Ukraine
April 4, 2025 at 9:24 pm
They've burned through the veterans. They've burned through the troops taught by veterans. They've burned through raw recruits, and are now calling up another 150,000 or so.
And now Putin's alleged desire for peace is shown bullshit by his conditions and qualifications. It will hurt Russia more than Ukraine. But he's stuck in a trap -- if he continues, his military will be rendered even more useless, and if he quits, the knives will come out for him in delivering yet another defeat to the state.
I said it from the beginning, even if Russia wins militarily, the unavoidable insurgency will make this a ten-year quagmire, and we saw in the 80s what that did to the USSR. But the fork in the road is long in the rear-view mirror, and Putin is now only spending lives in order to lengthen the life of his domestic regime. Even LBJ had enough brains to eat his own sword over Vietnam.
Posts: 1110
Threads: 61
Joined: September 17, 2022
Reputation:
3
RE: Russia and Ukraine
April 5, 2025 at 6:20 am
Belaqua on Ukraine defeating Russia:
The Afghans (a few marauder tribes) managed to defeat the Soviet Union (The world’s – perhaps – N.1 military power at the time) after a 10 year war between 1979 and 1989.
Or: Turkey had never been able to completely end the Kurdish insurgency that began in 1980 and claimed the lives of many people on both sides of the conflict.
Still: I did expect the Russians to quickly take all of Ukraine and a Chechnya or Syria like situation afterward (with the whole region leaving the Russian Federation block as soon as the autocratic regime in Russia collapses).
But something weird happened and the Ukrainians are resisting (while paying a huge human cost in this war).
On Free Speech and US Propaganda:
The world is changing quickly as I said. What was very true in the 1990’s is very superficial knowledge today.
Example: Marine Lepen (The leader of the Populist RN Party that has been constantly increasing its votes during the last two decades) in France has been banned from politics. So guess who is reacting to that first: Hungrary’s Victor Orban and of course Vladimir Putin. Marine Lepen herself is making speeches that seem like logical statements but when you dig into it, it’s a bit like D. Trump’s speeches. Half of the things she is saying is false, exaggerated or distorted realities. Her statements are rarely about making her point (like an adult person). It has more to do with convincing people with very limited knowledge (ordinary people who perhaps don’t have enough time to study political issues in a detailed manner) through some simplistic statements that these people will somehow perceive as being true.
So this is our main issue today: Everyone is going to be affected by D. Trump’s new tariffs for instance. And although people seem to believe him, it’s now going to make Americans (or anyone else) richer.
(And there is never going to be a Riviera in Gaza either. Populist leaders are the ones who are deluded and are deluding their audience because of their ways of doing things that are based on despising the intellectual capacities of ordinary people like you and me J )
Later Comments:
Whether we are correctly reading the situation or not, almost all countries are now boosting their defense budgets. I don’t know if it is good to think of this as a good thing. If Russia’s economic and political transition to liberal capitalism had been monitored and supported more closely in the 1990’s there would probably be no Putin and we might even be living in a world in which Europe + the US + Russia + China were building the next ISS while Elon Musk was assisting them by bringing the old ISS back into the earth’s atmosphere.
Personally: I don’t like this era of protectionism and rising tensions between different powers. I’m thinking in terms of specie. All that money we spend on our armies etc. is actually money that we could use to avert climate collapse and create a truly circular economy. (And not cancel but increase things like US-AID because that’s the sort of thing that will bring lasting security to the word, not more and more sophisticated weapons) 
![[Image: 7151bc275de2d3d422106a4008215efe.jpg]](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/71/51/bc/7151bc275de2d3d422106a4008215efe.jpg)
Posts: 67730
Threads: 140
Joined: June 28, 2011
Reputation:
161
RE: Russia and Ukraine
April 5, 2025 at 10:45 am
(This post was last modified: April 5, 2025 at 10:47 am by The Grand Nudger.)
Well, if you intend to fight for the last bag of stuff in a post apocalyptic hellscape, you're going to need a big gang. No point in calling it an army, an army..as understood by the professional forces of developed countries, isn't the tool for looting and pillaging. It's not just the cost, but also that the things you have to indoctrinate john and jane q citizen towards to create effective soldiers are at odds with the aim of open resource conflict. You cant have them stopping to fill their pockets, you can't have them gunning down the locals for their soap and towels, they cannot believe in the validity of deals with the enemy. They need to be incorruptible and impossible to negotiate with. Even, and especially, if you as cinc are a corrupt piece of transactional shit.
Ask Vlad.
I am the Infantry. I am my country’s strength in war, her deterrent in peace. I am the heart of the fight… wherever, whenever. I carry America’s faith and honor against her enemies. I am the Queen of Battle. I am what my country expects me to be, the best trained Soldier in the world. In the race for victory, I am swift, determined, and courageous, armed with a fierce will to win. Never will I fail my country’s trust. Always I fight on…through the foe, to the objective, to triumph overall. If necessary, I will fight to my death. By my steadfast courage, I have won more than 200 years of freedom. I yield not to weakness, to hunger, to cowardice, to fatigue, to superior odds, For I am mentally tough, physically strong, and morally straight. I forsake not, my country, my mission, my comrades, my sacred duty. I am relentless. I am always there, now and forever. I AM THE INFANTRY! FOLLOW ME!
|
![[Image: extraordinarywoo-sig.jpg]](https://i.postimg.cc/zf86M5L7/extraordinarywoo-sig.jpg)
