(May 4, 2023 at 9:56 pm)Thumpalumpacus Wrote:(May 4, 2023 at 8:02 pm)Irreligious Atheist Wrote: And you answered your own question at the bottom of your post. The person who's country is under attack is probably going to be more ok with doing things that may risk WWIII, and justifiably so perhaps, because their country is under attack and they are more desperate. I'm not blaming Zelensky personally as a human being for being panicked, because such is human nature, and he's throwing out some really bad ideas right now about what he might do with bombs in Russia, as internal spy document leaks show, so my problem is more so in the West propping him up, when Zelensky may not be thinking as a completely rational actor right now. Zelensky wouldn't be the threat that he was without us Westerners propping him up, so I'm giving us (the West) the biggest slap on the wrist here with my rhetoric, and Zelensky gets slightly less blame, because he's just using the toys that he's been given.
It's actually pretty rational to strike at the source of one's problems rather than trying to find more thumbs to plug holes in a dike. Were I in his shoes, I too would want to strike at logistics chains that stretch back across the Russian borders several hundred miles. It's sound strategy to starve an opposing army of resources. A hungry army short of fuel and ammo doesn't fight very well.
I don't think it's "panic" at all. I think he's asking for the tools needed to accomplish the mission of evicting the Russians from Ukrainian soil. Yes, that means civilian Russian casualties, but given the circumstances of his own people, he can't afford to be wringing his hands in his nightly speeches. When you buy the boat, you get the leaks too, as the Russians are learning ... once again.
Put shortly, I think you're really glossing over the military necessities, and most likely, the military advice, he's facing. Why fight tanks at the front if you can keep them from arriving at all? When your house is flooding from leaky plumbing, the first thing you do is cut off the water. Only then do you fix each and every leak. It's not different in operational art.
The West has said that they don't want Zelensky striking Russian troops within Russia, and since the West is the ones providing the weapons, I think they get the say so and final word when it comes to what Zelenski is allowed to do with the weapons. Whether it's rational to strike someone attacking you, it's not as simple as that. North Korea would not be wise to strike South Korea due to sanctions by the West, and in kind, Ukraine should not be striking Russia. If Zelensky can not be shown to be a rational actor, his toys should be taken away so he is forced to negotiate an end to the war.
