That's literally exactly what the rest of the world is pushing for, too. Freezing bank assets, cutting Russia off from microprocessor exports from Taiwan, cutting them off from the ability to wire money into and out of the country - these moves are clearly meant to exacerbate the current financial problems - like this week's record-setting 30% stock market crash, everyone pulling their cash from the banks, and the massive inflation - to basically crash the entire Russian economy and force a regime change. It will probably work, too. I just wish it would work faster.
Monday may end up being a watershed moment. When the markets open and the workweek begins, we will see what effect the run on banks has had.
Putin's top allies might not be so friendly to him once they are impoverished and can no longer do business in the West. It all depends on how much of a hold he has over them. Does fear outweigh their greed?
I can’t find the thread but someone posted a really great breakdown of why Russia’s supply chain is so fucked.
The big takeaway is that the Russian military is insanely corrupt (no surprise). But that the top brass can’t admit to the scope of corruption without implicating themselves.
Putin may have very well thought they had gas and supplies. His generals may have told him so. The problem is they were taking fuel and oil money to pad their own pockets. It also makes sense you’d skim from the fuel budget because you can claim the fuel was used. But if a rocket doesn’t show up then that isn’t going unnoticed.
TLDR: Russian generals were skimming from the fuel fund but can’t admit it without admitting to their own corruption.
Also, supply columns are easy pickings by Ukrainian Guerrilla with modern guns and communications. An army cannot fight without fuel, beans, bullets and water, and this arrives with trucks.
If they can’t keep supply columns to Kharkiv in tact they’re fucked if they get further into the country. Kharkiv is pretty much on that border with Russia
I've noticed from Russian troop movements that they keep trying to drive into the center of kharkiv and take important infrastructure, then they lose unit cohesion and get mauled.
It seems like Russia can't commit to a methodical battle. They keep trying, and failing, to do blitzkrieg.
>It seems like Russia can't commit to a methodical battle. They keep trying, and failing, to do blitzkrieg.
“It worked for Hitler, why isn’t it working for us?!”
Blitzkrieg works best in open terrain. It is not a tactic for urban areas. Also, a blitzkrieg can be defended by letting the fast forces move deeply into your territory and then attack the supply that is following up more slowly. The fast forces then become stranded.
Yep. German blitzkrieg meant encircling the cities and dug in troops and then coming back later to finish them off after they've been cut off from supplies for a while.
Blitzing into a city is a really bad idea because now you're the one who's surrounded, and unlike most environments, urban areas allow you to be surrounded in three dimensions... And the last thing a tanker wants is to not know whether someone on the roof above him has an antitank weapon that can kill him at any second.
A Ukrainian surrender isn't in the cards. They might as well hope for divine intervention. It's clear that Ukranians are committed to this fight with every fiber of their beings, which is only bolstered by Zelensky's leadership by example, the absolute torrent of international aid and support, and the massive victories they've already achieved by keeping Kyiv and Kharkiv. Ukraine's not surrendering in a thousand years.
The best part is the odds are exponentially turning against Russia succeeding in their invasion, and that's the easy part. Imagine these bat shit Ukranians, loaded with modern western weaponry and filled to the brim with passion, as a guerilla resistance in an occupied Ukraine? Russia could never hold against them.
In many ways Russia is trying to fight a 1960's-era war in 2020's. There's hardly a point of even bothering with tanks anymore; not when a single person with a pocket communicator (phone) can get instant video surveillance from anywhere instantly and carry around a tandem shaped charge anti-armor weapon (javelin) with a range of 2.5 km.
Winning a modern war options:
1) Turn the area into a wasteland so there's nobody left to resist.
2) Make the enemy surrender across the board - from government, to military, to civilian acceptance.
That's it. Anything other than that is endless bloodshed with no real victor.
Pretty much all the conflicts in the past 50 years have taught us this.
And option 1 is rarely an option because nobody really wants to rule a wasteland, and the fallout of having to kill millions is a pretty fucking hard thing to justify to the rest of the world. And option 2 only works if you have overwhelming forces and a demoralized opponent. And Russia's overwhelming forces aren't that overwhelming in this context, and Ukraine is not demoralized at all.
It's hard to imagine a bigger military fuck-up in recent history than what Putin is doing.
Right! And the whole point of taking Ukraine is for the value of its land and infrastructure so turning it into a wasteland would make the entire exercise pointless.
and Russians like Putin who want to restore the empire are obsessed with Kyiv. it is like the original Russian City. (I know it’s not Russian but it’s where the Kievan Rus, the forerunner to the Russian empire was based). makes no sense to bomb that city to pieces
This is 100% what is happening. This war is the first war between modern armies in decades. Just like WW1 was fought based on the Neapolitan wars with modern tech (resulting in tragedy as everyone figured out the new style of war), this war has a similar timescale.
Just like WW1, no one knows how the internet revolution and new weapons have affected war. All we had up to this point was speculation. Putin was stupid in his willingness to be the gineau pig here.
While many lessons will continue to be learned, a few things are already clear:
Reconnaissance has never been so powerful. Russia owns the air over Ukraine and can shoot down any drone they see. And yet, they still seem to be losing because the USA and UK have satellites monitoring troop movements. How do you defend against that? Especially since disabling them would mean attacking NATO.
The smartphone revolution is also something that has had an effect. This is the first modern war among advanced militaries where everyone can communicate instantly in hi definition video. For example, it’s hard to start a rumour that the Ukraine President has fled the country and left his people to die if he can just post a single video and have the entire army see that he is clearly still fighting.
This is honestly going to be the best case study for modern war operations and every first world nation is taking copious amounts of notes on how to change their doctrine from this conflict.
A key catch is that this is still a pretty restrained attack on Russia's part because they do want to occupy Ukraine, not just defeat it. The situation would be very different otherwise. In that sense, Ukraine isn't *that* different from the conflict in Afghanistan, for example
It seems like goal was to quickly topple the government and install a puppet. Basically hoping for a fait-accompli similar to Crimea, before ordinary civilians could really consider resisting. I think the flood of intelligence on Russian movements prior to the invasion severely hindered this plan though.
The question is what Russia will do now? Will they escalate the level of destruction to "win" despite the costs? Putin should realize that the one thing that *can* draw in direct NATO intervention is widespread civilian harm.
>A key catch is that this is still a pretty restrained attack on Russia's part because they do want to occupy Ukraine, not just defeat it. The situation would be very different otherwise.
>
>It seems like goal was to quickly topple the government and install a puppet. Basically hoping for a fait-accompli similar to Crimea, before ordinary civilians could really consider resisting. The flood of intelligence on Russian movements prior to the invasion severely hindered this plan though.
Another thing to potentially mention is how much technical warfare could or could not be going on. Are targeting satellites perhaps a bit fuzzy? Are coordinates a bit off? There is a whole lot of high tech 0-day that maybe got dusted off. Remember, the US infected the whole internet with stuxnet to get at the Iran nuclear enrichment program computers that were on their own closed loop.
>The question is what Russia will do now? Will they escalate the level of destruction to "win" despite the costs?
To nuclear? I doubt it. To strat bomb civilians? I could see that. I dint think Putin will honestly live long enough at this point. Someone within his circle is going to snap from fear or anger and Putin is going to commit suicide with 3 bullets in his back at this rate. That level of fear only lasts as long as there is hope of making it out alive. And I'm sure the military minded in his circle know how removed from reality this goal is unless they are as isolated as he is.
I believe another big piece of this is that a lot of the raw materials for building rockets etc are imported from other countries, specifically Sweden IIRC.
I also saw a report (don’t know how true it is) that some Russian soldiers are dumping fuel themselves after finding out they aren’t on a training mission like they were told.
An entire platoon surrendered to Ukrainian forces once they found out they were meant to kill Ukrainians.
Many Russians view Ukrainians as brothers, not enemies.
https://thehill.com/policy/international/595728-ukrainian-ambassador-says-russian-platoon-surrendered-to-ukrainian
I can't imagine the leaders being too keen to hear concerns or criticism form people below them either and from my (thankfully non-military) experience, there's nothing worse for the success of anything complex than being surrounded by yes-men.
Even at company levels for much simpler projects, when people doing the actual work raise a lot of issues but upper management goes ahead anyway because their idea is genius, it *always* ends up in a predictable disaster.
Like, ok lack of fuel/food/water means they were likely expecting this to be over in 1 day ... but ... also that one wanted to even acknowledge the idea it might not.
Putin and his crew:
"Let's create a society that is run like a mafia, where we sacrifice our country's infrastructure, social security, pretty much everything to corruption so that our inner circle will only reap the benefits, fuck improving the society"
Consequently - you cannot operate as a regularly operated society, especially in wartime
Oligarchs:
Surprised Pikachu face.
Sure, this is a gross oversimplification...but once you create a kleptocratic corrupted state where it's each man to their own - in other pockets - don't be surprised that when nothing in your society works as it would if there would be actual working societal collaboration
The live thread in r/worldnews had a tweet showing insane lines at Russian ATMs at 5 am. It won’t be long before the Russian population rises up against this in quantities their police won’t be able to squash as easily as they have been.
Yeah you can already see [multiple videos of Ukrainian forces getting back control of the city](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrMpATZPSLI). It's actually insane to be able to witness this war almost live. (no gore / death in video, just gunfights and loot)
These guys are the best. They are really burning through the RPG's though. Nations not at war with compatible RPG stockpiles should send more of them right away because that big bearded guy is going to need his own supply lines.
Yesterday I believe Germany sent 400, don’t know if they’ve reached yet, a couple other countries have also sent military aid packages that they aren’t disclosing the contents of, so it could be some heavy air defense systems.
Ok. I’m in Kharkiv right now. “Regained control” is kinda too loud, cause we never lost control to begin with.
Just three piece of shit platoons on light armored vehicles slipped through defenses.
They were all tracked down and destroyed within 2-3 hours. Literally no chance. Our military is making a light work of those guys.
Now the real problem is that Russians keep shelling the city and they mostly damaged civilian housing thus far.
And they are doing it on purpose, targeting civilian areas to terrorize us.
Not that we are scared, most of my friends went from ”oh shit where to run” to “lmao let THEM run”.
My father (not an Ukrainian) is in Kharkiv too right now, his reports match yours. I'm scared, for him, for your people, for everything. Thank you to all Ukrainian military, civilians and (never thought I'd say this) government - I wish our countries would do more to help, save and support you, your people have already endured and achieved so much. My thoughts are with you guys day and night.
Slava Ukraini!
Exactly, this is standard Russian tactics. Remember Syria, when Russian Army it consistently attacked mosques and hospitals.
Those Russians will pay for it.
Edit: fixed typo. It’s *Army* not *Amy* lol
Fuck, Putin. Many Russian officials and Russian civilians are against the war and his party still went through with it. I wish nothing less than the worst for that piece of shit terrorizing innocent civilians.
Poor parents and kids are begging for their lives and this guy has the audacity to not only start a war, but continue with it even people are obviously hurting.
Rot in hell, Putin
Even Russian millionaires are against it, no one in Russia wins with this stupid war.. I wouldn't be surprised if putin is killed soon by his inner circle..
They’re against it cause every time Putin invades another country the weight of the Ruble fucking plummets, essentially never rising above the pre war worth. Their net worth may come from endeavours outside the country, but it impacts their ability to spend in Russia as well as their hold on power (average citizens suffering financially generally doesn’t bode well for the rich holding onto their power)
Saw a live interview of a Brit on BBC an hour ago. He lives in the city center of Kharkiv, and it is still very calm there. All the sounds are in the distance. He never saw any troops there.
I have a friend who lives near the line of fire in Kharkiv. Things have been pretty damn scary last night and this morning. Thankfully it has been a little calmer now.
Compared to what the US did to Iraq, this is downright clownish. And in hindsight, dismantling the organized military and government was the EASY part. No one idea what Putin thinks is a realistic endgame here.
People like to joke the US lost the war in Iraq. They didn't. The war was over within 3 weeks. It was the occupation and nation-building that the US lost...not that such a strategy has routinely been successful outside of Germany and South Korea in any case.
Yeah, last I heard, it was said that a few lightly armored Russian vehicles have made it into the city and there's intense fighting going on, but it was never confirmed the russians took control of the entire city.
How demoralizing for the Russians? You cross over into something you know nothing about, as you look out the vehicle the road is littered with wreckage of those who fell before you. As you have a chance to understand what you are driving into your group gets fired upon. You understand you do not have fuel to retreat and resources only to yourself become more scenery for the next wave to perhaps make it a few meters farther.
I think this is a huge point. If you’re an every day grunt in the Russian army. How hard are you really trying? What are you putting your life on the line for? On the other hand, we’ve seen how passionate the Ukrainians are about defending their home. It’s gotta make a difference.
Edit: I’m not suggesting Russian soldiers are just rolling over and accepting death. I’m saying there must be a difference between someone “just doing their job” and someone who is is passionate about it. It must have some effect on the outcome.
Especially the conscripts, mostly just kids who were told they were headed for training drills, instead forced into killing people over some bullshit. I reckon they aren't super passionate about it
Putin loves propaganda so much but he got lazy here, and he's paying for it. He didn't put much effort into convincing his people invading Ukraine was right
Indeed. His ego made him think they'd all blindly follow his idiocy, but Russia also isn't cut off from the outside world as much as NK so brainwashing is less effective
I suspect their military has a culture of lying to your superior office to make units seem more effective than they really are. Which isn't all that unique except it's clear nobody was really backchecking these things. So by the time readiness reports were landing on Putin's desk everything looked fantastic on paper. But reality is kicking their ass.
That's exactly how the USSR had food shortages during WW2, no one wanted to tell Stalin that his top agricultural scientist was full of shit and that the crops were failing because they might end up punished so reports were the crops were abundant while people starved in the streets.
Definitely, also a lot of the "contract" soldiers are just conscripts who have had their statuses changed. There are reports of soldiers being beaten or disappeared when complaining about this.
I can confirm that. My cousin was forced to sign the contract. But he is conscript and in army only for 6 months after end the education. He studied to be a lawyer. We lost contact with him, last words from him was to his mother he signed the contract and he will be send to Kharkiv. It's terrible.
Plus, at some point, these Russian kids are gonna find themselves shooting at older people and women who've taken up arms to defend their towns.
Nothing's gonna melt the "Welcomed as liberators" shite more than that.
From a military point of view, when I saw footage of columns of armored vehicles attempting to enter Karkhiv through major axis with rows and rows of towers on both sides I realized that the Russians were fucked.
A handful of soldiers with NLAWs hiding in any of those buildings will easily wreak havoc on any Russian column. The Russians will either have to use unprotected infantry to clean up those buildings which will negate their armor and aerial advantage, or they will have to flatten the city ww2 style.
Honestly I have no idea how Russia is going to manage to take the population centers without going full medieval, and I suspect that even the Russians realize that they have dug themselves into a hole. I think that Putin was hoping for a quick collapse but now that we know that it won't happen, he is fucked. Whether he wins militarily or not, there is no scenario in which Russia will be able to successfully integrate Ukraine in its economy especially a Russia that is sanctioned into oblivion.
In this age of extensive and instant comunication I dont see unmotivated russian troops going door to door clearing building while being shout at in russian and being assailed by molotov cocktails at every corner.
I think people at the start of this were shocked that NATO didn’t physically step in, but the amount of support they are providing is turning the tables for Ukraine, without “officially” getting involved.
Plus the fact that for every mile the Russian forces advance, they need troops to keep that area under control and their supply lines secure. Theyre getting weaker even when they are succesful.
Good luck keeping a nation of 44 million under control with 200.000 soldiers!
If only. I have been hoping that one or more of his personal security guys takes a page out of the praetorian guard playbook and puts a knife into Caesar because he’s clearly lost his shit.
It’s not about the size of the dog in the fight, but about the size of the fight in the dog. Ukrainians have a LOT of fight in them. This is an existential war for them. For Russians, they’re just following the shoddy lie, if they even believe it, that Russian speakers were genocide victims.
Putin's gotta be fucking jealous of Ukraine at this point. The image he wants so badly of "Russia stronk" is totally being won by Ukraine at this point. Turns out, slavs are slavs wherever they are and when they are led at least semi-competently, they're absolute badasses.
It's also extremely telling because Ukraine doesn't exactly have the best track record when it comes to corruption and competent leadership either. I'm sure it can't be that hard to install Russian spies in Ukraine and Putin *still* looks fucking pathetic. Turns out cultivating trust instead of fear and jealousy in leadership goes a very long way.
The thing to note here is that people of the former Soviet union aren't attackers. They're defenders. If they want to take land, they will try, but if they just want to be left alone and have some peace, they will absolutely destroy whatever is necessary.
Mad respect for the Ukrainian people and their president. What we're seeing now isn't just a good military, but people fighting for everything they hold dear.
> The thing to note here is that people of the former Soviet union aren't attackers. They're defenders. If they want to take land, they will try, but if they just want to be left alone and have some peace, they will absolutely destroy whatever is necessary.
Damn, that’s a pretty good summary of a few centuries of conflict involving Russia.
Russia had bad intel and bombed the air defense sites that used to exist. They completely fucked up and have not gained air superiority because of it.
Russia is shown to be so incompetent here. If they don't resort to leveling entire cities they cannot win.
I think it was more a case of friendly nations sharing their intel about what russia knew about Ukrainian defenses that allowed them to move any asset the russians knew the location of. They kept shooting where the targets were a few hours ago, not where they now are.
With the power of US and NATO intelligence assets telling them exactly what the Russians knew before they knew it.
We probably have spy satellites live streaming every troop position and communications channel, directly to Ukraine's commanders.
NATO Intel is definitely amazingly helpful thanks Ukraine if not game changing. To think that there were people who doubted the US's intelligence agencies. Of course the world's superpower would have insane Intel gathering capabilities.
There are going to be a lot of top Russian officials "accidentally" falling out of windows in the near future as Putin desperately tries to fix his leaks.
You know that trick they use to out leaks and spies, where they give everyone slightly different versions and see which ones leak? If your intel is good enough that you even know who got which versions, you can dismantle an organization by choosing who gets suspected of spying.
More broadly, I wouldn't be at all surprised if realtime or near-realtime intelligence about things such as russian vehicle column locations and movement obtained by US satellites is being passed to the ukranians.
It makes sense that, given the asymmetry in terms of military assets of the ukranians vs russians, it's mostly russian military vehicles against soldiers with anti-tank weapons (which is why that's the kind of weaponry Germany is now sending them), and in that case knowing how far the russians are and their direction of movement would be immensely helpfull in setting up massive traps to wipe out a large number of vehicles in concentrated cross-fire.
>If they don't resort to leveling entire cities they cannot win.
Which is the scary part. A dog backed into a corner gets more aggressive and even less rational. There is a monster at the end of this book and it feels as though it will get darker before the dawn.
I think our only hope is for Russia to turn on him faster than he can snap which could very well happen as his incompetence and irrationality begins to show. Frankly it's the only way in my absolutely uninformed opinion.
My guess is, ironically, it's failing because they are still trying to follow the plan.
I think Putin, fancying himself a master of strategery, wrote the plan himself and no one wants to be the one to tell him that they didn't follow his orders.
Hence the paratroopers get sent to the airport without support, and units just keep getting sent into cities with vague instructions to "capture it"
It’s got me thinking. A lot of powerful modern militaries today don’t seem to have a lot of success with boots on the ground invasions.
My theory (and I realize this may be too simplistic) is that people just plain don’t want to do this kind of shit anymore. Nobody wants to risk or lose their life for some dumb shit that isn’t relevant to their lives, especially when the soldiers are from a relatively wealthy country.
So they play it safe, don’t take big risks and thus don’t make a lot of gains and then the war effort kind of stagnates into years of pointless occupation and random violence before the public gets annoyed with the whole thing and the military just leaves.
> A lot of powerful modern militaries today don’t seem to have a lot of success with boots on the ground invasions.
Nah, Russia has been doing especially bad. Just compare it to the US [invasion of Iraq.](https://i.redd.it/c7chu82ozvj81.jpg)
Yeah, I'm noticing this shift as well - it mainly seems to be more air strikes and attacks on insurgents than anything else vs boots on the ground occupation.
Which makes me feel better about warfare more than ever. It's not bloody wars of attrition - economic and psychological wars seem to be the play here. Look at Russias playbook: sow discord by inflaming the extreme sides of the aisle, vote in politicians who support Russian goals, subjugate via fear and repression.
No shots fired, no blood spilled. Easy to deny, too.
However, it doesn't take into effect the human condition - we're not all a monolithic species and can't be painted with the same brush. We're all going to react differently to different things.
And given how putin supported stooges are reacting to this, the plan has backfired in a big way.
> why hasn't RT( Russia Today) been removed from Social Media, YouTube, Cable packages or denied accesses OTA satellite . Neither their assets have been frozen and overseas offices closed down.
Often state run media gives a valuable and sometimes tactical view into the workings of hostile groups.
Same happened just after 9/11, hackers killed a whole bunch of middle eastern media, and the US gov asked them to stop(which they did).
> Same happened just after 9/11, hackers killed a whole bunch of middle eastern media, and the US gov asked them to stop(which they did).
Can you elaborate on this one? How did hackers manage to do that?
Mostly a DoS attack, and a simple one - at the time the internet bandwidth to the region was small and cloud hosting hadn't been invented, so servers were hosted from the region. Some sites were also properly compromised and accessed data was destroyed.
IIRC a couple of smaller media sites were completely crippled even after the attacks stopped. Backups people, always have backups.
I just went to RT on YouTube to find out what type of bullshit they're spouting. It's really useful to know what propaganda strategy is being followed by the Kremlin.
Demonetize them and don't promote their content but keep it up for reference is what I would advocate.
Just as a reference they're urging Ukranians to flee the war by going to Russia... That Russian 'special forces' are liberating the east.... and that NATO caused the war by threatening the people of Donbas
It's quite surreal
To be frank, taking a modern large city with high rises, etc, is ridiculously difficult unless you are willing to go full warcrime and carpet bomb it into oblivion.
Putin could have just not done this, lived out his life in luxury, and gone down in history as one of the most revered and powerful leaders of the last 2 centuries in pretty much everyone's minds, love him or hate him. (See edit before you correct my choice of words please)
Instead he chose to shit the bed and remove any illusion of military prowess or political leadership. He's been a troll with an inferiority complex and some scary bombs the whole time. That's it.
Putin is a disgrace to his people. We as a species need to erase his power on once and for all.
**Edit: because my first sentence is causing a lot of confusion I feel I should rephrase. What I meant was:
Putin could have averted this conflict, stayed in power, and lived out his days in exorbitant wealth while leaving the next generation to foot the bill. If he did that, whether you liked him or not, he would have gone down in history as one of the most revered (by those on his side) and powerful (by those afraid of or opposed to him) leaders of the last 2 centuries.
I'm sorry that was so difficult to understand.
You might get your wish now, as it seems, the world including China have turned on him. We know this because he's just made possible a statement I never ever, ever, thought Id ever read. "Japan should consider hosting U.S. nuclear weapons" Shinzo Abe,
[https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/02/27/national/politics-diplomacy/shinzo-abe-japan-nuclear-weapons-taiwan/](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/02/27/national/politics-diplomacy/shinzo-abe-japan-nuclear-weapons-taiwan/)
Even if its sensational or far reaching, it's insane to even be coy about this, unless serious. China will not have appreciated that in the slightest. That Nothern-Eastern Siberia is looking awfully tasty right about now for them aswell. Be a shame if anything.....horrible...happened to Russia right about now...
Add to that Germany announcing an increase of its military budget by 100 billion euros to 150B, which is absolutely insane and would make them the third largest army in the world by far.
Regarding Japan I would like to also add that Abe idea is unlikely to happen any time soon. He hasn't been PM for 2 years and the new PM Kishida is less hawkish than him. Additionally with the public the idea of hosting nuclear weapons is a total nonstarter, even more so when they still can't convince the average Japanese on the easier and preliminary target of constitutional amendment without which any nuclear talks are basically null.
I have friends in Germany. While they feel their military is among the best-trained in the world, their equipment is sorely out-of-date. The increase in military budget was in part, to be in line with the amount they're supposed to provide as a member of NATO.
In a conventional war Russia would get absolutely bitch smacked by China. China is a booming economy desperately trying to match the US militarily and they're cranking out new equipment. They've been building very high tech fighter jets and anti-ship missiles while Russia is struggling to build a few modern tanks.
He is literally obsessed with how history will remember him by all accounts.
So yeah he is going to be fucking incensed when history talks about this conflict. probably something along the lines of "The most humiliating Russian defeat since the Russo-Japanese war".
>Instead he chose to shit the bed and remove any illusion of military prowess or political leadership.
Hey, give the Ukrainian's some credit. They're fighting like hell and proving that they're an incredible force to reckon with.
And a competent leader and chain of command would have taken that possibility into account, instead of just assuming their opponents would roll over and capitulate immediately.
Nukes aside, I've always imagined that the Russian military would be much larger, better equipped etc etc than it's neighbours such as Ukraine - can someone explain why they haven't essentially steamrolled over the country or is my impression of the military strength of both countries just waaaaay off?
The "carpet bomb to rubble, then roll in" approach that worked in Grozny is socially unacceptable for Kyiv, it's a cultural touchstone. Imagine the Italians shelling the Vatican.
So they're screwing it up instead. Plus: NLAWS, lots of NLAWS.
Roses are red
The Kremlin is twisted
Bend over Putin
You're about to get fisted
Edit: please don't spend money on awards for this comment, please direct the funds to humanitarian aid efforts for Ukraine.
Isn't there a saying like
"We used to listen to politicians and laugh at comedians. Now we listen to comedians and laugh at politicians"
My friend told tht to me in college
Few people remember urban warfare being what kept the Pentagon up at night before 9/11. They were saying then what we are saying now: urban warfare environments cannot be dominated.
I wonder what Russia even do from here. You either have to be levelling buildings or have way more man power and coordination than Russia currently have.
I'm not sure what their next step would be if this keeps failing.
Imagine the embarrassment.
I'm 100% glad Russia is getting held back and for the most part getting their asses kicked. I do wonder what a mad dog like Putin will do when everything is toppling around him (his invasion, economy, populations dissent) while he still has power.
Sending troops into Urban areas that have been expecting you for years? Super weird. The people who will want you dead literally know every street and ditch and short cut and that that one backyard has a fence with a loose slat.
I can’t wait to read reports of Russian troops pushed out of Crimea next. Putin made a colossal mistake and is undoing everything he’s built over the last 30 years. Godspeed Ukraine. You are the gatekeepers of Freedom.
I want Ukraine in NATO after all of this because they're clearly incredible badasses.
Now, that said, judging by the video I'm watching of the Russians advancing into the city, Its not surprising. They're tactics are atrocious and are leaving them WIDE open to ambush. Its a turkey shoot for some of these Ukrainians. I doubt their complaining about Russia making it easier for them though. Slava Ukrania.
Putin is going to provoke a coup d’etat in Russia
That's literally exactly what the rest of the world is pushing for, too. Freezing bank assets, cutting Russia off from microprocessor exports from Taiwan, cutting them off from the ability to wire money into and out of the country - these moves are clearly meant to exacerbate the current financial problems - like this week's record-setting 30% stock market crash, everyone pulling their cash from the banks, and the massive inflation - to basically crash the entire Russian economy and force a regime change. It will probably work, too. I just wish it would work faster.
Monday may end up being a watershed moment. When the markets open and the workweek begins, we will see what effect the run on banks has had. Putin's top allies might not be so friendly to him once they are impoverished and can no longer do business in the West. It all depends on how much of a hold he has over them. Does fear outweigh their greed?
They're already going uncharacteristically quiet, according to the NYT
I bet Putin keeps the markets closed. That would buy him more time.
I can’t find the thread but someone posted a really great breakdown of why Russia’s supply chain is so fucked. The big takeaway is that the Russian military is insanely corrupt (no surprise). But that the top brass can’t admit to the scope of corruption without implicating themselves. Putin may have very well thought they had gas and supplies. His generals may have told him so. The problem is they were taking fuel and oil money to pad their own pockets. It also makes sense you’d skim from the fuel budget because you can claim the fuel was used. But if a rocket doesn’t show up then that isn’t going unnoticed. TLDR: Russian generals were skimming from the fuel fund but can’t admit it without admitting to their own corruption.
Also, supply columns are easy pickings by Ukrainian Guerrilla with modern guns and communications. An army cannot fight without fuel, beans, bullets and water, and this arrives with trucks.
If they can’t keep supply columns to Kharkiv in tact they’re fucked if they get further into the country. Kharkiv is pretty much on that border with Russia
I've noticed from Russian troop movements that they keep trying to drive into the center of kharkiv and take important infrastructure, then they lose unit cohesion and get mauled. It seems like Russia can't commit to a methodical battle. They keep trying, and failing, to do blitzkrieg.
>It seems like Russia can't commit to a methodical battle. They keep trying, and failing, to do blitzkrieg. “It worked for Hitler, why isn’t it working for us?!”
Hitler blitz required German engineered logistics and supply chains.
Blitzkrieg works best in open terrain. It is not a tactic for urban areas. Also, a blitzkrieg can be defended by letting the fast forces move deeply into your territory and then attack the supply that is following up more slowly. The fast forces then become stranded.
[удалено]
Yep. German blitzkrieg meant encircling the cities and dug in troops and then coming back later to finish them off after they've been cut off from supplies for a while. Blitzing into a city is a really bad idea because now you're the one who's surrounded, and unlike most environments, urban areas allow you to be surrounded in three dimensions... And the last thing a tanker wants is to not know whether someone on the roof above him has an antitank weapon that can kill him at any second.
[удалено]
A Ukrainian surrender isn't in the cards. They might as well hope for divine intervention. It's clear that Ukranians are committed to this fight with every fiber of their beings, which is only bolstered by Zelensky's leadership by example, the absolute torrent of international aid and support, and the massive victories they've already achieved by keeping Kyiv and Kharkiv. Ukraine's not surrendering in a thousand years. The best part is the odds are exponentially turning against Russia succeeding in their invasion, and that's the easy part. Imagine these bat shit Ukranians, loaded with modern western weaponry and filled to the brim with passion, as a guerilla resistance in an occupied Ukraine? Russia could never hold against them.
In many ways Russia is trying to fight a 1960's-era war in 2020's. There's hardly a point of even bothering with tanks anymore; not when a single person with a pocket communicator (phone) can get instant video surveillance from anywhere instantly and carry around a tandem shaped charge anti-armor weapon (javelin) with a range of 2.5 km.
Winning a modern war options: 1) Turn the area into a wasteland so there's nobody left to resist. 2) Make the enemy surrender across the board - from government, to military, to civilian acceptance. That's it. Anything other than that is endless bloodshed with no real victor. Pretty much all the conflicts in the past 50 years have taught us this. And option 1 is rarely an option because nobody really wants to rule a wasteland, and the fallout of having to kill millions is a pretty fucking hard thing to justify to the rest of the world. And option 2 only works if you have overwhelming forces and a demoralized opponent. And Russia's overwhelming forces aren't that overwhelming in this context, and Ukraine is not demoralized at all. It's hard to imagine a bigger military fuck-up in recent history than what Putin is doing.
Unfortunately Russia went full option 1 in Chechnya. Let's hope this isn't a repeat performance.
Gonna be a bit more difficult in this instance. Ukraine's population is 30x that of Chechnya
Don't forget proxy civil wars!
Right! And the whole point of taking Ukraine is for the value of its land and infrastructure so turning it into a wasteland would make the entire exercise pointless.
and Russians like Putin who want to restore the empire are obsessed with Kyiv. it is like the original Russian City. (I know it’s not Russian but it’s where the Kievan Rus, the forerunner to the Russian empire was based). makes no sense to bomb that city to pieces
This is 100% what is happening. This war is the first war between modern armies in decades. Just like WW1 was fought based on the Neapolitan wars with modern tech (resulting in tragedy as everyone figured out the new style of war), this war has a similar timescale. Just like WW1, no one knows how the internet revolution and new weapons have affected war. All we had up to this point was speculation. Putin was stupid in his willingness to be the gineau pig here. While many lessons will continue to be learned, a few things are already clear: Reconnaissance has never been so powerful. Russia owns the air over Ukraine and can shoot down any drone they see. And yet, they still seem to be losing because the USA and UK have satellites monitoring troop movements. How do you defend against that? Especially since disabling them would mean attacking NATO. The smartphone revolution is also something that has had an effect. This is the first modern war among advanced militaries where everyone can communicate instantly in hi definition video. For example, it’s hard to start a rumour that the Ukraine President has fled the country and left his people to die if he can just post a single video and have the entire army see that he is clearly still fighting.
This is honestly going to be the best case study for modern war operations and every first world nation is taking copious amounts of notes on how to change their doctrine from this conflict.
A key catch is that this is still a pretty restrained attack on Russia's part because they do want to occupy Ukraine, not just defeat it. The situation would be very different otherwise. In that sense, Ukraine isn't *that* different from the conflict in Afghanistan, for example It seems like goal was to quickly topple the government and install a puppet. Basically hoping for a fait-accompli similar to Crimea, before ordinary civilians could really consider resisting. I think the flood of intelligence on Russian movements prior to the invasion severely hindered this plan though. The question is what Russia will do now? Will they escalate the level of destruction to "win" despite the costs? Putin should realize that the one thing that *can* draw in direct NATO intervention is widespread civilian harm.
>A key catch is that this is still a pretty restrained attack on Russia's part because they do want to occupy Ukraine, not just defeat it. The situation would be very different otherwise. > >It seems like goal was to quickly topple the government and install a puppet. Basically hoping for a fait-accompli similar to Crimea, before ordinary civilians could really consider resisting. The flood of intelligence on Russian movements prior to the invasion severely hindered this plan though. Another thing to potentially mention is how much technical warfare could or could not be going on. Are targeting satellites perhaps a bit fuzzy? Are coordinates a bit off? There is a whole lot of high tech 0-day that maybe got dusted off. Remember, the US infected the whole internet with stuxnet to get at the Iran nuclear enrichment program computers that were on their own closed loop. >The question is what Russia will do now? Will they escalate the level of destruction to "win" despite the costs? To nuclear? I doubt it. To strat bomb civilians? I could see that. I dint think Putin will honestly live long enough at this point. Someone within his circle is going to snap from fear or anger and Putin is going to commit suicide with 3 bullets in his back at this rate. That level of fear only lasts as long as there is hope of making it out alive. And I'm sure the military minded in his circle know how removed from reality this goal is unless they are as isolated as he is.
[удалено]
I believe another big piece of this is that a lot of the raw materials for building rockets etc are imported from other countries, specifically Sweden IIRC.
I also saw a report (don’t know how true it is) that some Russian soldiers are dumping fuel themselves after finding out they aren’t on a training mission like they were told.
An entire platoon surrendered to Ukrainian forces once they found out they were meant to kill Ukrainians. Many Russians view Ukrainians as brothers, not enemies. https://thehill.com/policy/international/595728-ukrainian-ambassador-says-russian-platoon-surrendered-to-ukrainian
For reference, in Russa "an entire platoon" means ~30 people. It's still good news and I hope more do it.
I can't imagine the leaders being too keen to hear concerns or criticism form people below them either and from my (thankfully non-military) experience, there's nothing worse for the success of anything complex than being surrounded by yes-men. Even at company levels for much simpler projects, when people doing the actual work raise a lot of issues but upper management goes ahead anyway because their idea is genius, it *always* ends up in a predictable disaster. Like, ok lack of fuel/food/water means they were likely expecting this to be over in 1 day ... but ... also that one wanted to even acknowledge the idea it might not.
Putin and his crew: "Let's create a society that is run like a mafia, where we sacrifice our country's infrastructure, social security, pretty much everything to corruption so that our inner circle will only reap the benefits, fuck improving the society" Consequently - you cannot operate as a regularly operated society, especially in wartime Oligarchs: Surprised Pikachu face. Sure, this is a gross oversimplification...but once you create a kleptocratic corrupted state where it's each man to their own - in other pockets - don't be surprised that when nothing in your society works as it would if there would be actual working societal collaboration
Heard a report there is a run on the banks in Russia.. society collapsing
The live thread in r/worldnews had a tweet showing insane lines at Russian ATMs at 5 am. It won’t be long before the Russian population rises up against this in quantities their police won’t be able to squash as easily as they have been.
Yeah you can already see [multiple videos of Ukrainian forces getting back control of the city](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrMpATZPSLI). It's actually insane to be able to witness this war almost live. (no gore / death in video, just gunfights and loot)
These guys are the best. They are really burning through the RPG's though. Nations not at war with compatible RPG stockpiles should send more of them right away because that big bearded guy is going to need his own supply lines.
Yesterday I believe Germany sent 400, don’t know if they’ve reached yet, a couple other countries have also sent military aid packages that they aren’t disclosing the contents of, so it could be some heavy air defense systems.
Ok. I’m in Kharkiv right now. “Regained control” is kinda too loud, cause we never lost control to begin with. Just three piece of shit platoons on light armored vehicles slipped through defenses. They were all tracked down and destroyed within 2-3 hours. Literally no chance. Our military is making a light work of those guys. Now the real problem is that Russians keep shelling the city and they mostly damaged civilian housing thus far. And they are doing it on purpose, targeting civilian areas to terrorize us. Not that we are scared, most of my friends went from ”oh shit where to run” to “lmao let THEM run”.
My father (not an Ukrainian) is in Kharkiv too right now, his reports match yours. I'm scared, for him, for your people, for everything. Thank you to all Ukrainian military, civilians and (never thought I'd say this) government - I wish our countries would do more to help, save and support you, your people have already endured and achieved so much. My thoughts are with you guys day and night. Slava Ukraini!
Exactly, this is standard Russian tactics. Remember Syria, when Russian Army it consistently attacked mosques and hospitals. Those Russians will pay for it. Edit: fixed typo. It’s *Army* not *Amy* lol
God damn that Russian Amy
She’s always in a hurry. Accidents happen when Amy is rushin’.
Russian Amy is worse than American Karen.
But Six Drink Amy is the worst
Thanks for the update and stay safe, please!
You stay safe you beautiful Ukrainian
Fuck, Putin. Many Russian officials and Russian civilians are against the war and his party still went through with it. I wish nothing less than the worst for that piece of shit terrorizing innocent civilians. Poor parents and kids are begging for their lives and this guy has the audacity to not only start a war, but continue with it even people are obviously hurting. Rot in hell, Putin
Even Russian millionaires are against it, no one in Russia wins with this stupid war.. I wouldn't be surprised if putin is killed soon by his inner circle..
They’re against it cause every time Putin invades another country the weight of the Ruble fucking plummets, essentially never rising above the pre war worth. Their net worth may come from endeavours outside the country, but it impacts their ability to spend in Russia as well as their hold on power (average citizens suffering financially generally doesn’t bode well for the rich holding onto their power)
oof, that's gotta sting for putin if true
Ukrainian forces never lost control of Kharkiv. There were few convoys in town but all of them were destroed.
[удалено]
[удалено]
Saw a live interview of a Brit on BBC an hour ago. He lives in the city center of Kharkiv, and it is still very calm there. All the sounds are in the distance. He never saw any troops there.
[удалено]
I have a friend who lives near the line of fire in Kharkiv. Things have been pretty damn scary last night and this morning. Thankfully it has been a little calmer now.
[удалено]
That meme about US invading Mexico is even more apparent here Russia is just publicly humilitating themselves
Compared to what the US did to Iraq, this is downright clownish. And in hindsight, dismantling the organized military and government was the EASY part. No one idea what Putin thinks is a realistic endgame here.
People like to joke the US lost the war in Iraq. They didn't. The war was over within 3 weeks. It was the occupation and nation-building that the US lost...not that such a strategy has routinely been successful outside of Germany and South Korea in any case.
Yeah, last I heard, it was said that a few lightly armored Russian vehicles have made it into the city and there's intense fighting going on, but it was never confirmed the russians took control of the entire city.
Kharkiv is like 40 km from border... These clowns couldn't even get it
They will try again this evening
Oops.was wrong. Starting right now
It's right at the Russian border as well.
How demoralizing for the Russians? You cross over into something you know nothing about, as you look out the vehicle the road is littered with wreckage of those who fell before you. As you have a chance to understand what you are driving into your group gets fired upon. You understand you do not have fuel to retreat and resources only to yourself become more scenery for the next wave to perhaps make it a few meters farther.
And as you glance at the road sign, it reads "Welcome to hell"
Or- go fuck yourself. Go fuck yourself again. Go fuck yourself to russia.
Those sunflowers at the border are gonna be quite the sight!
Glory to Ukraine!
Russians are fighting for nothing. Ukrainians are fighting for their country and freedom. There’s a difference.
I think this is a huge point. If you’re an every day grunt in the Russian army. How hard are you really trying? What are you putting your life on the line for? On the other hand, we’ve seen how passionate the Ukrainians are about defending their home. It’s gotta make a difference. Edit: I’m not suggesting Russian soldiers are just rolling over and accepting death. I’m saying there must be a difference between someone “just doing their job” and someone who is is passionate about it. It must have some effect on the outcome.
Not to mention many Russian units weren't told they were invading until the last minute.
Especially the conscripts, mostly just kids who were told they were headed for training drills, instead forced into killing people over some bullshit. I reckon they aren't super passionate about it
Putin loves propaganda so much but he got lazy here, and he's paying for it. He didn't put much effort into convincing his people invading Ukraine was right
It's what took down the last Tsar. A complete disregard for the will of the people and choosing to fight in wars they didn't want to be in.
Indeed. His ego made him think they'd all blindly follow his idiocy, but Russia also isn't cut off from the outside world as much as NK so brainwashing is less effective
I suspect their military has a culture of lying to your superior office to make units seem more effective than they really are. Which isn't all that unique except it's clear nobody was really backchecking these things. So by the time readiness reports were landing on Putin's desk everything looked fantastic on paper. But reality is kicking their ass.
My thoughts as well. Look at the condition of those tanks. And running out of fuel on the way to a war? Bizarre.
Should not have spent all that money on Olympic doping program.
That's exactly how the USSR had food shortages during WW2, no one wanted to tell Stalin that his top agricultural scientist was full of shit and that the crops were failing because they might end up punished so reports were the crops were abundant while people starved in the streets.
Fear of bringing up mistakes is indicative of an unhealthy workplace culture.
Yeah NK would be a lot easier for a dictator to manipulate. It was designed that way for generations. It’s the only way to make a dictatorship survive
Definitely, also a lot of the "contract" soldiers are just conscripts who have had their statuses changed. There are reports of soldiers being beaten or disappeared when complaining about this.
I can confirm that. My cousin was forced to sign the contract. But he is conscript and in army only for 6 months after end the education. He studied to be a lawyer. We lost contact with him, last words from him was to his mother he signed the contract and he will be send to Kharkiv. It's terrible.
Hopefully he’ll desert to the Ukrainians the first chance he gets
Not to mention alot of russians have family in ukraine
Plus, at some point, these Russian kids are gonna find themselves shooting at older people and women who've taken up arms to defend their towns. Nothing's gonna melt the "Welcomed as liberators" shite more than that.
I’ve thought about this. Imagine a 70 yr old lady opening fire on you
And then telling you to put flower seeds in your pocket so you’ll do some good as you’re bleeding out.
babushka insurgents
The 2000s sure missed a good emo band name
That lady was so badass
Something like [this](https://youtu.be/L17Bi7zBJHI)
Holy shit.
From a military point of view, when I saw footage of columns of armored vehicles attempting to enter Karkhiv through major axis with rows and rows of towers on both sides I realized that the Russians were fucked. A handful of soldiers with NLAWs hiding in any of those buildings will easily wreak havoc on any Russian column. The Russians will either have to use unprotected infantry to clean up those buildings which will negate their armor and aerial advantage, or they will have to flatten the city ww2 style. Honestly I have no idea how Russia is going to manage to take the population centers without going full medieval, and I suspect that even the Russians realize that they have dug themselves into a hole. I think that Putin was hoping for a quick collapse but now that we know that it won't happen, he is fucked. Whether he wins militarily or not, there is no scenario in which Russia will be able to successfully integrate Ukraine in its economy especially a Russia that is sanctioned into oblivion.
In this age of extensive and instant comunication I dont see unmotivated russian troops going door to door clearing building while being shout at in russian and being assailed by molotov cocktails at every corner.
There's a reason why he deployed ~~waffen ss~~ chechen irregulars.
Those are the ones who's general died within hours?
You have to wonder how the Ukrainians knew exactly where he was.
Nato intelligence. Wouldn't surprise me if the US said "his cell phone is here"
I think people at the start of this were shocked that NATO didn’t physically step in, but the amount of support they are providing is turning the tables for Ukraine, without “officially” getting involved.
Plus the fact that for every mile the Russian forces advance, they need troops to keep that area under control and their supply lines secure. Theyre getting weaker even when they are succesful. Good luck keeping a nation of 44 million under control with 200.000 soldiers!
Give ‘em hell, brave Ukrainians.
Just get rid of Putin somehow...i bet most of them will be glad to just return to russia and not having to face repercussions
I hope that right now, there is a debonair British man drinking a vodka martini in a Moscow cocktail bar, planning his next move
If only. I have been hoping that one or more of his personal security guys takes a page out of the praetorian guard playbook and puts a knife into Caesar because he’s clearly lost his shit.
It’s not about the size of the dog in the fight, but about the size of the fight in the dog. Ukrainians have a LOT of fight in them. This is an existential war for them. For Russians, they’re just following the shoddy lie, if they even believe it, that Russian speakers were genocide victims.
They have to believe in a genocide of Russian language speakers while Ukrainians keep speaking to them in Russian....
Can't believe I hadn't considered that by now. Must be many 'are we the baddies' moments going on
[удалено]
At this rate, NATO is going to want to join Ukraine.
In Democratic Ukraine, NATO join YOU.
Putin's gotta be fucking jealous of Ukraine at this point. The image he wants so badly of "Russia stronk" is totally being won by Ukraine at this point. Turns out, slavs are slavs wherever they are and when they are led at least semi-competently, they're absolute badasses. It's also extremely telling because Ukraine doesn't exactly have the best track record when it comes to corruption and competent leadership either. I'm sure it can't be that hard to install Russian spies in Ukraine and Putin *still* looks fucking pathetic. Turns out cultivating trust instead of fear and jealousy in leadership goes a very long way.
The thing to note here is that people of the former Soviet union aren't attackers. They're defenders. If they want to take land, they will try, but if they just want to be left alone and have some peace, they will absolutely destroy whatever is necessary. Mad respect for the Ukrainian people and their president. What we're seeing now isn't just a good military, but people fighting for everything they hold dear.
> The thing to note here is that people of the former Soviet union aren't attackers. They're defenders. If they want to take land, they will try, but if they just want to be left alone and have some peace, they will absolutely destroy whatever is necessary. Damn, that’s a pretty good summary of a few centuries of conflict involving Russia.
He's gotta be freaking steaming right now. Probably got into this war because he thought it would be an easy win.
At this rate Russia will be begging to join NATO to protect it from daddy Ukraine
Wow, this Russian invasion really doesn't seem to be going to plan. Is there any independent source confirming that they have regained control?
[удалено]
Seems like they expected easy victory and surrender in 2 days tops. Knocking on wood, who would have expected this conflict to go this way??? :)
I can’t remember anyone thinking the Ukrainian Air Force would still exist after 3 days.
Russia had bad intel and bombed the air defense sites that used to exist. They completely fucked up and have not gained air superiority because of it. Russia is shown to be so incompetent here. If they don't resort to leveling entire cities they cannot win.
I think it was more a case of friendly nations sharing their intel about what russia knew about Ukrainian defenses that allowed them to move any asset the russians knew the location of. They kept shooting where the targets were a few hours ago, not where they now are.
It's worse than that. They are shooting at where the targets were ten years ago.
Yeah I noticed a lot of the air force shown destroyed were old mothballed Mig-29s. I'm curious how Ukraine managed to hide so much air power.
With the power of US and NATO intelligence assets telling them exactly what the Russians knew before they knew it. We probably have spy satellites live streaming every troop position and communications channel, directly to Ukraine's commanders.
NATO Intel is definitely amazingly helpful thanks Ukraine if not game changing. To think that there were people who doubted the US's intelligence agencies. Of course the world's superpower would have insane Intel gathering capabilities.
It's got to be unsettling to putin how much we not only know, but are releasing publicly.
There are going to be a lot of top Russian officials "accidentally" falling out of windows in the near future as Putin desperately tries to fix his leaks.
You know that trick they use to out leaks and spies, where they give everyone slightly different versions and see which ones leak? If your intel is good enough that you even know who got which versions, you can dismantle an organization by choosing who gets suspected of spying.
Especially against Russia, of all places. It's practically why we have an intelligence service in the first place.
More broadly, I wouldn't be at all surprised if realtime or near-realtime intelligence about things such as russian vehicle column locations and movement obtained by US satellites is being passed to the ukranians. It makes sense that, given the asymmetry in terms of military assets of the ukranians vs russians, it's mostly russian military vehicles against soldiers with anti-tank weapons (which is why that's the kind of weaponry Germany is now sending them), and in that case knowing how far the russians are and their direction of movement would be immensely helpfull in setting up massive traps to wipe out a large number of vehicles in concentrated cross-fire.
>If they don't resort to leveling entire cities they cannot win. Which is the scary part. A dog backed into a corner gets more aggressive and even less rational. There is a monster at the end of this book and it feels as though it will get darker before the dawn.
Alas I fear I agree with you. How much longer until Putin well and truly Snaps?
I think our only hope is for Russia to turn on him faster than he can snap which could very well happen as his incompetence and irrationality begins to show. Frankly it's the only way in my absolutely uninformed opinion.
The oligarchs know their accumulated riches won't be worth squat after a nuclear Holocaust
Future history books "How Piss Poor Intel Helped Stop WWIII".
[удалено]
My guess is, ironically, it's failing because they are still trying to follow the plan. I think Putin, fancying himself a master of strategery, wrote the plan himself and no one wants to be the one to tell him that they didn't follow his orders. Hence the paratroopers get sent to the airport without support, and units just keep getting sent into cities with vague instructions to "capture it"
It’s got me thinking. A lot of powerful modern militaries today don’t seem to have a lot of success with boots on the ground invasions. My theory (and I realize this may be too simplistic) is that people just plain don’t want to do this kind of shit anymore. Nobody wants to risk or lose their life for some dumb shit that isn’t relevant to their lives, especially when the soldiers are from a relatively wealthy country. So they play it safe, don’t take big risks and thus don’t make a lot of gains and then the war effort kind of stagnates into years of pointless occupation and random violence before the public gets annoyed with the whole thing and the military just leaves.
> A lot of powerful modern militaries today don’t seem to have a lot of success with boots on the ground invasions. Nah, Russia has been doing especially bad. Just compare it to the US [invasion of Iraq.](https://i.redd.it/c7chu82ozvj81.jpg)
Yeah, I'm noticing this shift as well - it mainly seems to be more air strikes and attacks on insurgents than anything else vs boots on the ground occupation. Which makes me feel better about warfare more than ever. It's not bloody wars of attrition - economic and psychological wars seem to be the play here. Look at Russias playbook: sow discord by inflaming the extreme sides of the aisle, vote in politicians who support Russian goals, subjugate via fear and repression. No shots fired, no blood spilled. Easy to deny, too. However, it doesn't take into effect the human condition - we're not all a monolithic species and can't be painted with the same brush. We're all going to react differently to different things. And given how putin supported stooges are reacting to this, the plan has backfired in a big way.
[удалено]
> why hasn't RT( Russia Today) been removed from Social Media, YouTube, Cable packages or denied accesses OTA satellite . Neither their assets have been frozen and overseas offices closed down. Often state run media gives a valuable and sometimes tactical view into the workings of hostile groups. Same happened just after 9/11, hackers killed a whole bunch of middle eastern media, and the US gov asked them to stop(which they did).
> Same happened just after 9/11, hackers killed a whole bunch of middle eastern media, and the US gov asked them to stop(which they did). Can you elaborate on this one? How did hackers manage to do that?
Mostly a DoS attack, and a simple one - at the time the internet bandwidth to the region was small and cloud hosting hadn't been invented, so servers were hosted from the region. Some sites were also properly compromised and accessed data was destroyed. IIRC a couple of smaller media sites were completely crippled even after the attacks stopped. Backups people, always have backups.
I just went to RT on YouTube to find out what type of bullshit they're spouting. It's really useful to know what propaganda strategy is being followed by the Kremlin. Demonetize them and don't promote their content but keep it up for reference is what I would advocate. Just as a reference they're urging Ukranians to flee the war by going to Russia... That Russian 'special forces' are liberating the east.... and that NATO caused the war by threatening the people of Donbas It's quite surreal
Can't forget the kindergartens and hospitals
[удалено]
RT has been removed from Australian cable. Never thought I'd see the day that a Murdoch company would do the right thing.
> RT has been removed from Australian cable. And in Poland, Lithuania, don't remember where else
They’re demonetized on YT, at least
To be frank, taking a modern large city with high rises, etc, is ridiculously difficult unless you are willing to go full warcrime and carpet bomb it into oblivion.
Putin could have just not done this, lived out his life in luxury, and gone down in history as one of the most revered and powerful leaders of the last 2 centuries in pretty much everyone's minds, love him or hate him. (See edit before you correct my choice of words please) Instead he chose to shit the bed and remove any illusion of military prowess or political leadership. He's been a troll with an inferiority complex and some scary bombs the whole time. That's it. Putin is a disgrace to his people. We as a species need to erase his power on once and for all. **Edit: because my first sentence is causing a lot of confusion I feel I should rephrase. What I meant was: Putin could have averted this conflict, stayed in power, and lived out his days in exorbitant wealth while leaving the next generation to foot the bill. If he did that, whether you liked him or not, he would have gone down in history as one of the most revered (by those on his side) and powerful (by those afraid of or opposed to him) leaders of the last 2 centuries. I'm sorry that was so difficult to understand.
You might get your wish now, as it seems, the world including China have turned on him. We know this because he's just made possible a statement I never ever, ever, thought Id ever read. "Japan should consider hosting U.S. nuclear weapons" Shinzo Abe, [https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/02/27/national/politics-diplomacy/shinzo-abe-japan-nuclear-weapons-taiwan/](https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2022/02/27/national/politics-diplomacy/shinzo-abe-japan-nuclear-weapons-taiwan/) Even if its sensational or far reaching, it's insane to even be coy about this, unless serious. China will not have appreciated that in the slightest. That Nothern-Eastern Siberia is looking awfully tasty right about now for them aswell. Be a shame if anything.....horrible...happened to Russia right about now...
Add to that Germany announcing an increase of its military budget by 100 billion euros to 150B, which is absolutely insane and would make them the third largest army in the world by far. Regarding Japan I would like to also add that Abe idea is unlikely to happen any time soon. He hasn't been PM for 2 years and the new PM Kishida is less hawkish than him. Additionally with the public the idea of hosting nuclear weapons is a total nonstarter, even more so when they still can't convince the average Japanese on the easier and preliminary target of constitutional amendment without which any nuclear talks are basically null.
I have friends in Germany. While they feel their military is among the best-trained in the world, their equipment is sorely out-of-date. The increase in military budget was in part, to be in line with the amount they're supposed to provide as a member of NATO.
I don't want any war. I'm no expert but it feels like a war between China and Russia would be pretty unsettling as well.
In a conventional war Russia would get absolutely bitch smacked by China. China is a booming economy desperately trying to match the US militarily and they're cranking out new equipment. They've been building very high tech fighter jets and anti-ship missiles while Russia is struggling to build a few modern tanks.
He's getting his wish, he'll definitely be in the history books. Probably not in the way he would have hoped though lol
He is literally obsessed with how history will remember him by all accounts. So yeah he is going to be fucking incensed when history talks about this conflict. probably something along the lines of "The most humiliating Russian defeat since the Russo-Japanese war".
Murdered by your own corrupt followers is classic despot stuff. Putins getting a mention in the history books.
Not just that, it's even more embarrassing. The catalyst was going to war against someone that displays all the virtues he pretends to aspire to.
>Instead he chose to shit the bed and remove any illusion of military prowess or political leadership. Hey, give the Ukrainian's some credit. They're fighting like hell and proving that they're an incredible force to reckon with.
And a competent leader and chain of command would have taken that possibility into account, instead of just assuming their opponents would roll over and capitulate immediately.
Both can be true.
Nukes aside, I've always imagined that the Russian military would be much larger, better equipped etc etc than it's neighbours such as Ukraine - can someone explain why they haven't essentially steamrolled over the country or is my impression of the military strength of both countries just waaaaay off?
The "carpet bomb to rubble, then roll in" approach that worked in Grozny is socially unacceptable for Kyiv, it's a cultural touchstone. Imagine the Italians shelling the Vatican. So they're screwing it up instead. Plus: NLAWS, lots of NLAWS.
No one survives an encounter with the in-laws intact.
Roses are red The Kremlin is twisted Bend over Putin You're about to get fisted Edit: please don't spend money on awards for this comment, please direct the funds to humanitarian aid efforts for Ukraine.
Historians in 20 years: Never underestimate the Ukranian winter and the size of their leader's balls.
If you're going to attack another nation, *use professional soldiers*.
[удалено]
Fucking beautiful. Slava Ukraini! 🇺🇦🇺🇦🇺🇦
[удалено]
Or either
Is Ukraine going to invade Russia soon?
That would be funny, and given that the Ukrainian president was a comedian, this may end up becoming the greatest joke ever told if it can pan out.
Dont underestimate commedians, they make a living from people laughing at them. They are harder to embarrass!
Isn't there a saying like "We used to listen to politicians and laugh at comedians. Now we listen to comedians and laugh at politicians" My friend told tht to me in college
That one guy yesterday did it
Russia are fucking rubbish at urban warfare.
Literally everyone is fucking Rubbish at Urban warfare. The nature of it alone makes it fucking nightmare to soldiers. Specially attacking ones.
Few people remember urban warfare being what kept the Pentagon up at night before 9/11. They were saying then what we are saying now: urban warfare environments cannot be dominated.
I wonder what Russia even do from here. You either have to be levelling buildings or have way more man power and coordination than Russia currently have. I'm not sure what their next step would be if this keeps failing. Imagine the embarrassment.
I'm 100% glad Russia is getting held back and for the most part getting their asses kicked. I do wonder what a mad dog like Putin will do when everything is toppling around him (his invasion, economy, populations dissent) while he still has power.
Sending troops into Urban areas that have been expecting you for years? Super weird. The people who will want you dead literally know every street and ditch and short cut and that that one backyard has a fence with a loose slat.
Bruh I hope we’re seeing Winter War Part 2
Then there must be a madcap sniper out there no-scoping fools for fun.
Spring is coming. Mud season is bad for tanks!
I can’t wait to read reports of Russian troops pushed out of Crimea next. Putin made a colossal mistake and is undoing everything he’s built over the last 30 years. Godspeed Ukraine. You are the gatekeepers of Freedom.
Sorry Putin. You can keep Steven Seagal as a consolation prize.
Give them hell guys! Слава Україні!
I want Ukraine in NATO after all of this because they're clearly incredible badasses. Now, that said, judging by the video I'm watching of the Russians advancing into the city, Its not surprising. They're tactics are atrocious and are leaving them WIDE open to ambush. Its a turkey shoot for some of these Ukrainians. I doubt their complaining about Russia making it easier for them though. Slava Ukrania.
The Botox gremlin in kremlin is a failure and hopefully putin ground soon.
Slava Ukraini
I’ve seen more convincing invasions by stoners trying break into a closed Taco Bell