I asm so happy to hear that my beloved friend.
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Russia & Ukraine War
- Thread starter BrokeStraightBoys
- Start date
From what I heard this is how the downfall of the USSR began but it may take years before Putin is ousted.
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Yes. One of the worst outcomes for them already is that the myth of the vaunted conventional modern Russian army being second only to the U.S. in formidability, has been shattered. It's been laid bare before the world as a corrupt, inefficient, under-staffed, under-supplied, poorly led, paper tiger. And Putin poured billions and billions of rubles into it for decades to supposedly modernize it. Most of that money was stolen and people embezzled and lined their pockets with it.
Not only is the Russian army not on par with other major powers like the U.S., NATO or China...it's the second best army in Ukraine. From Kyiv to Beijing to Washington...nobody is quaking in fear of this "mighty" Russian army. That is a real problem for them. They are still a nuclear power and have many military assets they can call upon to create hell on earth if they choose to. But their conventional army is not ready for prime time, if it ever will be in the near future.
They are lucky that fighting hasn't broken out in Syria again. They can't afford to fight war effectively in one theater at a time right now. Let alone two.
Not only is the Russian army not on par with other major powers like the U.S., NATO or China...it's the second best army in Ukraine. From Kyiv to Beijing to Washington...nobody is quaking in fear of this "mighty" Russian army. That is a real problem for them. They are still a nuclear power and have many military assets they can call upon to create hell on earth if they choose to. But their conventional army is not ready for prime time, if it ever will be in the near future.
They are lucky that fighting hasn't broken out in Syria again. They can't afford to fight war effectively in one theater at a time right now. Let alone two.
So true.
I found this really good video this morning that lays bare many of the Russian army's weaknesses right now. I'm rather shocked that it mentions a few things in the vid that I pretty much said verbatim in my post from yesterday. haha I can only assure you that I did not see this vid before I wrote yesterday's post. So any similarities really are coincidental.
This vid was apparently done only about one month into the war. But anyway...
This vid was apparently done only about one month into the war. But anyway...
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Another new perk I just figured out is that YouTube videos that are posted here, will now enlarge to full screen when you click on the square bottom right option for full screen. You don't have to switch the vid all the way over to the official YT site in order to watch the full screen version. 
See what I wrote on the other thread. It runs the video the same size as on it runs where you get the link.Another new perk I just figured out is that YouTube videos that are posted here, will now enlarge to full screen when you click on the square bottom right option for full screen. You don't have to switch the vid all the way over to the official YT site in order to watch the full screen version.
I think you missed the point. With the previous forum technology we had no choice but to watch posted vids in the smaller box size. Now we can watch posted vids in full screen if we choose to. We couldn't do that before.
Well, we now live in an updated world not quite to the present but getting. there. Webpg is still missing and a big part of it and there are other forms but the Forum is so much better as I am sure you have noticed. The error correction improvement is one big jump as you know . Of course the fact if you want to see an image KG refers to it opens inn another tab but that is a small quibble.
Did you happen to get my pm from yesterday?
I just checked, no, Tampa.Did you happen to get my pm from yesterday?
In the mean time Mark told me how to PM which I did yesterday to you, please check.
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juanjo
BSB Addict
My only question is when does Putin have his Swan Lake moment?
Basedc on the fall of his predecessor a decade or more.
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That's strange. I did send you a message that I can still read and see. The whole PM system is different. Can you see any prompt on your message symbol? If not, please try sending a PM to me and I'll see if we can get a private message chain going between us from there.
That's the trillion dollar question there Jaunjo. Putin was able to get away with the first Russian defeat of the war when his mighty invasion convoy ran out of gas outside of Kyiv, and then beat a hasty retreat. (Because they were somewhat able to get away with calling it a "tactical retreat" or "re-focusing on the primary mission" of conquering the Donbas.) The truth was of course that they believed they would conquer most of the country and overthrow the government in 3 days. So they only prepared for and brought enough for 3 day's worth of gasoline and food for the troops, trucks and tanks.
But... It didn't take long for one major battlefield defeat and rout north of Karkhiv to deal a blow to Putin's invincible strongman image. His stature is already diminished on the world stage. And at home even lowly local politicians in Russia feel suddenly emboldened to take pot-shots at him.
Whether it's enough to dislodge him from power is another matter. Putin has for years maintained an iron grip and made sure by threats, imprisonsonment and outright brazen assassintions and fatal "accidents" (mulitple plurals) that there are no obvious viable successors to him. Stalin was so paranoid about being overthrown by his own military that he killed off nearly all of his best and brightest generals in the "Great Purge" right before the beginning of WWII. Maybe we're seeing some of that at play in Ukraine now. Perhaps the underwhelming performace of the army there is somewhat correlated to the fact that Putin didn't want any really strong, bright, ambitious and ruthless generals around who could one day threaten him. So his conventional army is definitely not of superpower quality or parity, and it's led by a very mediocre and corrupt command structure.
juanjo
BSB Addict
There are a number of factors at play here and I do wonder how it will turn out in the end. If we look at Putin's stated agenda at the start of his war, he intended to push the NATO troops farther from Russia's borders, remove "nazis" from Ukraine, and restore normal relations between the two countries, i.e. make Ukraine economically and politically dependent on Russia at the most liberal or annex it completely. In real-world terms, he has already lost the war.
He was forced to withdraw from the Northern offensive so no quick decapitation of the Ukrainian government, followed by the rapid installation of a puppet government in love with Russia. The Ukrainian army and people he encountered were not the people he encountered in 2014 when he started this little adventure in imperialism. They have fought him hard from the start. Even in areas under his control, partisan activity has started and continues to grow stronger. There is partisan activity in Kherson, Melitopol, and around Mariupol. In the north during the current offensive, partisans have played an important role. So, Putin needs to tie down the territory he is occupying with large numbers of troops. Troops he needs elsewhere.
He has actually weakened Russia's position in the world. He has a brand-new huge border with NATO in Scandanavia that he did not have before. He has NATO troops and equipment in Poland and the Baltic States that were not present there previously. He has revitalized NATO as well. Some of the older members, including the US who were questioning its relevance in the current world woke up quickly. So, Putin has done more to help NATO than anyone in recent decades. In addition, his imperialistic jaunt into Ukraine conclusively demonstrated that the massive army of the USSR is gone and has been replaced by a Russian army filled with corruption, and obsolete, poorly maintained equipment, and poorly trained troops. At the same time, he has been using up equipment, ammo, and troops at a rapid clip, all while the NATO boogieman sits there on the other side of his border. To the Russian generals who have been raised since birth to fear invasion from the West, that has to be the stuff of nightmares.
Then there is the economic side of things. Putin has been working hard to turn Russia into a pariah state with no small success. Those oil/gas sales to India and China, while nice, are not anywhere near the volume of his sales to the West, especially the EU. He can cook the books for a while but he is going to pay the price for doing so. Not to mention that India and China are not paying the market rate for the oil/gas they are buying. It is steeply discounted. Chinese sources have said as much as fifty percent. And while he has the EU over a gas barrel at the moment, they are moving quickly to reduce their reliance on Russian sources of energy.
Both of these countries have aging populations with a smaller-than-average pool of possible able-bodied troops. The Ukrainians are highly motivated and have been from the start but there are only 48 million of them compared to Russia's 144 million. The Russians have not been and so far, Putin has refrained from recruiting much in the west of the country around Moscow & St Petersburg. The majority of the troops fighting and dying in Ukraine have been from the eastern part of the federation. They are from impoverished areas and frankly, the "white" Russians in the west of the country don't care how many of those folks die. But sooner or later both sides will run out of troops. Ukraine has a third of the population of Russia.
The question here is what happens. The problem for Ukraine is that Russia and Putin are in a very bad situation. One that a smart person would wiggle out of by simply declaring they had won and now that they had grabbed some land, they are leaving. But the Russian mentality is twisted here. They really do consider themselves far superior to the Ukrainians in every aspect. The idea of the Ukrainians beating them in a stand-up war is simply unacceptable. That is why recently on their own media the talking heads are claiming that the troops in the current Ukrainian offensive are actually NATO troops, including [gasp] Negroes, not Ukrainians!
So, how does this end? With a bloody war of attrition in which Putin finally overcomes Ukraine by simply having a few more men than the Ukrainians have while exhausting his country to the point it fractures and falls apart? Or will the Russian military, political, and business elites finally see the foolishness of following that path to its logical conclusion? One at the end of which, China and the US will simply split up the remains of the old Russian empire. Hence my reference to Putin's Swan Song moment.
Is the day coming when the people of Russia awaken to hearing the music of Swan Lake on the radio as their televisions show the ballet itself, all on repeat until some once news announcer comes on line to tell them that Putin has tragically suffered a catastrophic stroke and dies or did not die but has resigned and gone to his dacha in Soichi? It definitely could happen.
He was forced to withdraw from the Northern offensive so no quick decapitation of the Ukrainian government, followed by the rapid installation of a puppet government in love with Russia. The Ukrainian army and people he encountered were not the people he encountered in 2014 when he started this little adventure in imperialism. They have fought him hard from the start. Even in areas under his control, partisan activity has started and continues to grow stronger. There is partisan activity in Kherson, Melitopol, and around Mariupol. In the north during the current offensive, partisans have played an important role. So, Putin needs to tie down the territory he is occupying with large numbers of troops. Troops he needs elsewhere.
He has actually weakened Russia's position in the world. He has a brand-new huge border with NATO in Scandanavia that he did not have before. He has NATO troops and equipment in Poland and the Baltic States that were not present there previously. He has revitalized NATO as well. Some of the older members, including the US who were questioning its relevance in the current world woke up quickly. So, Putin has done more to help NATO than anyone in recent decades. In addition, his imperialistic jaunt into Ukraine conclusively demonstrated that the massive army of the USSR is gone and has been replaced by a Russian army filled with corruption, and obsolete, poorly maintained equipment, and poorly trained troops. At the same time, he has been using up equipment, ammo, and troops at a rapid clip, all while the NATO boogieman sits there on the other side of his border. To the Russian generals who have been raised since birth to fear invasion from the West, that has to be the stuff of nightmares.
Then there is the economic side of things. Putin has been working hard to turn Russia into a pariah state with no small success. Those oil/gas sales to India and China, while nice, are not anywhere near the volume of his sales to the West, especially the EU. He can cook the books for a while but he is going to pay the price for doing so. Not to mention that India and China are not paying the market rate for the oil/gas they are buying. It is steeply discounted. Chinese sources have said as much as fifty percent. And while he has the EU over a gas barrel at the moment, they are moving quickly to reduce their reliance on Russian sources of energy.
Both of these countries have aging populations with a smaller-than-average pool of possible able-bodied troops. The Ukrainians are highly motivated and have been from the start but there are only 48 million of them compared to Russia's 144 million. The Russians have not been and so far, Putin has refrained from recruiting much in the west of the country around Moscow & St Petersburg. The majority of the troops fighting and dying in Ukraine have been from the eastern part of the federation. They are from impoverished areas and frankly, the "white" Russians in the west of the country don't care how many of those folks die. But sooner or later both sides will run out of troops. Ukraine has a third of the population of Russia.
The question here is what happens. The problem for Ukraine is that Russia and Putin are in a very bad situation. One that a smart person would wiggle out of by simply declaring they had won and now that they had grabbed some land, they are leaving. But the Russian mentality is twisted here. They really do consider themselves far superior to the Ukrainians in every aspect. The idea of the Ukrainians beating them in a stand-up war is simply unacceptable. That is why recently on their own media the talking heads are claiming that the troops in the current Ukrainian offensive are actually NATO troops, including [gasp] Negroes, not Ukrainians!
So, how does this end? With a bloody war of attrition in which Putin finally overcomes Ukraine by simply having a few more men than the Ukrainians have while exhausting his country to the point it fractures and falls apart? Or will the Russian military, political, and business elites finally see the foolishness of following that path to its logical conclusion? One at the end of which, China and the US will simply split up the remains of the old Russian empire. Hence my reference to Putin's Swan Song moment.
Is the day coming when the people of Russia awaken to hearing the music of Swan Lake on the radio as their televisions show the ballet itself, all on repeat until some once news announcer comes on line to tell them that Putin has tragically suffered a catastrophic stroke and dies or did not die but has resigned and gone to his dacha in Soichi? It definitely could happen.
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Okay. I looked tosee a heading to send you a message & did not see any, so frankly I am stumped
A very well-writtten and thoughtful post Juanjo. Thank you for sharing all that.
There is another aspect to this confilct in which the interests of the West and Ukraine may diverge ever so slightly. When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan, Jimmy Carter's Foreign Policy Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski was quoted as saying that, "We must bleed the Soviets in Afghanistan." And he meant that as callously and as stone-cold seriously as he said it. He saw an opportunity to grind the Soviets down and make them pay a high price in casualties, loss of equipment and aircraft, low morale and of course vast sums of money. That became the U.S. goal.
Since Putin has tried to turn back the clock and go for an antiquated concept of conquest and empire building once again,
the previously more complacent countries of Western Europe in particular seem to know now what they are dealing with. (Along with a potentially bleak future if nothing changes.) IF Putin succeeds in Ukraine, pretty much everyone knows that the Baltic States, Moldova, Scandinavia and even Poland (among other possible countries) could be in Russia's sights next, even if they are NATO members.
To get back to my initial point though, while everyone in Ukraine would no doubt love to have a lightning fast victory over Russia and a quickly negotiated settlement to get any remaining Russian troops off their soil... The cold truth is that U.S. and the West want to bleed the Russians in Ukraine. The U.S. policy right now is the opposite of the Russian goal of "demilitarizing Ukraine". The U.S in this proxy war wants to "demilitarize Russia" inside the theater of Ukraine. And that takes time. Put more succintly the U.S. wants to grind down the Russians miserably in a war of attrition in Ukraine. So much so that they will be so weakened from the effort, that they will have no future reserves of troops, equipment or money they can use in order to threaten any of their other neighbors for at least the next 10-20 years. (Hopefully even more.) The U.S. would like to leave them in a state where their conventional military is only useful as a defensive force, rather than an offensive threat to its neighbors.
So even IF a somewhat quick Ukrainian victory is possible, the U.S. in its heart of hearts would prefer a somewhat prolonged effort to destroy as many Russian tanks, planes, trucks and ammo as they possibly can before any cessation of hosilities or a negotiated settlement. A high Russian casualty rate is also a given. The more money and equipment Russia throws into Ukraine, that's just more the U.S. (and Ukraine) would like to see destroyed, captured or otherwise taken off the table, and not brought back over the Russian border to be used again another day.
Put in a context most favorable and empathetic to the Ukrainians who are doing the actual fighting and dying right now... While the U.S. wants to defend NATO countries from future bullying and/or attack from Russia... They also don't want the war in Ukraine to end too soon (even possibly in Ukraine's favor) only to have Russia simply withdraw, regroup, re-arm and come back and invade Ukraine again in another 3-5 years. And then here we go again. We don't wanna play that bullshit game with them. It's a sucker's game. So let's just make the Russians pay as high of a price as reasonably possible in money, expensive arms and equipment, ammunition and yes...unfortunately even lives if necessary. Grind them down. Then hopefully Ukraine and the rest of Europe won't have to be nervously looking over their shoulders for a good long while.
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