Ukrainian War Developments

nixdorf said:

To the point that America didn't bleed population in the Vietnam war, actually a large number of Americans did flee to Canada or elsewhere, according to Wikipedia 60,000 to 100,000 men left.

But it would have been many more than that if America was a country sanctioned and suffering an economic crisis. The better comparison would be to countries like Venezuela and Cuba. The effect of the sanctions will become clear in time.

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So you agree a negligible amount? I don't think it'll come to mass conscription, Russia would likely end it with nukes before then.

We've discussed the impact of the sanctions here quite a few times now. All it has lead to is a massive windfall for Russia's state budget thanks to high oil, gas and commodity prices and serious economic damage to the west.

Overbom said:

100% someone very important is trapped Mariupol...

"so, by my calculation, that makes 5 Ukrainian helicopters - possibly 6 - shot down on 3 separate occasions trying to do the same exact thing"

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1511425131012309008

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I don't think the lt gen story is true. There are some important people there who NATO wants out though. I don't think all 6 got shot down, some of them escaped.

nixdorf said:

To the point that America didn't bleed population in the Vietnam war, actually a large number of Americans did flee to Canada or elsewhere, according to Wikipedia 60,000 to 100,000 men left.

But it would have been many more than that if America was a country sanctioned and suffering an economic crisis. The better comparison would be to countries like Venezuela and Cuba. The effect of the sanctions will become clear in time.

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America did. (Russian ones are 20% right now). But US also had an unemployment spike while Russia doesn't.

So no the situation is indeed broadly comparable. Unlike US in Vietnam though Russia is likely to escalate rather than back down.

gadgetcool5 said:

They were said to be mining a bridge across the Dnieper in Kherson a while ago. IMO it would be a mistake, but they know their capabilities more than we do. It's possible that Putin has decided he lost in March and he wants to end the war and all the stuff about focusing on Donbas is just cover for an orderly withdrawal back to pre-February 24th borders. In that case, a major humiliation and defeat for Russia.

I'm getting vibes of the 1904-05 Russo-Japanese war.

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That's a very flawed historical analogy in this case, because Japan actually gained territorial concessions from the Russians with the Treaty of Portsmouth. Definitely not as much as they wanted, but still. The best analogy for this war has already been cited a million times: the Winter War. You had an overconfident Soviet Union then, just like you had an overconfident Russia now. The Finnish did very well in the early phases of the conflict, but the Soviets pumped more and more troops into Finland and eventually obtained 10% of all Finnish territory. That's the basic trajectory of this conflict as well: superb Ukrainian performance in the early going will eventually get overwhelmed by Russian reinforcements. I expect Ukraine will lose about 20% of its territory once it's all said and done (including Crimea).

Zichan said:

I don't know if that's true or not, but assuming that it is, it still makes no meaningful difference for people living outside the US, especially those in countries that end up in American cross-hairs.

George W. Bush committed a war crime by illegally invading Iraq in a war of aggression. How did the American people punish him? By re-election.

Barack Obama most likely committed a war cime by ordering over 500 extrajudicial executions with drone strikes in foreign lands. Over 3,500 people were killed. Hundreds of them were innocent civilians, among them pregnant women and children. Particularly heinous were the double-tap strikes wiping out first respondents who rushed to the bombing scene to assist any survivors. How did the American people punish him? By re-election.

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Hence why the USA as a collective one way or the other will end up suffering something very similiar in the near future and at that time, the nations in power will show no sympathy and may end up making the situation even more painful. At that time, it they try to complain that they never supported such evils before that caused many of these nations turn on the usa in the first place, well they will simply say they supported these actions by their extreme inaction and thus they will never listen to another voice from the USA until they exterminate as many people as they can in revenge. The USA is digging a big grave and in the end, they may be force to bury themselves in it

nixdorf said:

It's improbable that the Ukrainians will surrender and give up territory. The people running the show are nationalists, extremists. Their game plan is to escalate this to World War III. That's how they intend to win, when NATO joins the fight. The more likely scenarios for Russia are total defeat or constant decades-long war until Russia is totally exhausted (and possible regime change in Moscow) and Ukraine is totally destroyed.

The chances of Ukraine signing anything that would give up even Crimea is very remote. They will fight to take it all back, and they will fight to the end. They will be constantly supplied by NATO so they're never going to run out of ammo or equipment. The numbers are in their favor as well, because the Russians are unwilling to draft more than the standard number of yearly conscripts. Russia is also going to bleed population almost as much as Ukraine as young people flee to avoid conscription and to seek better opportunities abroad. I would expect to see expanding colonies of Russian expats in places like Latin America, Central Asia and Southeast Asia.

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Let's say it is six months from now and the Russians progressively, one by one, have taken all the cities bordering Russia (Kharkiv and Sumy) as well as all the cities along the sea (Mykolaiv and Odesa). If the Ukrainians don't agree to de-militarize at that time, they will try to take Kiev. The West can supply light weapons, but only so much. Once a city is surrounded, no more weapons will get through. A big part of Kiev will be destroyed, with a big part of the government inside. If this were to happen, the Russians will come down the river and take all the towns along the river. They will send the Ukrainians that are anti-Russia Westward to the other side of the river. They will keep Ukraine East of the river and all the South. For the region that they keep, there are enough Russian speaking populations that will be armed to the teeth (at least 20-30%) to keep the other Ukrainians in check. It will be quite defensible due to the presence of the river. West Ukraine is largely farmland and can't support all the influx of refugees. Many of these extremists will leave Ukraine and head over to Poland and beyond. The population that West Ukraine can support would actually be quite low and even if NATO arm them, they would be no match against their Eastern half with all the industries and logistic hubs. Western Ukraine will be a depopulated no man's land between Russia and Poland. That would probably be an acceptable outcome though I think they would prefer a negotiated settlement where Ukraine is de-militarized.

Interesting graphic from the Russians. Apparently there claiming there are only 635 foreign mercenaries left in Ukraine. Last week they claimed it was around 6,000. It seems very low to me, only 13 Poles?

I wonder if these number are from a single foreign battalion, rather than the total numbers.

Bill Blazo said:

That's a very flawed historical analogy in this case, because Japan actually gained territorial concessions from the Russians with the Treaty of Portsmouth. Definitely not as much as they wanted, but still. The best analogy for this war has already been cited a million times: the Winter War. You had an overconfident Soviet Union then, just like you had an overconfident Russia now. The Finnish did very well in the early phases of the conflict, but the Soviets pumped more and more troops into Finland and eventually obtained 10% of all Finnish territory. That's the basic trajectory of this conflict as well: superb Ukrainian performance in the early going will eventually get overwhelmed by Russian reinforcements. I expect Ukraine will lose about 20% of its territory once it's all said and done (including Crimea).

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Except the Russians have no reinforcements, and they show no signs of being willing to escalate. Instead, we've had one unilateral concession / retreat after another. Not only are they being made to look evil in the eyes of the West and some neutral observers, they are being made to look weak.

People still can't get their heads wrapped around the idea but it's a real possibility: Russia may deliberately choose to lose the war rather than escalate their tactics or send reinforcements. It's possible that they are horrified at what they themselves did in terms of humanitarian costs, gobsmacked at the unified Western response and its economic effects, and just want to cut their losses, retreat back to their borders, and try to repair the damage. Their continuing attacks are to provide cover for their retreat. It's possible. You have no idea what's going on in Moscow. All we have is what they are doing on the ground, which is entirely consistent with what I wrote above.

Overbom said:

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1511451033268101126

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The Russians now have an almost straight shot to Barvinkove. It's amazing to me that the Ukrainian military leadership looks at this map and doesn't immediately order a strategic withdrawal from the Donbas. Or at least, it seems confusing until you realize that this war has become very brutal, nasty, ideological, and even existential, with both sides seeing each other as a mortal threat to national sovereignty. The Ukrainians have decided on an uncompromising fight-to-the-death strategy, which sounds cool and heroic until you realize it will mean tens of thousands of additional dead civilians who will tragically get caught in the middle of it all. It takes two to tango. After the Luftwaffe destroyed Rotterdam in May 1940, they threatened to do the same to Utrecht and the city promptly surrendered, sparing its civilian population inevitable destruction. By contrast, the Ukrainians have chosen to fight a hopelessly lost position like Mariupol to the bitter end. Yeah it's the Russians destroying the city, but the Ukrainian military could have stopped it a long time ago by doing the rational thing and surrendering.

Bill Blazo said:

The Russians now have an almost straight shot to Barvinkove. It's amazing to me that the Ukrainian military leadership looks at this map and doesn't immediately order a strategic withdrawal from the Donbas. Or at least, it seems confusing until you realize that this war has become very brutal, nasty, ideological, and even existential, with both sides seeing each other as a mortal threat to national sovereignty. The Ukrainians have decided on an uncompromising fight-to-the-death strategy, which sounds cool and heroic until you realize it will mean tens of thousands of additional dead civilians who will tragically get caught in the middle of it all. It takes two to tango. After the Luftwaffe destroyed Rotterdam in May 1940, they threatened to do the same to Utrecht and the city promptly surrendered, sparing its civilian population inevitable destruction. By contrast, the Ukrainians have chosen to fight a hopelessly lost position like Mariupol to the bitter end. Yeah it's the Russians destroying the city, but the Ukrainian military could have stopped it a long time ago by doing the rational thing and surrendering.

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The whole time Mariupol is being defended is time the Russian units involved cannot be used elsewhere. Of course many of them will no longer be able to fight anywhere else, ever. The fact that Mariupol is still at least partly in Ukrainian hands some 6 weeks after the Russians invaded is a testament to the courage and tenacity of the defenders.