It’s Not Enough for Ukraine to Win. Russia Has to Lose.

[candide]

After Russia loses, they will also have others subjects to worry about....

 

China courts Central Asia as Russia falters

The Kremlin’s obsession with conquering Ukraine has left a vacuum in Central Asia that China and Turkey are more than happy to fill.

https://www.gisreportsonline.com/r/china-central-asia-russia/

 

[Bkk Brian]

Just now, OneMoreFarang said:

And are you sure about your prediction and that you understand Putin and the people who follow his orders?

Is it good enough for you that likely he won't do that, or they won't follow orders?

Of course you can bow to Putin's threats, just as he planned, or you can act as one, as the west and Ukraine are doing. Call out those threats for what they are. 

 

Its  very naive of you to believe that if we give in to nuclear blackmail, Putin will back off.

 

"Russia will not stop. Russia will keep on going and will deploy nuclear threats in the hope of securing further concessions. Other nuclear countries will take note, and non-nuclear countries will rush to get a nuclear weapon so that their sovereignty won’t be threatened. In short, if we give in to Putin’s threats, we will be living with nuclear threats and nuclear proliferation for a very long time."

https://www.thedailybeast.com/marie-yovanovitch-playing-the-nuclear-card-is-putins-version-of-flop-sweat

[tgw]

Just now, OneMoreFarang said:

And are you sure about your prediction and that you understand Putin and the people who follow his orders?

Is it good enough for you that likely he won't do that, or they won't follow orders?

I have added a paragraph to my reply above:

Quote

And that would be the end of Putin.

The same reason he can't go into full mobilization.

It's not just Putin. Putin will die from illness at some point, but after Putin, there will still be Putin's system.
Medvedev and all his cronies are already scared to lose their grip on power today that they take great care to not cause the Russian people to rise up against them.

Putin's not alone.

He gives the order and it is refused, he is finished.

He gives the order and nukes someone, then Putin's system is finished. They are all finished. They don't want that.

 

Is it good enough for me ?

In theory no.

In practice, I don't feel we have much of a choice than to give guarantees the conflict remains limited to Ukraine, so they don't have to fear for their power.

 

If they decide to launch a nuke anyway, they would behave like an immature little bully child, and it's not possible to negotiate with immature little bully kids. And little immature bully kids don't stop once they get what they want because in the next minute they want something else --> Baltics, Georgia, Poland, Moldova .... And their friends too --> Taiwan.

 

So that's my reasoning.

[jvs]

16 minutes ago, tgw said:

What disturbs me is that this is what I, as an armchair general, would expect to happen. So, the Ruzzians will expect this as well. And I hope the Ukrainians have a plan that is ten times better.

The Ukrainians will have the technical over hand and the russian soldiers

know it is coming.

What i think is a trap that the Wagner group is saying they will take some time off and leave Bachmut for R&R and hand over the city to regular russian forces.I do not trust this but if they are stupid enough to really do this the Ukrainian forces (already having the flanks covered)will be able to take the city back in a few days i think.

Russian soldiers are not going to be very happy being sent into Bachmut.

Moral is low already and the Ukrainians are waiting on the hill.

[tgw]

26 minutes ago, OneMoreFarang said:

And are you sure about your prediction and that you understand Putin and the people who follow his orders?

Is it good enough for you that likely he won't do that, or they won't follow orders?

and another aspect of the tactical nuke question is - tactical nukes aren't THAT powerful that one or even two could stop Ukraine in its tracks.

 

nuking Kyiv and Kharkiv won't stop Ukraine. It will make it enraged.

 

for Putin, there are only negatives in using a nuke.
they are only useful as long as they remain a threat, preferably an empty one.

Edited May 21, 2023 by tgw

[HighPriority]

3 hours ago, OneMoreFarang said:

What punishment do you have in mind? Dropping one or more western nukes on the people of Russia? That won't happen! 

And neither should your solution of kissing Putins arsssse

He must be defeated.

Edited May 21, 2023 by HighPriority

[Woof999]

7 hours ago, OneMoreFarang said:

Yeah, sure, Ukraine should win.

How would such a win look like - realistically?

Putin has already made it clear he has no capability to negotiate in anything even close to good faith. He's also deluded. He continues to bleat on about the west wanting to break up Russia while doing the very thing that might make the west begin to have those thoughts.

 

If Putin achieves ANY kind of victory (in his eyes), his goals will expand further.

 

The real danger (in my eyes) is that Putin is not all that far from end of life (natural or not). If he doesn't care about what becomes of Russia or his family after his death then he is more dangerous than most can imagine. Same goal in my mind though - he should be removed now, not later.

Edited May 21, 2023 by Woof999

[tgw]

3 hours ago, OneMoreFarang said:

What punishment do you have in mind? Dropping one or more western nukes on the people of Russia? That won't happen! 

Of course there will be arrest warrants, investigations, etc.

 

But it's unlikely much more will be done than transforming Ruzzia into another North Korea until the regime changes or collapses. The Iron Curtain will be back.

 

I expect many more Ruzzian assets to be seized and used/sold for reconstruction of Ukraine and compensation of victims.

[Lacessit]

12 minutes ago, OneMoreFarang said:

And are you sure about your prediction and that you understand Putin and the people who follow his orders?

Is it good enough for you that likely he won't do that, or they won't follow orders?

The US has already made it quite clear to Putin if he uses tactical nukes in Ukraine, there will be grave consequences.

Tactical nukes in Ukraine would achieve nothing on the battlefield. Their only use is as a terror weapon. History demonstrates the tactic is almost always unsuccessful.

A non-nuclear response could include taking out the Black Sea Fleet with stealth fighters, or letting the Ukrainians respond in kind to Russian missiles. So far, it has only been acts of sabotage inside Russia.

It's only the older Russians that support Putin, the younger ones are voting with their feet.

Russia has lost already, it is a pariah state that has to beg for war supplies from the Iranians and North Koreans.

I can remember when Russia was buying whole spectrometers from the USA via intermediaries during the Cold War to strip them of their diffraction gratings, which were used in missile guidance systems. Current sanctions have put Russia even further behind in technology.

I'm predicting Russia will either become a failed state, or a vassal of China. As John McCain once famously said, it's a gas station, not a country.

 

[OneMoreFarang]

25 minutes ago, HighPriority said:

And neither should your solution of kissing Putins arsssse

Where did I mention to kiss his <deleted>?

That is your interpretation of me saying: be careful. 

[rabas]

Any suggestion Western views of Russia's problems are propaganda are destroyed by Yale professor Jeffery Sonnenfeld, top expert on Russia's economy. In truth, it's much worse as even Western media is inadvertently repeating parts of Putin's complete wall of lies. Listen to the fascinating no holds barred interview:

 

Summary

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QU0resswOds

Full unabridged interview

https://youtu.be/B643JWVOO2g?t=141

 

[Lacessit]

1 hour ago, rabas said:

Any suggestion Western views of Russia's problems are propaganda are destroyed by Yale professor Jeffery Sonnenfeld, top expert on Russia's economy. In truth, it's much worse as even Western media is inadvertently repeating parts of Putin's complete wall of lies. Listen to the fascinating no holds barred interview:

 

Summary

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QU0resswOds

Full unabridged interview

https://youtu.be/B643JWVOO2g?t=141

 

Even Professor Sonnenfeld misses one point. Russia must keep producing oil, even at the loss he claims, because many of the wells are in the permafrost region. Oil does not come out of the ground as pure oil, there is a lot of water too. Shutting the well down means the water freezes, which effectively wrecks the well indefinitely.

Wetern technical help may solve that problem, Russia won't be getting it.

[rabas]

41 minutes ago, Lacessit said:

Even Professor Sonnenfeld misses one point. Russia must keep producing oil, even at the loss he claims, because many of the wells are in the permafrost region. Oil does not come out of the ground as pure oil, there is a lot of water too. Shutting the well down means the water freezes, which effectively wrecks the well indefinitely.

Wetern technical help may solve that problem, Russia won't be getting it.

Very true, Russia has always been behind in petro and many areas of technology.

 

Russia is a conundrum. It has some of the best scientists and engineers but under Putin's kleptocracy did little to develop Russia's technological base, consumer industry, or anything except horrific weapons and oligarchs' personal wealth.

[scorecard]

6 hours ago, candide said:

I am not sure numbers are so relevant. Even small nuclear countries such as France or UK, have enough missiles to destroy the 50 largest Russian cities.

Also, China appears to want to 'help' with gaining some agreement to stop the war between R and U.

 

I wonder what China's attitude to nucs is?

Edited May 21, 2023 by scorecard

[candide]

23 minutes ago, scorecard said:

Also, China appears to want to 'help' with gaining some agreement to stop the war between R and U.

 

I wonder what China's attitude to nucs is?

Actually China can benefit much from a weakened Russia. 

It is definitely against Russia using nukes.  Too much disorder for them.

[Tug]

12 hours ago, Bkk Brian said:

It may be easier than that. All the Russian money and assets that has already been frozen by the EU and the West will go a long way.

Quite true but,to make Putin’s removal and hopefully his demise more attractive to the elites perhaps it would be better to return their I’ll gotten gains (with conditions)say supporting free and fair elections perhaps?who knows but I know this Putin is a thug you don’t appease thugs you get rid of them every one would be better off including the Russian people 

[Celsius]

13 hours ago, OneMoreFarang said:

Did you forget the little issue that Russia has almost 6000 nuclear weapons?

Have you thought about what the "paper tiger" could do with them?

 

"Russia possesses a total of 5,977 nuclear warheads as of 2022,^[2] the largest stockpile of nuclear warheads in the world"

Russia and weapons of mass destruction - Wikipedia

 

 

 

Considering that Ukis took down russian hypersonic missiles with a 20 year old patriot missile tech, i have to say i am not scared. 

Edited May 21, 2023 by Celsius

[scorecard]

1 hour ago, Tug said:

Quite true but,to make Putin’s removal and hopefully his demise more attractive to the elites perhaps it would be better to return their I’ll gotten gains (with conditions)say supporting free and fair elections perhaps?who knows but I know this Putin is a thug you don’t appease thugs you get rid of them every one would be better off including the Russian peopthat I suspect the same people le 

I wonder how knowledgeable the russian midle classes and lower are about democracy / change of governments etc., in the rest of the world.

 

Along with that I suspect the same folks see 'leadership', 'leaders', who becomes the next leader as a strong man battle to gain an image and track record of winning battles and therefore become the man of the moment / the king on the hill. And at that moment in time nobody would challenge that new leader.

Edited May 21, 2023 by scorecard

[Tug]

There’s a lot to consider with your point,as in any country there’s that tribal patriotism fear of change plus the Russian people have been repressed for a very very long time all that beeing said the new factor to consider is the cell phone utube ect ect the Russian people have been exposed to the western style of governance and had a bit of a taste of it I think the majority want more obviously there’s more opportunities and Russia has incredible potential     (Score card) forget to quote you sorry 

Edited May 21, 2023 by Tug

[tgw]

22 hours ago, scorecard said:

I wonder how knowledgeable the russian midle classes and lower are about democracy / change of governments etc., in the rest of the world.

This I can tell you - the basic "apparatchik" a term that didn't completely die and makes a comeback under Putin - that apparatchik, meaning "a small piece of the big machine", that person has never seen a system that was not cruel and corrupt, never seen a system where people can speak freely.

When they read about elections, or watch Western movies with elections, they think it's a show. They think all elections are fake/rigged and results dictated by the USA. And Trump didn't really help to sell the idea of free and fair elections.

Most Russian apparatchiks when taken to the West are surprised - wait, a private person can win a court case against the state ? wait, police doesn't extort people ? wait, people can elect the people they want to run the country, just like that ? journalists can write what they want and not get killed ?

It's a different planet for them, and they can only believe it after living for some years in the West.

[onthedarkside]

Off topic post removed.

 

It’s Not Enough for Ukraine to Win. Russia Has to Lose.

 

 

[onthedarkside]

Inflammatory post removed