Ukraine has already lost the war

[TheEncogitationerParticipant]

Robert,

I will take those numbers over some old right-wing nut podcast sitting in his living room any day.

If you’re referring to George Galloway, he’s a Loony Leftie who will evidently shill for anything and anybody who is Anti-American, Anti-Israel, Anti-West, Anti-Capitalist, and Anti-Freedom, not to mention just being a walking drama mill:

George Galloway–Wikipedia
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Galloway

[_Robert_Participant]

TheEncogitationer wrote:

Robert,

I will take those numbers over some old right-wing nut podcast sitting in his living room any day.

If you’re referring to George Galloway, he’s a Loony Leftie who will evidently shill for anything and anybody who is Anti-American, Anti-Israel, Anti-West, Anti-Capitalist, and Anti-Freedom, not to mention just being a walking drama mill: George Galloway–Wikipedia https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Galloway

No, talking about the col Douglas MacGregor,  the former advisor to the Secretary of Defense in the Trump administration. You know, just another guy ticking Trumps balls as he blows Putin.

[UnseenParticipant]

@robert

Both sides have reached the point where pretty much only draftees are fighting with little or no training. The reason? Ukraine has lost almost all of its professional army over the last few months. They are being propped up by the West, who are increasingly giving them weapons we said we wouldn’t give them early on in the war for fear of escalating the conflict. Well, apparently escalating the conflict is no longer to be feared. Almost as bad, as the missiles and howitzers we give them are more technically sophisticated, Americans are actually controlling or supervising them. American boots on the ground. Another thing we were told (lied to?) would not happen.

If this war goes on for another 10 months, there won’t be much of Ukraine left to be fighting over anyway.

[_Robert_Participant]

@unseen,

100,000 Ukranian casualties/40,000,000 people = 0.25% of all Ukrainians are casualties (wounded included). Let’s say half die. So about 0.125% of their population killed in battle. Covid just killed 1.1 million Americans. That’s 0.33% of our population. Guess what? Life goes on. Forgotten already in the public zeitgeist.

Seems to me Ukrainians are never going to accept that murderer as their leader. Turns out Ukranian (home of the Cossacks) are fighters.  They are smart and they learn fast and aim.

Everyone but Trumpers know Putin has expansion plans beyond Ukraine. That’s why the united response from Europe. World is better off helping to kill it now.

[jakelafortParticipant]

Cossacks’s history began as revolutionaries. But guess what? They ended up an instrument of oppression. I saw em as a kid at the circus. Wow can they ride. I wonder whether cossacks were as good as Mongols or Commanches.

In any event i do not believe Putin has or had plans to expand beyond Ukraine. And i am no Trumper. Once again the parallel to Nazi Germany is inapposite.

[_Robert_Participant]

jakelafort wrote:

Cossacks’s history began as revolutionaries. But guess what? They ended up an instrument of oppression. I saw em as a kid at the circus. Wow can they ride. I wonder whether cossacks were as good as Mongols or Commanches. In any event i do not believe Putin has or had plans to expand beyond Ukraine. And i am no Trumper. Once again the parallel to Nazi Germany is inapposite.

 

Georgia and the Caucasus and Moldova have already been attacked and basically are at a frozen conflict with Russia. Georgia has troops fighting in Ukraine. Azerbaijan is at risk. The Baltic states of Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia signed up to NATO as fast as they could. They knew what would have come. Poland supports Ukraine’s war effort.

Plenty of “think tank” analysts agree:

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/02/25/putin-russia-ukraine-invasion-endgame-experts-00011652

It’s clear now that Putin’s endgame is nothing short of a revanchist imperialist remaking of the globe to take control of the entire former Soviet space. He has complete disregard for international law, norms and human rights and will only be stopped by maximum economic, political and military pressure. Russia is nothing less than a rogue state on par with North Korea and Iran.

In his pretext speech and declaration of war, Putin described Finland and maybe Sweden as part of his domain, and he discussed the Baltic states and Poland, which are NATO members, as “results of the Second World War” that belong to Moscow.

[jakelafortParticipant]

That article makes it clear that his intentions are unclear. One author even says so. Where they concur is thinking that Putin intends to make Ukraine into a puppet state. That makes sense. At worse it is as you have quoted or stated differently, “Putin certainly has an endgame in mind: It’s recreating the Russian Empire with himself as tsar. After more than two decades of iron rule and with no competitors to worry about, he seems to think he is a genius. Nobody stated that he is seeking world domination.

Even if that were once his ambition; in the aftermath of his military embarrasment and his citizenry being unenthusiastic and the world’s outrage and the spirited resistance from the Ukranians i don’t think he has that ambition any longer. How does he save face or save his ass makes more sense.

[_Robert_Participant]

Just taking a look at history, are authoritarian dictators ever satisfied? Show me one. Especially when they start getting what they want? They pretty much all go down the hard way. And if the West fails Ukraine, that will just embolden China, Iran and N Korea.

Perhaps many have just given up on Russians. Can they ever become a civil nation or even better, a democracy? Seems like so many everywhere have given up on democracy in general, probably because the decline and idiocy rampant in the US. Everyone forgets how badly the alternatives suck.  Is there anything more disgusting than the hypocrisy of a Pro Putin conservative? He played them like the idiots they are. Putin’s hackers really work the pro religion, anti-gay, racist sentiment social media angle hard. And these morons suck it all up.

[Reg the Fronkey FarmerModerator]

I agree with you there Robert. We should also bear in mind the history of Ukrainian resistance to Russia. I was chatting with my friend there last night. His district in the south was bombed again on Friday. He was telling me about the impact that the Stalin induced famine had on Ukrainians just 90 years ago. Many people had grandparents die because of it. Known as the Holodomor, it was a deliberate genocidal attempt of the Ukrainian people by Russia, especially in the rural towns and villages.

Everybody in Ukrainian is resisting and fighting. They will kill Russians any chance they get. As for the cold…well “Next spring is closer every day and then it will be warmer”. “The causalities have not hit 4 million like in the famine”.

[jakelafortParticipant]

Robert writes: Just taking a look at history, are authoritarian dictators ever satisfied? Show me one. Especially when they start getting what they want? They pretty much all go down the hard way. And if the West fails Ukraine, that will just embolden China, Iran and N Korea.

Perhaps many have just given up on Russians. Can they ever become a civil nation or even better, a democracy? Seems like so many everywhere have given up on democracy in general, probably because the decline and idiocy rampant in the US. Everyone forgets how badly the alternatives suck. Is there anything more disgusting than the hypocrisy of a Pro Putin conservative? He played them like the idiots they are. Putin’s hackers really work the pro religion, anti-gay, racist sentiment social media angle hard. And these morons suck it all up.

Authoritarian dictator is a bit of a tautology. I am not sure there is much difference between democracies and dictatorships in their decision-making in regards to whether to invade and conquer. The Brits had Commons and Lords when they invaded and conquered all over the globe. The US had a democracy when it invaded Mexico with an utter BS pretext. The Brits were happy to see a million Irish starve to death during the famine. The Americans instituted a policy paying for Bison to be killed to starve Plains culture natives. It is true that a dictator is more apt to be less sensible in their assessment as a result of distorted understanding and odd psyches. Nevertheless each instance is unique. Dictators same as democracies will show restraint when the odds are against successful conquest. When you read history it is the conquests that are noted rather than the restraint.

Sure it is probable that further conquest is enabled through prior successful conquest. That is hardly the case in Ukraine. And while i have read enough about how Putin is influenced by the nostalgia/propaganda of mother Russia in glorious days of yore i don’t think he is stupid. The west may have averted this war but having proceeded it has conferred a benefit in demonstrating the folly of further conquest.

How China, N. Korea and Iran react to the war and the passivity/aggression of the west is a matter of some speculation. China could certainly be emboldened either way. I get your argument. It is also plausible that the west’s response could be a provocation. China may see itself as the emergent super-power numero uno. So if they want Taiwan it may embolden them to take action since an actual confrontation with escalation is mutual suicide. Why would the west risk it? China comes out the other side flexing their muscles and celebrating their chi.

N. Korea? Their dictator is fucking insane. Will a show of strength be a better shield than restraint? I am not sure this war has much relevance to Iran and its desire to nuc Israel.

Obviously Putin is a despicable human. As to the hypocrisy of American conservatives they already sold out to the evangelicals who have the same values.

[UnseenParticipant]

jakelafort wrote:

In any event i do not believe Putin has or had plans to expand beyond Ukraine. And i am no Trumper. Once again the parallel to Nazi Germany is inapposite.

Imagine a different world where Russia’s economy and military might are vastly larger than America’s. Imagine also that our our northern and southern neighbors are far more prosperous than is presently the case and are both nuclear powers. Imagine if Russia had formed an alliance with Canada and Mexico and regularly held military “exercises” just across their borders and imagine that their warships are tooling around off our shores and holding war “games” with Canada’s and Mexico’s navies.

When you think like that, it helps to explain Russia’s behavior.

[_Robert_Participant]

Do you really think that the countries near Russia all attempting to join NATO are doing so because Russia is a good neighbor? Even the US isn’t stupid enough to treat Canada and Mexico so poorly as to threaten them into making deals with countries across an Ocean.

No, Russia brings this on herself. If Putin today declared the war is over and that he wants to fix relations with the West and work together towards peace and prosperity, it would be an offer accepted. But no, his legacy as a KGB agent who hated watching the USSR dissolve and wants to bring it back by coercion, murder, propaganda, war, nuclear threats, election meddling, infrastructure attacks, environmental terrorism and illegal Arctic Circle land grabs.

[UnseenParticipant]

@robert

Much of what I described in terms of what modern Russia faces with/without Putin also applied to the old USSR and ended up turning into another America-engineered regime change.

[_Robert_Participant]

Unseen wrote:

@robert Much of what I described in terms of what modern Russia faces with/without Putin also applied to the old USSR and ended up turning into another America-engineered regime change.

Unlike the US and her allies, the USSR annexed the land it conquered from Nazi Germany into the USSR. They occupied Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Poland and eastern Germany. Imagine if the US/UK annexed Northern Africa, Italy, The Nordic countries, France and West Germany.

Ukraine was already part of the USSR but it certainly was not Russia. From 1944 until 1952 the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UIA) were engaged in an armed struggle against the communists. So yeah, this land grabbing is nothing new and too bad the USSR couldn’t keep up with the West, as usual. Russia was offered a place in NATO even. Now I will agree the West could have done a lot to help Russia post USSR but once Putin got in charge that chance evaporated.

[Simon PayntonParticipant]

Unseen wrote:

When you think like that, it helps to explain Russia’s behavior.

Since when did torturing and raping civilians become a reasonable response?  Putin is a humiliated bully.

[Author]

Posts