kraze

Except Afghanistan brought zero change in attitudes of an everyday russian. When Yeltsin staged a coup to take power in Russia and ordered an invasion of Moldova, Georgia and Ichkeriya - russians couldn't care less.

Then people will get rid of that bad leader again. Only people are responsible for their life and people who they choose to lead them. A great recent historical proof of that is South Korea. It went through half a dozen extremely corrupt leaders, not much different from DPRK, before they got where they are - each time changing the bad leader. In fact learn the history of any developed country - it's always about people changing the bad leader until they got the better one. No change means no desire for change. Every russian must be held accountable or we'll repeat 1991 once again. If not 1939.

I'm sorry but no. If "ordinary people" aren't happy with someone in power - they get rid of that guy. If they don't - they are happy with the guy.

If russians are ordinary people and only top of the leadership of Russia is bad - then who are those 800k serving in russian army and another 800k in reserves? Is it putin firing Grads at apartment blocks? But most importantly - who lets putin stay in power for 22 years and all other bloodthirsty dictators before that? If russians are against the war - then why are they doing literally nothing? In Germany allies forced "ordinary" germans to bury all the people they murdered or at least forced them to come to concentration camps and stare at what they've done. While also forcing germans to pay reparations for decades to come. Not to mention that bastards felt at least some part of how it felt for their victims when allies entered Germany. If "ordinary russians" are not at fault - then how come they always pick the worst bastards to lead them for the past 300 years?

It has nothing to do with brainwashing or propaganda. It also has nothing to do with "siloviki" - look at countless videos showing 50 russian "protesters" running from 2-3 cops or 100 russian "protesters" idly filming 2 cops arresting 1 guy. Russians live by war, it's what makes them feel better, since they are incapable of fitting with the civilized world for whatever reason that doesn't matter really. It's why nobody should repeat the mistake of the '90s and help russians again. They do not treat that as good will, they will use that for another war again and again. It's very important to realize.

You mean Kherson did. Yeah they were zerg rushing it for 2 days straight, had to halt advances on Mariupol and Mykolaiv - I wonder how much of a pyrrhic victory that is

Corruption is not a top-down thing - it's always bottom-up. Leaders are always chosen by people - yes even dictators, as no dictator can exist without his people blindly supporting him - and if someone has a corrupt mindset - he would choose a similar person to lead him. However you are correct that putin & co. were completely sure that everything written on paper is true. The lack of doubt is what comes with an ever growing god complex.

This level of indoctrination has been going there for centuries. It remains unpunished and that's why you get outright bloody formations like USSR and Russian Federation. It's not just putin who indoctrinates russians - it's also their pa and ma. Also "fascist ideology driving other governments being subtle" is this funny first-world-problems thing. I'm sorry, but no, just no. There's only one country in the world that constantly starts genocidal wars, excusing them with own "chosen-oneness" to grab territories and force people into slavery (by any other name) People saying "omg omg US is fascist because they installed CCTV on my street" is downright ridiculous compared to a ballistic missile launched at the nursery to punish those "lowly pig farmers".

I think it's a lot more deeply rooted than that. Corruption. So basically russians were mass stealing money in every way they could, but reported back about their successes 'on paper'. Like - order: buy 2000 ratniks. They buy 500, the rest of the money is stolen and shared with someone above to look the other way - but on paper they still write "we bought 2000". It's the reason their artillery still uses rulers and calculators to plan a strike (on civilian targets). Hopefully it looks like the whole might of russian army is indeed predominantly only on paper.

That's another erroneous logic. Iraq was an unfinished, unpunished deed from early '90s. Iraq invaded and occupied Kuwait and, ultimately, got almost no consequences for it. It was pushed back but it didn't change and was a constant threat to neighbors, incl US allies. US citizens do not have a fascist ideology driving them, unlike russians, and that's why most still don't make that important connection. Russians on the other hand, as people, are extremely far right, in the 90s they effectively replaced communist ideology with fascist. For US an invasion in Iraq caused much uproar. For Russia invasions into Moldova (not even a year passed since USSR fell), Georgia, Ichkeriya, Azerbaijan, Armenia (russian specops staged a coup by murdering the parliament), Yugoslavia, Ichkeriya again, Georgia again, Syria, Ukraine and Kazakhstan triggered NOTHING. Russians live and breathe the war. The failure to understand that is the reason you read the list of non-stop tragedies and crimes above.

I guess it's time to throw down all the arms then and stop murdering invaders.

He is. He is no different to putin, just wanted to take his throne. He fully supported an invasion of Georgia in 2008 and an annexation of Crimea in 2014 and said time and again that freeing Crimea is out of the question to him. The worst thing the West can do is support Russia once again after collapse like it did in the 90s. When Yeltsin waged bloody wars in Moldova, Georgia and Ichkeriya, full of warcrimes, leveled Grozny - the West was still feeding russians. Because the problem is not putin, the problem is russians themselves. There will always be 'putin' under any name. Only full and complete disintegration of Russia will make the world a safe place. There's 1 putin but 140 mln russians and they do nothing, like they did every other war - figure out why. Not learning the lesson that no dictator can exist without full support of his people will make the tragedy repeat again and again.

Nagorny-Karabakh was actually a russian occupied territory, on behalf of Armenia, kinda like a "blood pact" between them and Armenia - which is why russian relations with Azerbaijan are so lukewarm.

No-fly zone for everyone is perfect for us, as russian ground forces in their current state would be completely screwed and would most likely get routed in days

Shooting a traitor during war isn't a war crime. Just like a bystander shooting russian soldiers driving straight into Kyiv that didn't even get to their weapons before getting shot. When russians enter a city - they don't behave like the said West. They go full warcrime berserk. They mass murder, rape, torture - it becomes a living hell for anyone who didn't or doesn't want to get out. So I can guarantee you the thought of "would this look bad to a warm, cozy, peaceful West" in the face of russians quite possibly gauging one's eyes, while raping and murdering his wife - wouldn't even be on thought schedule. For whatever reason.

That happens too, but to Ukrainians this is a war of survival. Russians didn't come to just enforce some geopolitical decisions, they came to "solve a Ukrainian question" - remember? The increasing amount of violence against civilian population only enrages people and makes the fuse very very short when it comes to anyone who is OK with russians cluster bombing hospitals and nurseries. And that's what they do without entering the city. Try imagining the massacre e.g. Kharkiv or Mariupol would face if any one of those surrenders. Better to shoot one traitor than see russians murder thousands in that very town unopposed.

Today people shot dead a pro-russian mayor that had offered to surrender his town to russians when they were 15 km away. Our government said nobody will be prosecuted for such actions and congratulated the deed. Rules have changed after feb24. Ukrainians aren't forgiving people anymore after six days of increasing war crimes and russians murdering over 2000 civilians.

Budapest memorandum had zero security guarantees for Ukraine and zero requirements for some country to defend it. Read the text. It was literally "we give away our nuclear arsenal and you all pinkie-promise you don't invade us". And in case of invasion countries that signed it call on UN security council and... That's it. Really, that's it.

I guess you haven't been following the events of the past 8 years, let alone a few hundreds of years. Russians couldn't care less about Donbass or Crimea or "neutrality". They are a fascist empire from 20th century and, just like any empire, to merely exist they need to permanently expand. If they won't expand - they would disintegrate. It took a single war lost in Afghanistan for a vastly more powerful russian empire to crumble - so there's chance there will never be any Russia anymore ever.

Yugoslavia was an artificial country, with different cultures and ethnicities, held together by force and terror - literally like Russia always was. Also russian soldiers were doing genocide together with serbs in there so a bad bad bad example, don't do it again.

Low morale. You were told you are a part of a Chosen One ethnicity that can't be defeated and Ukrainians are nothing but lowly farmers - but you just saw half of the previous guys returning in body bags / not returning at all (or smell that mobile crematorium working day and night) - and then you are being send in there, see the tank crew nearby getting grilled on that very grill they installed by the NLAW, while your old soviet BMP runs out of fuel due to Bayraktars from another era ****ing up your fuel convoy - while your analog radio can't reach command and your food supply is 7 years past expiration date - so you only think "screw you guys, I'm going home".

Historical revisionism of what? There was no Rossiya (how they themselves spell and write it, not 'russia') until 1721 but there is literally 'Rus' in Grand Duchy of Lithuania and 'Rus' at the time of Muscovy - and the vast majority of Rus lands were a part of Grand Duchy. And Rus dynasties were highly represented and electing the the Duke/King of GD for centuries to come. The first real Rus territory that came under Muscovy control was Novgorod in 1578 after a really really bloody war that ended up in a genocide of Novgorod population. Muscovy itself, being the territory of Golden Horde, was muslim. Rus was christian. Rossiya itself has been doing historical revisionism since forever, their whole history is a lie - it's literally why they invented "tataro-mongolian yoke" in 18th century, while disregarding Grand Duchy fighting against muscovites and Golden Horde as a whole to begin with and kept on twisting and turning events since then. Or maybe you can explain to me why XIII-XVII centuries is a one giant hole in russian official history? It's almost literally "there was Rus, then evil mongols captured all then suddenly Russia out of the blue" Even talking languages - how come ukrainians, belarusians, poles and czechs mostly understand each other without vocabulary - but russians understand nobody? If we were the same and closely connected - wouldn't it make sense for languages to be similar? But russians instead spent 300 years trying to eradicate slavic languages of Ukraine and Belarus.

No. Our troops tested those against javelins way back in 2020 and they have zero effect

Stop calling us cousins please. Ukrainians are completely unrelated to russians. We share no history nor culture with them. Just because they occupied our territories on and off for 300 years before - makes us connected to then literally in the same way as Czechs being connected to Germans.

CMBS also has Ukrainians as the weakest ground force. Time to rebalance the game eh