How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[FancyCat]

rumors so who knows, Biden and NATO intelligence will know more, but I was hoping Ukraine could have the chance to retake more territory before Putin places nukes actually on the table. Insisting on seizing gains made this year, is a much more difficult place for the West to accept than Russia retaining Crimea and the pre-invasion borders of the puppet republics. 

 

 

[JonS]

13 minutes ago, Artkin said:

If Germany doesn't brashly expand their military before the beginning of next year, ...

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/germany-hike-defense-spending-scholz-says-further-policy-shift-2022-02-27/

Note the date

[Grigb]

3 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

Unless the imperial mindset really is what makes a Russian a Russian. Which I really hope it isn't, for all our sakes.

It is not. Nationalistic mindset is a direct result of RU school indoctrination (that's why they try to put URK kids at RU schools as soon as possible) + constant mass media propaganda.

[Letter from Prague]

The Ruters headlines have been suspicious for a while, but this one takes the crown I think.

 

[Probus]

1 hour ago, FancyCat said:

So aside from threatening the remaining pipelines and other underwater infrastructure, and warning Germany from increasing aid to Ukraine, I want to point out the most serious problem if Russia is behind this is this is quite close to a act of war. If Russia tries to do it again, and NATO identifies the action, does NATO start what could potentially be a war? Or does it let Russia destroy European energy? The answer is obvious, NATO needs to stop the attack and then, I assume not retaliate, just sink the offending vessel. Then, dare Russia to declare war or back down. 
Dangerous times. Something else to note, that he does this now, it’s a signal to the West, let him have what he occupies now forever or he will escalate. And obviously, that is unacceptable for both Ukraine and the West. 

In my humble but correct opinion , Putin just couldn't stand not using his shiny new submarine the Belgorod which is specifically designed to work on the bottom of the ocean.

 

[Lethaface]

13 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

I know I'm bunch of pages late.

But I have a question: what would you call what happened with Germany and Japan after WW2. Those are both not perfect nations, but are far removed from their WW2 incarnations. Did cultural genocide happened there?

The way I read Kraze is he is not asking for cultural genocide. The point is not to make Russians stop speaking Russian, drink kvass, eat pelmeni, bathe in frozen rivers, write surprisingly good scifi books and be good at chess or whatever it is that defines them (and I'm sure this is much more diverse). The point is the imperial mindset.

And we do have examples in history that that can be somehow stripped away.(*)

Unless the imperial mindset really is what makes a Russian a Russian. Which I really hope it isn't, for all our sakes.

(*): although Japan has its issues (like anime) and as for Germany some of the kariwurst stuff is really getting out of hand

 

Some issues with that line of thought imo:

* Not all countries who lost their *imperial mindset* have done so in the same fashion as Germany or Japan.
* There seems to be a misunderstanding of what actually happened in Germany / Japan. 
* So you are planning for an unconditional surrender of Russia and follow up occupation forces? Are you looking for a landwar in Russia, armed with Nukes? 
 

[Zeleban]

 

Footage of the liberation of Kupyansk-Uzlovoy, a settlement on the left bank of the Oskol River.

[Letter from Prague]

4 minutes ago, FancyCat said:

rumors so who knows, Biden and NATO intelligence will know more, but I was hoping Ukraine could have the chance to retake more territory before Putin places nukes actually on the table. Insisting on seizing gains made this year, is a much more difficult place for the West to accept than Russia retaining Crimea and the pre-invasion borders of the puppet republics. 

Russia doesn't even have uniforms and rifles for new mobiks and would let soldiers die in Chernobyl radiation but now is giving out NBC equipment?

I don't remember even one picture of Russian NBC equipment captured by Ukrainians since the beginning so they probably don't have it as part of normal equip, they would have to deliver it. In Kherson? How exactly?

[DerKommissar]

Two questions for you, well-informed forum members:

A. How likely is it that tactical nukes will be used?

B. What would be NATO's response?

[Aragorn2002]

8 minutes ago, Probus said:

In my humble but correct opinion , Putin just couldn't stand not using his shiny new submarine the Belgorod which is specifically designed to work on the bottom of the ocean.

 

It must have been detected. We will soon know.

[Lethaface]

5 minutes ago, DerKommissar said:

Two questions for you, well-informed forum members:

A. How likely is it that tactical nukes will be used?

B. What would be NATO's response?

Lol that has been discussed almost every 10-20 pages, of which I'm also guilty.

I guess it's summarized as:

A) Unlikely but like most things in life no guarantees

B ) Catastrophic as phrased by Biden recently (still no guarantees)

Edited September 27, 2022 by Lethaface

[Artkin]

20 minutes ago, JonS said:

https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/germany-hike-defense-spending-scholz-says-further-policy-shift-2022-02-27/

Note the date

Fine. A quick search turns up that Germany's GDP is around 3.4 trillion dollars, 2% of that would be just over 76 Billion.

Isn't Germany's armored and aviation fleet in shambles currently? Or have been for a while?

I don't do economics so I don't know the validity of this website, but in 2010 German defense spending was 1.27%. Their GDP was 3.4 trillion so their budget was 43 billion dollars. I understand they will not be able to bump up military spending right away, but a bunch of that new extra money will probably disappear restoring the fleet that is currently inoperable.

https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/DEU/germany/military-spending-defense-budget

Edited September 27, 2022 by Artkin

[Grigb]

1 hour ago, Grigb said:

Thank you. Katerinovka is small village next to Nove, so it is not very important. But Kolodyazi is very interesting - 4 km to an important crossroad and Stavki settlement. Once it is captured Lyman is sealed from the North direction. 

and now this road is under UKR fire as well.

The road Drobyshevo-Stavky-Torske is under UKR fire. The pocket is formed. UKR just need to enter Torkse to close it. 

 

[kraze]

4 hours ago, The_Capt said:

So we are pretty much going to have to agree to disagree - I think your view of things is a little overly binary.  We seem to disagree on "worse".  Your position is that a functioning Russia is worse for Ukraine, of which there is ample evidence.  My view is that a reduced and boxed in, but functioning Russia with Ukraine within NATO (we took Turkey for fewer reasons than Ukraine currently has) is the way ahead.

Turkey isn't a country any nuclear country will ever fight over. We aren't getting into NATO because we are that country. You have a whole NATO member wanting to occupy our territories and having an agreement with Russia to do it, remember? Hungarian vote NO alone will be enough to make sure we are alone.

Quote

Based on your posts, it appears you are arguing that imperial aggressiveness is deeply embedded within Russian culture, which may have some kernels of truth - I personally think you are way over simplifying the Russian cultural construct and are very broadly painting every Russian with the same brush, so to speak.

Not me, just historical facts being cold and cruel. There have been zero times when russian culture showed any humane traits, instead it produces non-stop wars, misery and suffering for literally everyone around them. There's literally no indication that russians will change this time either. Their whole population is absolutely pro-war (as long as most aren't fighting or suffering consequences personally - but that's another story) and shows no signs of wanting to change.

Quote

Much of what you are proposing is the exact same thing back onto the Russian people - a collapse that erases their identity. 

Do you know what a "russian identity" even is? 'russian' is not an ethnicity or nationality. It's just an artificial construct designed to obliterate identities and make everyone a grey mass without history, ethnicity and roots. Now buryats, kalmyks, chechens, dagestanians, mordvins, tatars, tuvins and about 20 other nationalities and ethnicities of the empire are... nationalities and ethnicities. So them having separate countries is bad how? Sure Chechnya becoming free will erase their "russian" identity. Because it will just make them have their own, finally.

Quote

So many of those refugees are going to be elderly and women/children.  It would appear your position is to group them in with the "murders and rapists" and let them freeze to death along the Ukrainian border.  This is very tough talk but you can see my point here (or perhaps cannot, which is the problem); however, in my experience, more atrocities do not make things better.

Those "elderly" and "women" are responsible for murdering our elderly and women and even our children. So why exactly should we give them free ticket from responsibility? Their husbands and children came here to murder us in cold blood - and now we should give them warm welcome so that they or their descendants will get to kill us a lot easier when they get the chance since they got no consequences? You really don't see anything horribly wrong with your argument?

Quote

Your narrative that you are putting on this forum only serves an end state that will wash all that good away - likely when you need it most.

If my narrative of making sure my kids aren't getting killed by russians because I'm not pretending russians aren't murdering my friends (they killed two yesterday, as it turned out) - lets my kids survive - then so be it. I get that it's very easy for you to sit in a peaceful country, while trying to put equal signs between our refugees and russian "refugees" (who on multiple occasions beat up our refugees abroad without consequence) - but it will not change the reality. And the reality is - it's either us or them. There's no other way - russians made sure it is like that. Go convince them to stop, why are you convincing me I should love them for it?

Edited September 27, 2022 by kraze

[Huba]

On a lighter note, a video that threw me out of my comfy chair. I don't get how anybody would NOT want to be a part of NATO:

 

[acrashb]

31 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

The Ruters headlines have been suspicious for a while, but this one takes the crown I think.

Headlines matter, but in the first paragraph of the article "...after five days of voting in so-called referendums that Kyiv and the West denounced as a sham."

Few news organizations can afford investigative reporting, and none are able to do so in the occupied areas, so they report the News, which is dueling press releases, which is better than raving and prejudiced editorials.    Having said all of that, the headline is a bit one-sided.

[Probus]

21 minutes ago, kraze said:

Do you know what a "russian identity" even is? 'russian' is not an ethnicity or nationality. It's just an artificial construct designed to obliterate identities and make everyone a grey mass without history, ethnicity and roots.

Very true @kraze!

[dan/california]

Was going to say about 90 things, someone else got o most of them first.

We are sort of stuck off topic, or at least on the uppermost political level of the topic. Even with very interesting tactical, and operational developments.

Steve needs to go for the last option to bring things back into line. Release real info about the new game. So we can all tell him he is doing it wrong, while we frantically pre order it. I suggest he double the price and send the proceeds, and a complementary copy, to the Ukrainian MOD. It solves about five problems at once. It isn't a cold hearted attempt to take advantage, its a fundraiser!  

 

Edited September 27, 2022 by dan/california

[poesel]

43 minutes ago, Letter from Prague said:

... as for Germany some of the kariwurst stuff is really getting out of hand

You mean Currywurst? Don't insult the Currywurst or we two have a problem!

Btw, goes extremely well together with a Pilsbier - which you might know of.

13 minutes ago, Artkin said:

Fine. A quick search turns up that Germany's GDP is around 3.4 trillion dollars, 2% of that would be just over 76 Billion.

Isn't Germany's armored and aviation fleet in shambles currently? Or have been for a while?

And navy - yes. Underfunded for nearly 30 years, it has been shrunk to uselessness.

There is a very long list of problems, but the root cause is that no one wanted to have an army because it was seen as a useless waste of money after the Cold War was over. We are surrounded by friends, why do we need weapons? And projecting military power into others lands was (and is) seen as militaristic, imperialistic, historically inappropriate and generally a bad idea.

And this: you, dear reader, may live in a country where you are proud of your army. We are not.

[Huba]

Just now, dan/california said:

Was going to say about 90 things, someone else got o most of them first.

We are sort of stuck off topic, or at least on the uppermost political level of the topic. Even with very interesting tactical, and operational developments.

Steve needs to go for the last option to bring things back into line. Release real info about the new game. So we can all tell him he is doing it wrong, while we frantically pre order it. I suggest he double the price and send the proceeds, and a complementary copy, to the Ukrainian MOD. It solves about five problems at once. It isn't a cold hearted attempt to take advantage, its a fundraiser!  

Let's be honest, the way things are we need a forum section and a dozen threads to keep things in relative order. I wonder how this would fly with people who just want to play and talk about CM

[dan/california]

Just now, Huba said:

Let's be honest, the way things are we need a forum section and a dozen threads to keep things in relative order. I wonder how this would fly with people who just want to play and talk about CM

The chaos is part of the charm...

[Battlefront.com]

13 minutes ago, Huba said:

On a lighter note, a video that threw me out of my comfy chair. I don't get how anybody would NOT want to be a part of NATO:

 

This video shows that it is possible for an army to look menacing on parade and also be menacing on the battlefield.  Russia only had one of the two, now it doesn't have enough to do either.

Steve

[Ultradave]

38 minutes ago, DerKommissar said:

Two questions for you, well-informed forum members:

A. How likely is it that tactical nukes will be used?

B. What would be NATO's response?

I think that subject has been beaten into the ground. I'd encourage you to search this forum thread for some key words and review. I hesitate to get it started all over again. And I'm sure Steve would appreciate that too

Dave

[danfrodo]

35 minutes ago, Grigb said:

and now this road is under UKR fire as well.

The road Drobyshevo-Stavky-Torske is under UKR fire. The pocket is formed. UKR just need to enter Torkse to close it. 

 

Gosh golly, there's a war going on?  And this thread is supposed to be about that?  I'll be darned.  Thanks for this update, GrigB.  

So looks like that's the last road that can supply Lyman area?  And I've heard around 2000 troops estimated in the area?  Those 2000 seem to have actually fought hard, so it'll be nice to get them out of the war.  I think we can safely assume their replacements will be less capable and willing.

[Letter from Prague]

22 minutes ago, Huba said:

On a lighter note, a video that threw me out of my comfy chair. I don't get how anybody would NOT want to be a part of NATO:

 

This video got shared so much in certain parts of the internet (like the NAFO base r/noncredibledefense) that some people started calling that track "NATO theme".

(it's Sublimation by Neo Fresco, to those who are into electronic music)