How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[FancyCat]

4 hours ago, poesel said:

Then, Russian gas was out on February 25th. That was a political decision and there is no way back. Except maybe to pay for Russian reparations to Ukraine when the war is over.

The most convincing theory is IMO that Putin burned the bridges behind him with that. To kill any chance of disposing of him, retreating from Ukraine and buying the way out with gas.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File%3ANord_Stream_gas_flows.webp

From wiki, graph link shows flows thru NS1 continued thru February, with lowered flows as Russia kept strangling it until the red X signifying the sabotage. NS1 wiki article will attest that Russia sought to avoid being blamed for stopping gas exports to Germany thru excuses and with a eye on defeating sanctions for example, the threats to keep gas exports low unless sanctions were lifted. When that didn't work, how nice NS1 goes belly up and NS2 retains one of two lines.

The bridge exists, and remains, but the cost to reopen it on the part of Germany is so high now (NS2), it would have destroyed the EU front on Ukraine. The cost to keep NS1 gas flows open as indicated in the graph and by Russia's excuses, was high on Russia and low on Germany.

[sburke]

for those who can get it, NFL 360 is doing a piece on Ukrainian league football players (US style) who have joined the fight against the Russian invasion.

NFL 360: Kyle Brandt | UKRAINE DOCUMENTARY ANNOUNCEMENT

Edited December 25, 2022 by sburke

[dan/california]

Merry Christmas all, and spare a thought for the folks standing dawn watch in a cold trench, right about now.

 

 

[JonS]

11 hours ago, Splinty said:

The ANA wasn't nearly as motivated, educated, and committed like the UA are.

Again, not the point. The Ukrainian Army has employed a highly successful doctrine that works well for them culturally and in their context.

Edited December 25, 2022 by JonS

[Kinophile]

From CEPA, ref long term impact of RUS lower rank officer casualties. 

Point 3 is particularly salient. 

I'm correspondingly curious about how "joint" trained are UKR officers? 

 

Edited December 25, 2022 by Kinophile

[Kinophile]

13 hours ago, sburke said:

WP has a good article on the logistics push for Ukraine,  probably paywalled, but this was an interesting bit for current state

Inside the monumental, stop-start effort to arm Ukraine - The Washington Post

 

Excellent.  As in, push hard to get them firmly away, en masse, from the Soviet Mass mentality to the Western Precision format. Much easier of course with the newer recruits, but also will have knock back effects onto the existing officer corps. 

[_Morpheus_]

 

 

[_Morpheus_]

Nice video about battalion `Karpatska Sich` who fought without any heavy armor but now the use russian trophies and become mech battalion.

 

[Letter from Prague]

The Russian carrier is on fire pretty often. It feels like they set it on fire in winter so they can evacuate it and the sailors don't freeze in it or something.

 

As for doctrine, I'm sure Ukrainians would love to "fight like Americans", for example do precision bombing with hundreds of planes that are invisible to enemy air defence. I'm also sure they would love to attack using Western IFVs with actual armor and cannons instead of attacking with machine gun humvees. 

Except you know, they don't have any.

[Letter from Prague]

Also happy holidays, everybody! 

[Letter from Prague]

There's also some money trouble in Russia it seems. Might be routine, might be a point where things really fall apart:

 

[Seedorf81]

17 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

Egads, I most definitely did not.  That's just the thing... people who think all Republicans adore MTG are just as wrong as those who think all Democrats think the sun rises and sets on OTC.  I should be able to criticize Carlson and Fox without it being interpreted as an attack on Republicans AT ALL, either in part or in full.  Last time I checked Carlson is not a spokesperson for the GOP and Fox is a private corporation run for profit.

Sorry, missed it. Wingnut = someone who believes Jewish controlled space lasers start forest fires.  Wingnut = someone who thinks Putin is the good guy in this story because he's standing up for white Christians against the Muslim and gay menace.

Hopefully you will go back and re-read what I wrote and understand you read something I didn't write.  As far as I'm concerned, Carlson is RINO.  He holds none of the ideals of Reagan, that's for sure.

Steve

For non-Americans, like myself, who haven't a clue what all those abbreviations mean, "URBAN DICTIONARY" is your solution. Easy to find, no paywall or anything, easy to use.

[Kinophile]

3 hours ago, Letter from Prague said:

There's also some money trouble in Russia it seems. Might be routine, might be a point where things really fall apart:

 

I'm rlly curious about thus,  if it's accurate and recent.

Putin not paying pensions is a very bad thing, if it becomes systemic or repeated, but I assume this instance ps will be brushed off as low level crony incompetence 

I'm highly skeptical though, Tbh.  The pyscho granny brigade is a vocal supporter... So long as they get their pension cheques. And there's been no inkling of Russian cash flow problems. We'd hear far more before it got to the atml-shutdown stage. 

[poesel]

10 hours ago, FancyCat said:

From wiki, graph link shows flows thru NS1 continued thru February, with lowered flows as Russia kept strangling it until the red X signifying the sabotage.

You are totally right. I glossed over this a bit. There was a contract and a need and that outweighed morals. The reasoning then was that Russia couldn't buy anything useful at this point, and it would hurt us more than them. Not our finest hour.
When NS blew up, it was relief of some sort. If you go 'cui bono' you need to put Germany on that list, too.

10 hours ago, FancyCat said:

The bridge exists, and remains, but the cost to reopen it on the part of Germany is so high now (NS2), it would have destroyed the EU front on Ukraine.

Technically, that part of NS belongs to Russia. Only the part in German waters belongs to Germany. So Russia would have to repair it. Although such things are usually done inside a bigger deal. Maybe sometime in the future, H2 from the wind farms in the country of Siberia will flow through it...

[Letter from Prague]

1 hour ago, Kinophile said:

I'm rlly curious about thus,  if it's accurate and recent.

Putin not paying pensions is a very bad thing, if it becomes systemic or repeated, but I assume this instance ps will be brushed off as low level crony incompetence 

I'm highly skeptical though, Tbh.  The pyscho granny brigade is a vocal supporter... So long as they get their pension cheques. And there's been no inkling of Russian cash flow problems. We'd hear far more before it got to the atml-shutdown stage. 

Yeah. I can imagine lack of western goods, but I'm not sure why Russia would have non-local lack of cash.

On the other hand, bank runs can do a lot of damage even if there's no good reason for them, so here's hoping.

[kevinkin]

New Years is a time for lists and we have one to add to and/or edit below.

https://www.businessinsider.com/biggest-russian-blunders-during-putin-war-against-ukraine-2022-12#underestimating-western-unity-5

Screwing up the invasion

Overlooking the strength of Ukraine's defense

Abandoning lots of weapon

Expending its stockpiles of precision munitions

Underestimating Western unity

A boiler plate list. Perhaps the thread can do better. Here is one,

deliberately targeting civilians and their critical infrastructure. 

[Butschi]

35 minutes ago, poesel said:

If you go 'cui bono' you need to put Germany on that list, too.

Indeed. If you go by cui bono, you can add a lot of countries to that list. Everyone who now fills the gap with LNG (Qatar, USA, Norway), the pipeline transit countries (Ukraine, Poland, ...), Ukraine (again) because less money goes to Russia, any number of non-state actors who profit in one way or another. Russia, IMO, is not on top of that list. At least from our western point of view Russia would have been better off with the pipelines still open. They lost money and an immense potential for blackmailing Germany or at least splitting German society (and let's not forget Denmark for instance). On the other hand, we know that what Russia does, doesn't have to make sense for us. It has to make sense for Putin and has to be sellable to the Russian audience. So currently this is all idle speculation. What I do find telling is that the usual finger pointing at Russia even before solid evidence could be found did not really happen this time. But that too is speculation and there are several good explanations for it.

[_Morpheus_]

 

 

[kevinkin]

Vlad is getting his holidays mixed up. It's not April Fools Day:

https://sports.yahoo.com/putin-says-russia-ready-negotiate-093854014.html

[Probus]

Merry Christmas to you all and especially those Ukrainian troops in those cold trenches and foxholes.

Merry Christmas!

[akd]

Probably BS:

 

[JM Stuff]

23 minutes ago, Probus said:

Merry Christmas to you all and especially those Ukrainian troops in those cold trenches and foxholes.

Merry Christmas!

Very nice gesture of solidarity towards the brave soldiers... also to civilian very affected by the misery of war.

Merry Christmas to them too!

JM

[BlackMoria]

Merry Xmas to everyone.  And my thoughts to all Ukrainians and Ukrainian Armed Force personnel everywhere.

May all you CM players get kissed under the mistletoe and not get kissed by a Tow missile this holiday season.   

[Butschi]

26 minutes ago, BlackMoria said:

and not get kissed by a Tow missile this holiday season.   

It is more blessed to give than to receive.

Edited December 25, 2022 by Butschi

[Artkin]

I worked indirectly for Hannity for a few years. The guy says whatever Fox tells him to say. He is a shill puppet. No doubt Carlson is too. 

Don't glorify people on television and pretend like theyre the best America can offer. Don't pretend like these people have one wit of credibility in the massive range of topics they discuss. Remember it's only about views. 

Wtf?