How Hot is Ukraine Gonna Get?

[Battlefront.com]

4 minutes ago, Seminole said:

Step 1 - stop foreign military interventions.

Wait... so what military intervention are you talking about in the context of this war?  Ukraine was not and is not a part of NATO.  There was not and is not NATO combat forces operating in Ukraine.

The only one on a foreign military intervention right now is Russia.

4 minutes ago, Seminole said:

Step 2 - no longer caught up in eternal responses to the unanticipated response to the earlier intervention (e.g. don't move military into Saudi Arabia to defend their dictator from the neighboring dictator, thus don't antagonize an entirely separate group of jihadists bent on ending that apostate intervention, the response to which begets another intervention, this time to 'fix' Afghanistan, and on and on until we have troops in Syria to partition that country while we pile more troops back into Somalia to 'fix' it too, and on and on...) the U.S. gets to know some peace.

Credit for you filling in the blank, but you missed the point.  The blank represents not having a workable plan to the achieve the stated end goal.  You have proved this true by proposing something that is unworkable because it is naive and divorced from reality.

Your premise is that if the US has no military presence anywhere that nobody will wish it harm Americans. The reality is that Jihadists are just as upset about US money and ideas as they are military support.  The simple fact that the United States exists at all is a reason for them to want to attack it.

Even if the US were to conduct no foreign foreign trade and cut off all foreign relations of any sort I don't think it would work.  At that point you'd get new aggrieved parties that would be upset that the US is not "sharing" its good fortune of having figured out the magic solution to a peaceful and prosperous society.

Not that we'd ever get to this sort of fantasy arrangement.  The only way this sort of isolation could ever come about is through a totalitarian system of government taking over for what is currently in place in the US.  And if that were to happen, the amount of violence and war would be immense, except that it would be fought on American soil by Americans against other Americans.

4 minutes ago, Seminole said:

Step 3 - there is no 'world peace', never has been.  But that isn't the same as us choosing to become a party to various and sundry conflicts around the globe.  As one of those old, dead guys noted: "[America] has abstained from interference in the concerns of others, even when the conflict has been for principles to which she clings, as to the last vital drop that visits the heart. She has seen that probably for centuries to come, all the contests of that Aceldama, the European World, will be contests between inveterate power, and emerging right."

Adams and the rest of the Founding Fathers were products of their time.  Specifically an agrarian based economy where global trade was more-or-less unnecessary for the United States to thrive.  This quote, in fact, shows the fallacy of blindly reading something written hundreds of years ago without making any informed attempt to apply it to the world in which we live in now.

Steve

[dan/california]

17 hours ago, Battlefront.com said:

More thoughts on the assassination plot in St. Petersburg:

The important bit here is that cameras were disabled in many critical locations, but someone hand filmed Trepova specifically as she entered the cafe.  Looks to me like the FSB wanted to control the narrative a little bit

Steve

The only thing I am sure of is that someone set her up.

 

1 hour ago, akd said:

At least 25 dead Russians easily counted (likely more that are buried or hard to distinguish amongst the general mess):

 

It looked to me like some of them were recent, and some of them hd been there quite a while. Which says some pretty awful things about the Russian army.

 

1 hour ago, Haiduk said:

FT:  US opposes offering Ukraine a road map to Nato membership

https://www.ft.com/content/c37ed22d-e0e4-4b03-972e-c56af8a36d2e

US, Germany and Hungary. 

Some our experts already say that for Ukraine is more easy to win the war than to win a peace [means afterwar conditions, which will maintain guarantees of our security in future and ]. 

Holy bleep is my congressman getting a nastygram

[Battlefront.com]

10 minutes ago, Tux said:

It sounds like your main complaint is with how complicated the wider world is.  I can empathise.  We’d all love there to be more easy answers.  Unfortunately (and with due apologies to clergymen and Jordan Peterson) old dead guy quotes aren’t a valid substitute for rational thought and analysis of the world as it seems to be.

“Let not any one pacify his conscience by the delusion that he can do no harm if he takes no part, and forms no opinion. Bad men need nothing more to compass their ends, than that good men should look on and do nothing. He is not a good man who, without a protest, allows wrong to be committed in his name, and with the means which he helps to supply, because he will not trouble himself to use his mind on the subject.”

Well put.

The thing is... any extreme is unstable by nature.  It doesn't work in the real world, or at least not for long.  Should the US intervene and meddle less than it currently does?  Yes.  Would that reduce the amount of negative attention it gets from violent groups?  Probably to some degree.  Should a better balanced approach be a goal?  I think so.  However, at some point scaling back fails to yield benefits and further scaling back starts things going in the opposite direction.

A good analogy of this is fuel economy in a car.  If you want to get someplace with the goal of using the least amount of fuel, drive slower and accept that it will take you longer to get there.  However, at some point you are driving so slow that there are negative consequences, including the possibility of harm (try driving on a highway at night at walking speed and let me know how well that works out for you!).  And if one is extreme about fuel efficiency, the best way to conserve fuel is to not drive.  Which is fine if you have a different and better means of getting to where you want to be, but not a great solution if you don't.

Steve

[sburke]

37 minutes ago, Seminole said:

Step 1 - stop foreign military interventions.

Step 2 - no longer caught up in eternal responses to the unanticipated response to the earlier intervention (e.g. don't move military into Saudi Arabia to defend their dictator from the neighboring dictator, thus don't antagonize an entirely separate group of jihadists bent on ending that apostate intervention, the response to which begets another intervention, this time to 'fix' Afghanistan, and on and on until we have troops in Syria to partition that country while we pile more troops back into Somalia to 'fix' it too, and on and on...) the U.S. gets to know some peace.

Step 3 - there is no 'world peace', never has been.  But that isn't the same as us choosing to become a party to various and sundry conflicts around the globe.  As one of those old, dead guys noted: "[America] has abstained from interference in the concerns of others, even when the conflict has been for principles to which she clings, as to the last vital drop that visits the heart. She has seen that probably for centuries to come, all the contests of that Aceldama, the European World, will be contests between inveterate power, and emerging right."

this is getting really old and is a complete derailment of the thread.  Unless you think Ukraine has no right to decide its own future what the heck are you going on about?

If you do feel that Ukraine has no right to make any decision on its future that Russia does not approve of then go somewhere else.

Enough already.  Calling the Ukrainian fight to defend its right to self-determination from a barbaric aggressor state "choosing to become a party to various and sundry conflicts" is insulting to all our Ukrainian members of this forum who are currently part of a fight to defend their country's right to exist.

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, akd said:

At least 25 dead Russians easily counted (likely more that are buried or hard to distinguish amongst the general mess):

 

This video was posted as part of a longer one which showed some of the attacks, including a closeup of a wounded Russian struggling and dying.  My guess is someone edited the first part out because it was pretty graphic.

Steve

[Letter from Prague]

Maybe it's because I'm too idealistic, but all this all this "the US should not involve itself" is just a fancy way of saying "oooh, there's a horrible going on, let's just watch and not do anything".

How can someone look at Bucha and the Mariopol and kidnapping children and whatever else and say that?

No matter how you spin it, it is such a heartless position and always will be. How can someone say this and live with themselves?

I will never understand.

[Battlefront.com]

2 minutes ago, sburke said:

this is getting really old and is a complete derailment of the thread.  Unless you think Ukraine has no right to decide its own future what the heck are you going on about?

If you do feel that Ukraine has no right to make any decision on its future that Russia does not approve of then go somewhere else.

Enough already.  Calling the Ukrainian fight to defend its right to self-determination from a barbaric aggressor state "choosing to become a party to various and sundry conflicts" is insulting to all our Ukrainian members of this forum who are currently part of a fight to defend their country's right to exist.

Yeah, agreed.

Seminole, you are obviously in the wrong place to be arguing pro-Putin claptrap.  And for sure it is having the usual negative impact that Kremlin "whataboutism" talking points have.  However, I did put out a list of specific questions you said you weren't dodging.  So far you haven't answered them so it would be unfair of me to deny you that.  If you want to give it a shot, here they are again:

1.  Do you believe that Russia is fundamentally a dictatorship founded on hundreds of years of imperialist expansionist tendencies?

2.  Do you believe that Russia has the fundamental right to dictate conditions for its neighbors to include military occupation and genocide?

3.  Do you feel a nation is justified to wage a genocidal war on a neighbor because the neighbor sought to protect itself from such a genocidal war?

4.  Do you believe the world is a better place with genocidal dictators operating without fear of consequences from the larger global community?

5.  What are your "de-escalation" suggestions for this war as it is right now?

 

Not really relevant to meaningful discussion of this war, but I have to admit I am curious to see your responses.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

1 hour ago, Haiduk said:

K-2 battalion of 54th mech.brigade destroys Russian MT-12 gun near Zolotarivka (Lysychansk direction). Russian crew abandoned the gun and fled after first distant impact

 

This is a perfect example of how much "reputation" can impact behavior.  These guys seem to have heard how accurate Ukrainian artillery is, so as soon as they figured out they were being attacked they fled.

Oddly enough, Russian Nat bloggers are making this worse.  They are amplifying how good Ukrainian artillery is in their messaging to the Russian audience.  Which is a great way to maximize Ukrainian propaganda

Steve

[JonS]

3 hours ago, Seminole said:

The business fable of The Chicken and the Pig is about commitment to a project or cause. When producing a dish made of eggs with ham or bacon, the pig provides the ham or bacon which requires his or her sacrifice and the chicken provides the eggs which are not difficult to produce. Thus the pig is really committed to that dish ("has skin in the game") while the chicken is only involved, yet both are needed to produce the dish.

I'm familiar with but have never quite understood this metaphor. As a parent I would readily sacrifice a leg for my children.

I guess that's just one of many reasons I don't like programme managers as a group.

[dan/california]

Just now, Battlefront.com said:

This is a perfect example of how much "reputation" can impact behavior.  These guys seem to have heard how accurate Ukrainian artillery is, so as soon as they figured out they were being attacked they fled.

Oddly enough, Russian Nat bloggers are making this worse.  They are amplifying how good Ukrainian artillery is in their messaging to the Russian audience.  Which is a great way to maximize Ukrainian propaganda

Steve

This is how Ukraine can win the war this year. If one on target JDAM and a couple of Excalibur rounds can send whole battalions running, Ukrainian HIMARS will be lining up on the beach just east East of Mariupol on the Sea of Azov for the Kerch Bridge turkey shoot by the 4th of July. It would be the best fireworks I could possibly ask for.

[danfrodo]

Really good summary here today w some stuff I haven't seen here.  Reports of three train attacks by UKR partisans (?) around Melitopol. 

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/4/6/2162416/-Ukraine-Update-Melitopol-turns-out-to-be-a-very-bad-place-for-Russia-to-park-a-train

 

[Beleg85]

34 minutes ago, sburke said:

this is getting really old and is a complete derailment of the thread.  Unless you think Ukraine has no right to decide its own future what the heck are you going on about?

If you do feel that Ukraine has no right to make any decision on its future that Russia does not approve of then go somewhere else.

Enough already.  Calling the Ukrainian fight to defend its right to self-determination from a barbaric aggressor state "choosing to become a party to various and sundry conflicts" is insulting to all our Ukrainian members of this forum who are currently part of a fight to defend their country's right to exist.

Perhaps in this context an excerpt from latest RUSI report about Russian plan of subduing Ukraine can serve us what we could expect if Putin and his NeoMongols managed to do it:

The approach to establishing the occupation administration was systematic. In the first instance,
Russian forces were tasked with seizing all forms of records. This included public health,
education, housing, tax, police, electoral and local government records. One of the first acts
upon seizing the Chornobyl and Zaporizhzhia NPPs was the seizing of all hard drives from these
sites.67 It also included private records from utility companies, insurance providers and NGOs.68
This data would be used to build a map of who was supposed to live where, who they were
related to and whether they had any connections with the Ukrainian state. The population was
divided into five core categories:

1. Those deemed leaders of Ukrainian nationalism who were specified for physical
liquidation on a high-priority target list, or for capture to enable show trials.
2. Those suspected of intending to support acts of resistance who needed to be recruited
or suppressed including anyone associated with Ukrainian law enforcement, local
government, the military or related to officials that were not actively collaborating.
3. Those who were deemed apathetic.
4. Those actively collaborating with Russian forces.
5. Individuals who were necessary for running critical national infrastructure and had to
be controlled.69

Perhaps, since knowledge of @Seminole of the region seems to be based on Russian declarations rather than centuries-long observeable behavior of all parts of muscovite state apparatus (not mentioning Ukrainian tendency to not comply), let me translate: since number of most active post-Maidan Ukrainian citizen body can be counted in low milions (roughly 1st and partly 2nd group), if we wouldn't help UA and they would collapse, we would probably have concentration camps several kms from NATO border now. I mean true, not filtration ones. On the top of massive survaillence program, zachistki (google the term, please, mate, if you don't know it) on truly horrific scale and of course resistance like Europe did not see from WWII. Ukraine is not Andora, it's largest European country with 44 mln people. Could anybody seriously believe we would just stand and watch?

We are in very optimistic scenario, and possibly the one in which violent confrontation between Russia and West is less probable than in beforementioned.

Edited April 6, 2023 by Beleg85

[FancyCat]

58 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

Adams and the rest of the Founding Fathers were products of their time.  Specifically an agrarian based economy where global trade was more-or-less unnecessary for the United States to thrive.  This quote, in fact, shows the fallacy of blindly reading something written hundreds of years ago without making any informed attempt to apply it to the world in which we live in now.

Steve

Eh, the U.S sent a fleet in 1805 to North Africa, due to shipping losses on American flagged ships. I've never been a fan of this supposed notion of the leased tiger following the independence of the country being the U.S chained to a pole by far seeing statesmen, when the reality is the U.S was not a world power, not close to being one, and decided to act accordingly.

When acting against entirely faceable entities, Native American nations, etc, no less was the need for foreign movements "foreign expansion" reframed as manifest destiny.

[Battlefront.com]

Surprising nobody, Macron comes up short with his meeting with Xi:

https://www.politico.eu/article/emmanuel-macron-xi-jinping-china-russia-war-ukraine/

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

This isn't good:

Ukraine War Plans Leak Prompts Pentagon Investigation

Classified documents detailing secret American and NATO plans have appeared on Twitter and Telegram.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/06/us/politics/ukraine-war-plan-russia.html?campaign_id=190&emc=edit_ufn_20230406&instance_id=89600&nl=from-the-times&regi_id=77867169&segment_id=129786&te=1&user_id=06eb42ecc9056dd32ea63af0c30707b6

News is fast breaking and no other major online news source has came up in my search, so apologies for the paywall.

The publication of this information isn't really that much of a problem for Ukraine because the source was probably the Kremlin.  In other words, they already had the information in hand.  And given how many agents Russia has operating with Ukraine, I'd be surprised if they didn't have a pretty good idea what was going on even without these documents.

So it seems the main purpose here is to wage a disinformation campaign to help motivate Russians to fight.

Steve

[Battlefront.com]

From the info that appears to be unaltered, it seems Ukraine is on track to field the sort of force we suspected it was holding in reserve for the attack.  It also seems that it could theoretically be ready soon after the weather clears up.

Steve

[Vacillator]

17 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

so apologies for the paywall

No paywall here Steve, but thanks for posting it.

[cesmonkey]

Four minute interview with this guy on how F-16s and their associated training should be provided to Ukraine.

 

[Beleg85]

29 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

This isn't good:

Classified documents detailing secret American and NATO plans have appeared on Twitter and Telegram.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/06/us/politics/ukraine-war-plan-russia.html?campaign_id=190&emc=edit_ufn_20230406&instance_id=89600&nl=from-the-times&regi_id=77867169&segment_id=129786&te=1&user_id=06eb42ecc9056dd32ea63af0c30707b6

News is fast breaking and no other major online news source has came up in my search, so apologies for the paywall.

The publication of this information isn't really that much of a problem for Ukraine because the source was probably the Kremlin.  In other words, they already had the information in hand.  And given how many agents Russia has operating with Ukraine, I'd be surprised if they didn't have a pretty good idea what was going on even without these documents.

So it seems the main purpose here is to wage a disinformation campaign to help motivate Russians to fight.

Steve

Hmm still perhaps there is a hope it may be intentional leak. If true however: 12 brigades is pretty high, it seems they may quite visibly not enough APC's to furbish them (250 tanks and 350 arm. vehicles is stated) but thisnumber may include extra artillery brigades (?).

[NamEndedAllen]

1 hour ago, Beleg85 said:

1. Those deemed leaders of Ukrainian nationalism who were specified for physical
liquidation on a high-priority target list, or for capture to enable show trials.
2. Those suspected of intending to support acts of resistance who needed to be recruited
or suppressed including anyone associated with Ukrainian law enforcement, local
government, the military or related to officials that were not actively collaborating.
3. Those who were deemed apathetic.
4. Those actively collaborating with Russian forces.
5. Individuals who were necessary for running critical national infrastructure and had to
be controlled.69

 

1 hour ago, Beleg85 said:

Perhaps in this context an excerpt from latest RUSI report about Russian plan of subduing Ukraine can serve us what we could expect if Putin and his NeoMongols managed to do it:

 

This is all the proof any rational person needs showing how the USA was behind it all from the start. And further, that the USA was completely controlled by Great Britain, who masterminded everything. As they do.

BTW, the article didn't include one of the secret codicils laying out the means and methods the USA used to setup the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand so it could intervene in a foreign war.

[Chibot Mk IX]

43 minutes ago, Battlefront.com said:

This isn't good:

Ukraine War Plans Leak Prompts Pentagon Investigation

Classified documents detailing secret American and NATO plans have appeared on Twitter and Telegram.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/04/06/us/politics/ukraine-war-plan-russia.html?campaign_id=190&emc=edit_ufn_20230406&instance_id=89600&nl=from-the-times&regi_id=77867169&segment_id=129786&te=1&user_id=06eb42ecc9056dd32ea63af0c30707b6

News is fast breaking and no other major online news source has came up in my search, so apologies for the paywall.

The publication of this information isn't really that much of a problem for Ukraine because the source was probably the Kremlin.  In other words, they already had the information in hand.  And given how many agents Russia has operating with Ukraine, I'd be surprised if they didn't have a pretty good idea what was going on even without these documents.

So it seems the main purpose here is to wage a disinformation campaign to help motivate Russians to fight.

Steve

Maybe this is another round of Maskirovka.   

Remember this one?

 

 

[dan/california]

4 minutes ago, Beleg85 said:

Hmm still perhaps there is a hope it may be intentional leak. If true however: 12 brigades is pretty high, it seems they may quite visibly not enough APC's to furbish them (250 tanks and 350 arm. vehicles is stated) but thisnumber may include extra artillery brigades (?).

Ukraine and the U.S. certainly ran a successful information operation before the Kharkiv counter offensive. Also It is noteworthy that the numbers quoted are not all that different from the ~consensus estimates bouncing around the thread and other places. A lot of people have been expecting the Ukrainians to take a swing as soon as the ground was truly dry. This just seems to reinforce that. Beleg, does your estimate the Ukrainians are short include the the hundred plus Rosomak AFVs Poland just donated?

[Battlefront.com]

10 minutes ago, Chibot Mk IX said:

Maybe this is another round of Maskirovka.   

Remember this one?

Yup!  And for sure that thought crossed my mind.  It certainly is possible, but I dunno... this has the feeling of a Russian op.  There's potentially damaging stuff in there, even if it's false.

Steve

[Beleg85]

39 minutes ago, dan/california said:

Beleg, does your estimate the Ukrainians are short include the the hundred plus Rosomak AFVs Poland just donated?

They were not donated, they were bought with a swap. Most probably very long way to go before this equipment reach Ukraine, there are only preliminary agreements made. Unless they somehow  managed to train ca.1000 personell to ride them in almost complete media balckout (near-impossible feat- there were some photos of UA soldiers circulating, but most probably just photoops), I would not count very much on seeing them this year.

Edited April 7, 2023 by Beleg85

[Kinophile]

46 minutes ago, Chibot Mk IX said:

Maybe this is another round of Maskirovka.   

Remember this one?

 

 

I dunno, a more limited mission is what Ukraine ended up with ref Kharkiv. The war gaming possibly identified sustainment of the offensive as an issue past a certain time point. To NATO eyes they might emphasize /prefer more emphatically successful operations (eg actually hit the eastern border).   

It must have been very apparent to NATO and ZSU that they (ZSU)  could achieve an initial breakthrough, but NATO was not convinced that it could lead anywhere decisive. But for Ukraine achieving a breakthrough at all would be a decisive morale breakthrough in-and-of itself ,  completely turning the assumptive portrayal of Ukraine from the defensive victim to a highly dangerous peer-opponent,  in both the Russian eyes and their own people, and crucially,  The West. It was now easy to point to the ZSU and say - look,  that's what they can do with just their own stuff. Imagine if they had NATO stuff...!

And There is now a direct line of thought traceable in Ukrainian and foreign media from Kharkiv to the arrival of Leo 2s.

So I'm not really convinced that there was some high level shenanigans. It always seemed a bit of a wishful overlay (look how much smarter Ukrainians are than Russian fools).

It could just as easily have been as mundane as differing concepts of the utility of a "limited" victory. 

 

Edited April 7, 2023 by Kinophile