Politics

[jpr9954]

 

[Red Leg]

I think we can begin to draw some conclusions about where we are. Where we are going is a bit more difficult.

I think it has become very clear that this "operation" was based upon a number of false assumptions for which the Russian military, the Russian people, and the Russian economy are paying dearly. It waits to be seem if those costs come due for Russia's leadership.

Those false assumptions included but are not limited to:

1) The will of Ukrainian people and the capabilities of the Ukrainian armed forces.
2) The capabilities of the Russian armed forces - particularly with respect to force protection operations including

a) The logistics to support and sustain operations
b) The command and control expertise (different than technology) necessary to execute combined operations in contested battle space.
c) The difficulty of trying to accomplish any of the above against a motivated and trained opponent (Ukrainian regular forces) armed with peer technology.

3) The reaction of NATO and the West.
4) Timeline, casualties, and material losses to achieve objectives.


Current situation:

1) The ground attack in the north has culminated. That is a military term which means that the attacker can no longer maintain the momentum of the advance. The Russians are no doubt working very hard to resume that attack, but this is now a logistics driven rather than personnel or weapons system calculus. As the northern battle group, seemingly dependent upon a single MSR, tries to untangle itself, the Russian Rasputitsa is preparing to throw itself into the battle. The spring thaw and mud will affect both sides, but is far more detrimental to the attacker - particularly a highly mobilized one.

Assuming that the Russians can get the attack moving again, one would expect an eventual encirclement of Kiev characterized by the sort of sustained bombardment of urban areas now occurring in the south.

2) The ground attacks in the South, which are supporting efforts, are still progressing, however very slowly. Russian forces seem to have captured Kherson and no doubt are attempting to generate combat power to drive on Odessa and Mariupol.

3) The battle for Kharkov continues with Russian forces resorting to planned bombardment of urban and civic areas.

The greater success in the south can be attributed to the major supporting depot and staging infrastructure in Crimea which shortens lines of resupply dramatically.

4) The air space above Ukraine is still contested. Russia can exercise local and time limited air superiority, but has been unable to do so across the battlespace.

5) The Russian military is suffering grievous losses in personnel and equipment. Four days ago they admitted to approximately 500 deaths and 1500 wounded. Based on the Russian record of honesty about such matters, I would comfortably estimate the actual numbers or 3X to 4X what was announced and of course there has been at least another 96 hours of combat since that tally. During the whole ten years of the Afghanistan campaign, the Soviet army lost roughly 14,500 killed and 53,000 wounded out of roughly 600,000 involved over that decade. The casualty rate with respect to forces committed in Ukraine is far higher.

To be sure the Russians will do everything in their considerable power to hide these losses, but at this loss rate, they will quickly become apparent to the population.

Additionally, US Army doctrine, built around a force model with far more experienced leadership at platoon and company level deems units unfit for offensive operations when casualties reach 20-25%. I suspect many Russian first echelon formations are at or above that critical loss rate.

6) It is correct that Russia itself is not a military risk. However the best forces in the Russian army are proving remarkably ineffective and are taking meaningful casualties at a rate not seen since WWII. Moreover, while the state is not at risk, I am not sure the same can be said about the current government.

6) War is expensive. Whatever preparations the Russian government has made, whatever its gold and foreign exchange reserves may be, it is still the state of Texas attempting to conduct a foreign war. They are easily burning 1 - 1.5 billion a day based upon a now badly damaged currency. With an inflation rate already north of 8 %, the economy is running the risk of a return to pre-Putin hyperinflation.

a. Roughly half of Russia's foreign reserves are trapped in sanctioned institutions.
b. Though gas is flowing in the pipelines, Russian crude and LNG are being offered at great discount. Interestingly, as of today, most shipping carriers are refusing to carry either regardless of the wishes of prospective buyers.
c. I suspect the upturn in price is hardly perceived as a windfall particularly as those prices also affect their domestic costs.

Were I attempting to exercise economic leverage, this would not be the hand I would wish to hold.

Both the Russian national command authority and military planners have bungled this operation from the outset and they can not continue at this pace, level of incompetence, or expense indefinitely. Most significantly, that incompetence has put the whole developed world at risk.

I see four possible outcomes:

1) Partial Russian withdrawal.

A complete withdrawal is extremely unlikely regardless of Putin's health. Acknowledgement of Crimea and a minimal eastern territorial concession is an outcome Ukraine could concede if objections to EU and perhaps NATO membership were dropped. Russia could claim "victory" and Ukraine would rid itself of a constant cause for conflict.

2) Russian "victory" achieved through brutal destruction of infrastructure and mass civilian casualties. Since the coup de main has already failed, this would seem to be the current Russian objective.

The feasibility of this seems to rest, at least for the moment, on the continuing "success" of the southern offensive. An interesting analysis to which I do not have the component data (but I am sure DIA is churning furiously) is how long can such a WWI like offensive battle be sustained. And it is important to remember that General Raputitsa (the Russian thaw) will enter the fight in the south before he does the north.

3) Russian miscalculation likely driven by desperation.

As we discuss this, major staging areas are being developed on the Polish and Hungarian borders with Ukraine for the onward shipment of humanitarian relief supplies and weaponry. Those NATO forward operating bases will pose a tempting target to the leadership of a collapsing military operation. Whether ordered by Putin or a subordinate commander, a strike against one or more of these depots (particularly by a tactical nuclear weapon) would be an act of war. I am confident that NATO would respond immediately and in kind with strikes at either or both staging areas in the Crimea and Belarus. Obviously this could and perhaps likely would spiral out of control into a full nuclear exchange.

4) A new cold war with a new iron curtain running along the Dnieper River.

If the Ukrainians continue to fight, I see little evidence that the Russian military is capable of occupying and subduing the whole country. The Dnieper, as a limit of advance might be achievable. In such a scenario, the West will quickly recover economically, but the Russian people potentially will be looking at another Soviet-like economic dark age.

Numerous news stories are out today concerning a potential declaration of martial law by Putin in Russia as early as tomorrow. Numerous Russian nationals with means seem to be leaving the country ahead of such draconian measures.

Who knows the veracity of these reports. But should such a state of emergency be declared it would not exactly be the action of an enlightened government on a noble quest to liberate a neighbor from fascism - or the action of a government that believes it is "winning." No doubt it would be couched in the terms of the "threat" posed by NATO.

'Thousands' of Russians flee amid fears Putin will declare martial law after protests

Fears are growing Russia could impose martial law on the country after a wave of mass protests against the invasion of Ukraine.

www.lbc.co.uk

Vladimir Putin may declare martial law in Russia. Here's what it would mean for Russians.

As the invasion of Ukraine grinds on and unrest grows in Russia, Putin may declare martial law to crack down on opposition to the incursion.

www.usatoday.com

 

[Red Leg]

Putin Loses No Matter How This Plays Out, But We Might Too - War on the Rocks

Editor’s note: This is an updated and adapted version of an article originally published in the European publication Le Grand Continent, in French,

warontherocks.com

Interesting commentary from a European (French) perspective written a couple of days ago.

 

[Red Leg]

ABOUT LOOKING FROM THE OTHER SIDE

I'll join the discussion, just in case. The fact is that tomorrow, due to sanctions, there will be a denial of service of Internet servers, and perhaps I will not be able to connect to some foreign resources, if the cross-border Internet persists at all. Whether it will happen or not, and for how many years, I do not know.

I read the articles of One Day with great interest, and I want to say that this material is really minimum at the level of Brzezinski, and in some ways even higher, since the author managed to mostly hold the position of "without anger and partiality”, and in terms of knowledge of the actual material, One Day is in no way inferior to old Zbigniew.
Nevertheless, I will try to show that there can be different views on any event, and based in general on the same facts, the difference is only in the sequence of their presentation and the selection of significant ones – this is where the position manifests itself. On the example of the Caribbean crisis. I quoted a brief description above.
There is nothing to object in general. But you can put the facts in chronological order.
In 1961, the United States began deploying medium-range missiles in southern Italy and Turkey, it was not hidden, Russian diplomats were dissatisfied, they were interested in “why?”, but the answer was like "what can you do?”. There was no protection against such missiles at that time. In the event of an attack on the USSR, Russian similar missiles could in response hit targets only in Europe, but not in America.
In 1961, the United States, completely independent of European affairs, made an attempt to overthrow Castro, who had done nothing wrong up to that time, except that he nationalized the gambling houses of the Italian mafia.
The Soviet government put 2 and 2 together and told Castro: "Listen, man, here's the thing: but our interests coincide at the moment!".
And in 1962, Soviet missiles appeared in Cuba – no worse than Thor or Jupiter. It should be noted that the American government turned out to be much smarter than the Soviet one. The Soviets could not understand why the Americans had placed missiles in Turkey. But the American understood everything at once. The "Caribbean Crisis" broke out. The USSR declared that it would not surrender an ally, and would not be afraid of a nuclear war in the event of a military operation against Cuba (and at that time the ratio of bombs was somewhere 20:1).
But America won. Soviet missiles were withdrawn from Cuba, with great fanfare and publicity, with export control. Then, with much less advertising, missiles were dismantled in Turkey and Southern Italy and, importantly, certain obligations were given to exclude military actions against Cuba. And the Government of Cuba has stood up to our time. At that time, America was ruled by gentlemen, and agreements, even inconvenient ones, were respected.
So the question is: what conclusions from this story have the Russians made for the future, and, by the way, the Cubans, and not only them?

This is just an example, and for almost every episode of history, different interpretations of events and especially motives are possible. You don't have to separate them, but it's better to know if you're going to reach an agreement with the enemy, for obvious reasons.

I think that is a pretty accurate reading of history with which no informed person would disagree. The US did institute a "quarantine," but both parties also quickly met and reached a mutual accommodation with respect to Turkey and Cuba.

 

[Wheels]

I think we can begin to draw some conclusions about where we are. Where we are going is a bit more difficult.

I think it has become very clear that this "operation" was based upon a number of false assumptions for which the Russian military, the Russian people, and the Russian economy are paying dearly. It waits to be seem if those costs come due for Russia's leadership.

Those false assumptions included but are not limited to:

1) The will of Ukrainian people and the capabilities of the Ukrainian armed forces.
2) The capabilities of the Russian armed forces - particularly with respect to force protection operations including

a) The logistics to support and sustain operations
b) The command and control expertise (different than technology) necessary to execute combined operations in contested battle space.
c) The difficulty of trying to accomplish any of the above against a motivated and trained opponent (Ukrainian regular forces) armed with peer technology.

3) The reaction of NATO and the West.
4) Timeline, casualties, and material losses to achieve objectives.


Current situation:

1) The ground attack in the north has culminated. That is a military term which means that the attacker can no longer maintain the momentum of the advance. The Russians are no doubt working very hard to resume that attack, but this is now a logistics driven rather than personnel or weapons system calculus. As the northern battle group, seemingly dependent upon a single MSR, tries to untangle itself, the Russian Rasputitsa is preparing to throw itself into the battle. The spring thaw and mud will affect both sides, but is far more detrimental to the attacker - particularly a highly mobilized one.

Assuming that the Russians can get the attack moving again, one would expect an eventual encirclement of Kiev characterized by the sort of sustained bombardment of urban areas now occurring in the south.

2) The ground attacks in the South, which are supporting efforts, are still progressing, however very slowly. Russian forces seem to have captured Kherson and no doubt are attempting to generate combat power to drive on Odessa and Mariupol.

3) The battle for Kharkov continues with Russian forces resorting to planned bombardment of urban and civic areas.

The greater success in the south can be attributed to the major supporting depot and staging infrastructure in Crimea which shortens lines of resupply dramatically.

4) The air space above Ukraine is still contested. Russia can exercise local and time limited air superiority, but has been unable to do so across the battlespace.

5) The Russian military is suffering grievous losses in personnel and equipment. Four days ago they admitted to approximately 500 deaths and 1500 wounded. Based on the Russian record of honesty about such matters, I would comfortably estimate the actual numbers or 3X to 4X what was announced and of course there has been at least another 96 hours of combat since that tally. During the whole ten years of the Afghanistan campaign, the Soviet army lost roughly 14,500 killed and 53,000 wounded out of roughly 600,000 involved over that decade. The casualty rate with respect to forces committed in Ukraine is far higher.

To be sure the Russians will do everything in their considerable power to hide these losses, but at this loss rate, they will quickly become apparent to the population.

Additionally, US Army doctrine, built around a force model with far more experienced leadership at platoon and company level deems units unfit for offensive operations when casualties reach 20-25%. I suspect many Russian first echelon formations are at or above that critical loss rate.

6) It is correct that Russia itself is not a military risk. However the best forces in the Russian army are proving remarkably ineffective and are taking meaningful casualties at a rate not seen since WWII. Moreover, while the state is not at risk, I am not sure the same can be said about the current government.

6) War is expensive. Whatever preparations the Russian government has made, whatever its gold and foreign exchange reserves may be, it is still the state of Texas attempting to conduct a foreign war. They are easily burning 1 - 1.5 billion a day based upon a now badly damaged currency. With an inflation rate already north of 8 %, the economy is running the risk of a return to pre-Putin hyperinflation.

a. Roughly half of Russia's foreign reserves are trapped in sanctioned institutions.
b. Though gas is flowing in the pipelines, Russian crude and LNG are being offered at great discount. Interestingly, as of today, most shipping carriers are refusing to carry either regardless of the wishes of prospective buyers.
c. I suspect the upturn in price is hardly perceived as a windfall particularly as those prices also affect their domestic costs.

Were I attempting to exercise economic leverage, this would not be the hand I would wish to hold.

Both the Russian national command authority and military planners have bungled this operation from the outset and they can not continue at this pace, level of incompetence, or expense indefinitely. Most significantly, that incompetence has put the whole developed world at risk.

I see four possible outcomes:

1) Partial Russian withdrawal.

A complete withdrawal is extremely unlikely regardless of Putin's health. Acknowledgement of Crimea and a minimal eastern territorial concession is an outcome Ukraine could concede if objections to EU and perhaps NATO membership were dropped. Russia could claim "victory" and Ukraine would rid itself of a constant cause for conflict.

2) Russian "victory" achieved through brutal destruction of infrastructure and mass civilian casualties. Since the coup de main has already failed, this would seem to be the current Russian objective.

The feasibility of this seems to rest, at least for the moment, on the continuing "success" of the southern offensive. An interesting analysis to which I do not have the component data (but I am sure DIA is churning furiously) is how long can such a WWI like offensive battle be sustained. And it is important to remember that General Raputitsa (the Russian thaw) will enter the fight in the south before he does the north.

3) Russian miscalculation likely driven by desperation.

As we discuss this, major staging areas are being developed on the Polish and Hungarian borders with Ukraine for the onward shipment of humanitarian relief supplies and weaponry. Those NATO forward operating bases will pose a tempting target to the leadership of a collapsing military operation. Whether ordered by Putin or a subordinate commander, a strike against one or more of these depots (particularly by a tactical nuclear weapon) would be an act of war. I am confident that NATO would respond immediately and in kind with strikes at either or both staging areas in the Crimea and Belarus. Obviously this could and perhaps likely would spiral out of control into a full nuclear exchange.

4) A new cold war with a new iron curtain running along the Dnieper River.

If the Ukrainians continue to fight, I see little evidence that the Russian military is capable of occupying and subduing the whole country. The Dnieper, as a limit of advance might be achievable. In such a scenario, the West will quickly recover economically, but the Russian people potentially will be looking at another Soviet-like economic dark age.

Numerous news stories are out today concerning a potential declaration of martial law by Putin in Russia as early as tomorrow. Numerous Russian nationals with means seem to be leaving the country ahead of such draconian measures.

Who knows the veracity of these reports. But should such a state of emergency be declared it would not exactly be the action of an enlightened government on a noble quest to liberate a neighbor from fascism - or the action of a government that believes it is "winning." No doubt it would be couched in the terms of the "threat" posed by NATO.

'Thousands' of Russians flee amid fears Putin will declare martial law after protests

Fears are growing Russia could impose martial law on the country after a wave of mass protests against the invasion of Ukraine.

www.lbc.co.uk

Vladimir Putin may declare martial law in Russia. Here's what it would mean for Russians.

As the invasion of Ukraine grinds on and unrest grows in Russia, Putin may declare martial law to crack down on opposition to the incursion.

www.usatoday.com

Thanks again for the in-depth analysis! IMHO, better than 99% of what is found on the internet regarding the war.

Much appreciated.

 

[sgt_zim]

footage from Ukraine. Rough to watch. NSFW

https://www.reddit.com/r/ukraine/comments/t6cxq1

 

[Scott CWO]

An analysis

https://www.understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/Russian%20Operations%20Assessments%20March%202.pdf

@sgt_zim please keep these updates coming. They are awesome and way more detailed than anything I see in the media!

 

[Randy F]

Putin Loses No Matter How This Plays Out, But We Might Too - War on the Rocks

Editor’s note: This is an updated and adapted version of an article originally published in the European publication Le Grand Continent, in French,

warontherocks.com

Interesting commentary from a European (French) perspective written a couple of days ago.

Wow, now that is interesting. Thanks. Now, how to keep the pressure on, but not too much.

Hour to hour this gets harder to stand back and watch while we pick the pocket of the bully while he beats up the little guy.

 

[Scott CWO]

The US spent 777 billion on defense in 2021, Russia spent 60 billion, roughly the same amount as the United Kingdom yet Russia's military consists of over 1 million active duty compared to the UK's 140,000. When you take into consideration the size of their respective areas of operation it becomes apparent that the Russian military is grossly underfunded.

Now I'm not a military expert, I never served in the military but it doesn't take a mastermind to figure out that an underfunded enterprise will be forced to cut corners somewhere. So what has been underfunded in the Russian military? Training, maintenance of systems and equipment, development and purchase of new equipment, pay for troops, logistical stockpiles or, all of the above?

My point is in agreement with (I believe Red Leg, I've read to many posts) the Russian military is far from the juggernaut that many picture it as. Furthermore one has to conclude that given it's limited funding it's ongoing adventures in Syria have further depleted its limited resources.

It's possible Putin based his plan on his experiences with the Eastern Ukraine in 2014 and figured the Russian military would roll through the country without a problem. So far that doesn't seem to be the way it's worked out.

He forgot the words of the great philosopher Mike Tyson, "Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth".

While we spent twelve times more than Russia on our military budget, we don’t get twelve times the people and equipment. Everything here is more expensive. The troop pay scales, medical care, benefits, etc… are better here and all cost way more per person. Same for supplies, equipment and our military bases. We have the best military in the world but the money doesn’t all make it to the troops and to the equipment needed. There’s a lot of regulations requiring a lot of expense to deal with the regulations and higher standards of everything.

 

[reineke]

@sgt_zim
Trump for example said-translated by me:" I'm no expert with regards to NATO, but I've got a lot
of common sense . Firstly, NATO is obsolete-it was created for a Sowiet Union that does not exist anymore". And he called Putin a "Genius" even shortly.

As to the German Army, our leftist governments- and that includes parts of Merkel's party- have done their best to ruin it. That's a sad fact and you can believe me that I have criticized that policy since it began after german reunification. But I trust that Germany, a country of competent soldiers, unfortunately often under incompetent or even criminal leadership, now will correct these mistakes.

 

[Scott CWO]

ABOUT LOOKING FROM THE OTHER SIDE

I'll join the discussion, just in case. The fact is that tomorrow, due to sanctions, there will be a denial of service of Internet servers, and perhaps I will not be able to connect to some foreign resources, if the cross-border Internet persists at all. Whether it will happen or not, and for how many years, I do not know.

I read the articles of One Day with great interest, and I want to say that this material is really minimum at the level of Brzezinski, and in some ways even higher, since the author managed to mostly hold the position of "without anger and partiality”, and in terms of knowledge of the actual material, One Day is in no way inferior to old Zbigniew.
Nevertheless, I will try to show that there can be different views on any event, and based in general on the same facts, the difference is only in the sequence of their presentation and the selection of significant ones – this is where the position manifests itself. On the example of the Caribbean crisis. I quoted a brief description above.
There is nothing to object in general. But you can put the facts in chronological order.
In 1961, the United States began deploying medium-range missiles in southern Italy and Turkey, it was not hidden, Russian diplomats were dissatisfied, they were interested in “why?”, but the answer was like "what can you do?”. There was no protection against such missiles at that time. In the event of an attack on the USSR, Russian similar missiles could in response hit targets only in Europe, but not in America.
In 1961, the United States, completely independent of European affairs, made an attempt to overthrow Castro, who had done nothing wrong up to that time, except that he nationalized the gambling houses of the Italian mafia.
The Soviet government put 2 and 2 together and told Castro: "Listen, man, here's the thing: but our interests coincide at the moment!".
And in 1962, Soviet missiles appeared in Cuba – no worse than Thor or Jupiter. It should be noted that the American government turned out to be much smarter than the Soviet one. The Soviets could not understand why the Americans had placed missiles in Turkey. But the American understood everything at once. The "Caribbean Crisis" broke out. The USSR declared that it would not surrender an ally, and would not be afraid of a nuclear war in the event of a military operation against Cuba (and at that time the ratio of bombs was somewhere 20:1).
But America won. Soviet missiles were withdrawn from Cuba, with great fanfare and publicity, with export control. Then, with much less advertising, missiles were dismantled in Turkey and Southern Italy and, importantly, certain obligations were given to exclude military actions against Cuba. And the Government of Cuba has stood up to our time. At that time, America was ruled by gentlemen, and agreements, even inconvenient ones, were respected.
So the question is: what conclusions from this story have the Russians made for the future, and, by the way, the Cubans, and not only them?

This is just an example, and for almost every episode of history, different interpretations of events and especially motives are possible. You don't have to separate them, but it's better to know if you're going to reach an agreement with the enemy, for obvious reasons.

ABOUT LOOKING FROM THE OTHER SIDE

I'll join the discussion, just in case. The fact is that tomorrow, due to sanctions, there will be a denial of service of Internet servers, and perhaps I will not be able to connect to some foreign resources, if the cross-border Internet persists at all. Whether it will happen or not, and for how many years, I do not know.

I read the articles of One Day with great interest, and I want to say that this material is really minimum at the level of Brzezinski, and in some ways even higher, since the author managed to mostly hold the position of "without anger and partiality”, and in terms of knowledge of the actual material, One Day is in no way inferior to old Zbigniew.
Nevertheless, I will try to show that there can be different views on any event, and based in general on the same facts, the difference is only in the sequence of their presentation and the selection of significant ones – this is where the position manifests itself. On the example of the Caribbean crisis. I quoted a brief description above.
There is nothing to object in general. But you can put the facts in chronological order.
In 1961, the United States began deploying medium-range missiles in southern Italy and Turkey, it was not hidden, Russian diplomats were dissatisfied, they were interested in “why?”, but the answer was like "what can you do?”. There was no protection against such missiles at that time. In the event of an attack on the USSR, Russian similar missiles could in response hit targets only in Europe, but not in America.
In 1961, the United States, completely independent of European affairs, made an attempt to overthrow Castro, who had done nothing wrong up to that time, except that he nationalized the gambling houses of the Italian mafia.
The Soviet government put 2 and 2 together and told Castro: "Listen, man, here's the thing: but our interests coincide at the moment!".
And in 1962, Soviet missiles appeared in Cuba – no worse than Thor or Jupiter. It should be noted that the American government turned out to be much smarter than the Soviet one. The Soviets could not understand why the Americans had placed missiles in Turkey. But the American understood everything at once. The "Caribbean Crisis" broke out. The USSR declared that it would not surrender an ally, and would not be afraid of a nuclear war in the event of a military operation against Cuba (and at that time the ratio of bombs was somewhere 20:1).
But America won. Soviet missiles were withdrawn from Cuba, with great fanfare and publicity, with export control. Then, with much less advertising, missiles were dismantled in Turkey and Southern Italy and, importantly, certain obligations were given to exclude military actions against Cuba. And the Government of Cuba has stood up to our time. At that time, America was ruled by gentlemen, and agreements, even inconvenient ones, were respected.
So the question is: what conclusions from this story have the Russians made for the future, and, by the way, the Cubans, and not only them?

This is just an example, and for almost every episode of history, different interpretations of events and especially motives are possible. You don't have to separate them, but it's better to know if you're going to reach an agreement with the enemy, for obvious reasons.

Okay fine. Yes, many of us are capable of analyzing things from both sides. The problem is that you Russians just don’t understand the American and European side. EXCEPT FOR GERMANY AND ITALY THROUGH THE 1940s, WE WANT NOTHING TO DO WITH INVADING, OCCUPYING OR TAKING YOUR HOMELAND! WE HAVE ALWAYS JUST BEEN TRYING TO CONTAIN YOUR EXPANSION OF COMMUNISM AND YOUR PARANOIA SINCE WWII. IS THAT CLEAR ENOUGH FOR YOU?? WE ONLY PUT MISSILES IN EUROPE TO BLOW YOU TO HELL IF YOU ATTACK US OR NATO, FIRST!! GET OVER YOUR PARANOIA!!

 

[John Wasmuth]

I think if we go by historical calendar dates, the US moved missiles into turkey before USSR moved missiles into Cuba. Simple observation and I always find it interesting that people think they need to yell at the opposing side by using all caps and expect the other side to just roll over and take it….. bad form and no way to win hearts and minds….

 

[Scott CWO]

Th

I think if we go by historical calendar dates, the US moved missiles into turkey before USSR moved missiles into Cuba. Simple observation and I always find it interesting that people think they need to yell at the opposing side by using all caps and expect the other side to just roll over and take it….. bad form and no way to win hearts and minds….

Did you miss the point? The point is that the West doesn’t want the Russian homeland. We only want to defend ourselves and contain them. Only Russians believe that the West wants their land. I wasn’t trying to win hearts and minds. Just hoping they get through their thick skulls that we don’t want their land!

 

[John Wasmuth]

If we hadn’t been paranoid after WW2 we wouldn’t have been strategically setting up house keeping all over Europe. One side says one thing, the other side says another. I think it’d be great if Russia would just leave everyone else alone. And it’d be great if the US would get out of nato and quit paying everyone else’s bills.

 

[Ray B]

One reason for the "paranoia" was a fat guy pounding his shoe on the desk at the UN and yelling We will bury you. Just a thought.

 

[sgt_zim]

If we hadn’t been paranoid after WW2 we wouldn’t have been strategically setting up house keeping all over Europe.

with due respect, I do not believe it was paranoia to expect the worst from someone like Stalin. No idea how widely known Holodomor (for one example) was known in the late 40s and early 50s, but I'm certain it was known at the highest levels in all western governments.

I don't think it is paranoia to be worried about being taken over and then starving to death. That's more or less what they did, or implicitly threatened, on their western border from the baltics south to the adriatic.

 

[spike.t]

BBC News - Ukraine war: 'My city's being shelled, but mum won’t believe me'

Ukraine war: 'My city's being shelled, but mum won’t believe me'

These Ukrainians say their Russian relatives only trust the narratives they see on TV at home.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[Kevin Peacocke]

Okay fine. Yes, many of us are capable of analyzing things from both sides. The problem is that you Russians just don’t understand the American and European side. EXCEPT FOR GERMANY AND ITALY THROUGH THE 1940s, WE WANT NOTHING TO DO WITH INVADING, OCCUPYING OR TAKING YOUR HOMELAND! WE HAVE ALWAYS JUST BEEN TRYING TO CONTAIN YOUR EXPANSION OF COMMUNISM AND YOUR PARANOIA SINCE WWII. IS THAT CLEAR ENOUGH FOR YOU?? WE ONLY PUT MISSILES IN EUROPE TO BLOW YOU TO HELL IF YOU ATTACK US OR NATO, FIRST!! GET OVER YOUR PARANOIA!!

Well said

 

[Red Leg]

If we hadn’t been paranoid after WW2 we wouldn’t have been strategically setting up house keeping all over Europe. One side says one thing, the other side says another. I think it’d be great if Russia would just leave everyone else alone. And it’d be great if the US would get out of nato and quit paying everyone else’s bills.

I must respectfully disagree with that idea. We are a global power with an economic system dependent upon free access to world markets - preferably other capitalist systems. We have been such a power since the conclusion of the Spanish American War. That global economic market (which has nothing to do with the new bogeyman "globalism") is bigger today than it has ever been in our history. "Isolationism" is a luxury for which neither a time machine nor an economy exits to which this nation can return.

NATO was created because we had just fought our second world war in a generation largely as a result of ignoring Europe's issues. Europe was materially and economically prostrate. An ascendant Soviet Union fueled by an expansionist communist ideology had already overrun Eastern Europe and Western Europe was ripe for social upheaval. NATO was created to represent our national interests and those of the member states. It has been extraordinarily successful in doing exactly that for more than seventy years. It remains a cornerstone of our national interests protecting our global markets. Indeed, the organization's success has been one of the major arguments used in claiming its obsolescence.

We don't pay anyone's bills in NATO. Defense expenditures are based upon percentage of GDP. The US currently spends approximately 3.7% of GDP on defense. Of the 1.35 million men and women in US uniform, less than 70,000 are actually deployed in Europe. Most of our focus over the last twenty years has been the Middle East. I should note our NATO partners contributed to the effort in Afghanistan.

One thing this current crisis has done is remove the scales from European eyes. Germany just announced it was doubling its defense expenditures and is embarking upon a significant modernization effort. That will be meaningfully higher than the 2% of GDP which was the Trump era target for member nations.

 

[wesheltonj]

. . . Germany just announced it was doubling its defense expenditures and is embarking upon a significant modernization effort. That will be meaningfully higher than the 2% of GDP which was the Trump era target for member nations.

It’s too bad it took a war in the Ukraine to get Germany and others to pay their 2%.