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Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

reuters.com

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Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#731

Post by jacquesm »

Azsy wrote: post #689
VoodooJuJu wrote: post #668

What is the endgame here? Russia is outclassed by NATO both economically and militarily. If NATO intervenes economically, Russia will lose much. If NATO intervenes militarily, Russia will lose much (but at great cost to NATO). The risk of NATO intervention is high, right? Russia understood this before invading, right? So it seems Russia is accepting a high risk of loss. But it doesn't make sense that a nation as soph…

The risk of NATO intervening by art 5 are zero. Putin is delusional about history and his place in it. But he's not about to literally destroy everything he owns and then some by triggering art 5.

> But he's not about to literally destroy everything he owns and then some by triggering art 5.

Assuming Putin is rational is a dangerous thing.

Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#732

Post by volkl48 »

dijit wrote: post #599
throw_m239339 wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hi, I have friends both in Russia and in Ukraine who live in Lvov. I'm very sorry about what is happening and pray for the lives of people in Ukraine who will suffer from yet another senseless war. I will refrain from commenting on geopolitics but Ukraine is an independent and free nation and no amount of Russian aggression will ever change that.

My great grandfather was from outside L'viv, and almost as a little irony he is polish (and Poland was controlling l'viv at that time). Not to make light of the situation, but the fact that you refer to l'viv as Ukraine (yes, I know we all agree it is) is a miniature proof that things do change and the way we look at things can be modified.

I mean, that was changed with massive forced relocations of the population (in both directions) by the Soviets.

It's not that the "people of Lviv" at the time stopped seeing themselves as Polish, it's that nearly the entire Polish population of the city was forced to relocate to Poland's post-war borders.

Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#733

Post by leto_ii »

JPLeRouzic wrote: post #702
BurningFrog wrote: post #670

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia has thousands of nuclear missiles. This makes them immune to NATO invasion.

It's an horrific idea, but what if Russia does not stop after invading Ukraine? What if they aim to "liberate" Moldavia, Bulgaria, Serbia and encircling Romania? After all, Putin told 2 days ago he wants NATO out of Romania and Bulgaria: https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2022/01/21/get-out-of-romania...

> What if they aim to "liberate" Moldavia, Bulgaria, Serbia and encircling Romania?

An attack on Moldova is not beyond conceivable. Bulgaria and Romania however are NATO members with US troops stationed there - Russia will not risk WW3 over those countries.

Serbia is a bit far to be invaded without a lot of other things happening before that.

Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#734

Post by nindalf »

Dolores12 wrote: post #693
VoodooJuJu wrote: post #668

What is the endgame here? Russia is outclassed by NATO both economically and militarily. If NATO intervenes economically, Russia will lose much. If NATO intervenes militarily, Russia will lose much (but at great cost to NATO). The risk of NATO intervention is high, right? Russia understood this before invading, right? So it seems Russia is accepting a high risk of loss. But it doesn't make sense that a nation as soph…

> Is Russia just suicidal? Russia has no other choice. When USSR in 1962 [0] did something similar to USA, USA was not happy and it could end up really bad. How is this situation is different? National security is paramount. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuban_Missile_Crisis

It takes a brave tankie to post this on HN. Godspeed comrade.

Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#735

Post by blablabla123 »

VoodooJuJu wrote: post #668

What is the endgame here? Russia is outclassed by NATO both economically and militarily. If NATO intervenes economically, Russia will lose much. If NATO intervenes militarily, Russia will lose much (but at great cost to NATO). The risk of NATO intervention is high, right? Russia understood this before invading, right? So it seems Russia is accepting a high risk of loss. But it doesn't make sense that a nation as soph…

IMHO the only logical explanation is either that Putin is truly delusional (which doesn't seem very far fetched if you saw his 1h speech/theater) or he wants to reinstate a soviet union'ish government (just consider how he dealt with oligarchs that didn't comply with him)

Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#736

Post by zer0tonin »

ericmay wrote: post #706
VoodooJuJu wrote: post #668

What is the endgame here? Russia is outclassed by NATO both economically and militarily. If NATO intervenes economically, Russia will lose much. If NATO intervenes militarily, Russia will lose much (but at great cost to NATO). The risk of NATO intervention is high, right? Russia understood this before invading, right? So it seems Russia is accepting a high risk of loss. But it doesn't make sense that a nation as soph…

Long story short, Putin's plan is, depending on how Ukraine goes, to further attack Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, maybe Finland (they'll join NATO by the end of the year if not sooner as will Sweden), maybe Poland , and push the United States and UK out of Europe. If Ukraine goes very well, this will be sooner. If Ukraine goes poorly but he still wins and installs a puppet government, it'll be on a longer time…

I really want to believe that you're wrong, but idk anymore.

Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#737

Post by ironcurtain »

phlipski wrote: post #681
VoodooJuJu wrote: post #668

What is the endgame here? Russia is outclassed by NATO both economically and militarily. If NATO intervenes economically, Russia will lose much. If NATO intervenes militarily, Russia will lose much (but at great cost to NATO). The risk of NATO intervention is high, right? Russia understood this before invading, right? So it seems Russia is accepting a high risk of loss. But it doesn't make sense that a nation as soph…

I think the only thing that makes sense is Putin's unchecked power (inside Russia) has essentially made him not give a damn anymore. He's rich and powerful and reaching end of his life. He might be physically ill - we don't know. And this is his chance to try to rebuild the USSR consequences be damned.

No post body was provided.

Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#738

Post by ericmay »

politician wrote: post #728
ericmay wrote: post #706

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Long story short, Putin's plan is, depending on how Ukraine goes, to further attack Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, maybe Finland (they'll join NATO by the end of the year if not sooner as will Sweden), maybe Poland , and push the United States and UK out of Europe. If Ukraine goes very well, this will be sooner. If Ukraine goes poorly but he still wins and installs a puppet government, it'll be on a longer time…

I disagree. These plays have been available since the establishment of the nuclear deterrent. The soft-peddling from the US and NATO is indicative of their respect for the deterrent. People calling for NATO to counterattack are delusional. NATO and Russia still benefit from minimizing shared borders, so I don't think Russia will annex Ukraine and instead will leave it demilitarized.

Look I hope you're right. I want to agree with you 100%. But just neutralizing Ukraine I'm not sure what that actually gets him. He could have gotten diplomatic agreements of some fashion to not have Ukraine NATO (and it wasn't seriously on track to join either). Idk. I hope you're right.

Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#739

Post by heyoni »

jacquesm wrote: post #720
harryf wrote: post #708

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But it doesn't make sense that a nation as sophisticated as Russia would accept such a high risk of loss. Which means that they might actually believe the risk of NATO intervention is low. Or they see it like Poker as an "all in" move. Either lose now on their own terms in Ukraine or eventually they lose anyway as Ukraine joins NATO and Russia's nuclear advantages are "neutralized". Meanwhile there's the chance NAT…

This is pretty close to how I view all this. Putin knows the game is lost and so this is an all-in gambit in the hope of forestalling the inevitable.

From the little I know about history, it seems like Russia has no problem throwing human lives away for the sake of winning any conflict.

Re: Russian forces invade Ukraine after Putin orders attack

#740

Post by ericmay »

zer0tonin wrote: post #736
ericmay wrote: post #706

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Long story short, Putin's plan is, depending on how Ukraine goes, to further attack Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, maybe Finland (they'll join NATO by the end of the year if not sooner as will Sweden), maybe Poland , and push the United States and UK out of Europe. If Ukraine goes very well, this will be sooner. If Ukraine goes poorly but he still wins and installs a puppet government, it'll be on a longer time…

I really want to believe that you're wrong, but idk anymore.

Me too friend. Me too. I think that as described is the worst-case scenario, but also the only one IMO that explains his actions. Hopefully someone else can come in and demolish everything I wrote so I can feel better.
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