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Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

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Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#91

Post by walkhour »

tokai wrote: post #84
walkhour wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rusia has been inching forwards for months. That's just a fact. Propaganda has got to you.

No propaganda has clearly gotten to you. Occupied Ukrainian territory peaked in march last year. This is a fact, there is nothing to argue. Russia's winter offensive is literally slower than a snails pace.

Please quote the statement that I wrote that you think it's propaganda.

I'll do the same:

> Russia has gone backwards for a year now.

This is false, Russia went backwards, and then went forwards. Maybe you meant to say "has gone backwards with respect to where it was last year". That is true.

Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#92

Post by tokai »

smcl wrote: post #60
codedokode wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because tanks are expensive and sending prisoners with AK-47 to storm enemy trenches is much cheaper.

So you're saying they've got this enormous fleet of tanks that they've yet to deploy but which could turn the tide of the war ... and they're just sitting on them? I don't buy it.

Its a classic russian strategy for coping. They will state that they are choosing to loose and that they could win if they wanted. It's unclear what exactly this helps, other than making them seem incompetent and willing to let people die when it could have been avoided.

Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#93

Post by smcl »

mcv wrote: post #89
smcl wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> many thousands of high-quality Soviet tanks I'm curious why they have chosen not to deploy them, then.

Because they're old rust-buckets that are only good as supplies of replacement parts for the tanks that still work. Have you seen that smoking aircraft carrier? Russian military equipment is often in a terrible state. Of course they also have this brand new super tank, the T-14 Armata. No idea why they're not fielding that one, but I suspect it doesn't work.

Yep I don’t believe the described enormous, modern tank fleet exists. T-14 exists and probably does work fine, it just doesn’t exist in sufficient numbers to matter.

Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#94

Post by JumpCrisscross »

codedokode wrote: post #83
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Rusia has been inching forwards for months Emphasis on inches. Ukraine War Mapper [1] does a good job documenting the line of control. It's not a good look for what, until recently, looked like a dominating regional power. [1] https://twitter.com/war_mapper

Even if Russia is advancing 100 meters (300 feet) a day eventually it will reach the Western point of Ukraine unless something changes.

> if Russia is advancing 100 meters (300 feet) a day eventually it will reach the Western point of Ukraine unless something changes

Something is changing every day as Russia's annual defence budget's worth of modern arms and training are deployed by Kyiv [1][2].

[1] https://www.cfr.org/article/how-much-aid-has-us-sent-ukraine...

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_budget_of_Russia

Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#95

Post by elif »

codedokode wrote: post #48
elif wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What of the fact that multi-million dollar tanks are being taken out by $500 drones?

If you talk about kamikadze drones then a simple fishing net can protect against them. Also, are Western tanks immune to $500 drones?

So you manage to catch a 180kph drone with a fish net. Impressive.

Congratulations now you've traded a soldier with better reflexes than most professional baseball players for a $500 drone.

Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#96

Post by codedokode »

smcl wrote: post #60
codedokode wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because tanks are expensive and sending prisoners with AK-47 to storm enemy trenches is much cheaper.

So you're saying they've got this enormous fleet of tanks that they've yet to deploy but which could turn the tide of the war ... and they're just sitting on them? I don't buy it.

I just wrote that Russia has lot of tanks so it has reserves to replace lost ones; I didn't write that using them all at once can give any advantage.

Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#97

Post by tokai »

walkhour wrote: post #91
tokai wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No propaganda has clearly gotten to you. Occupied Ukrainian territory peaked in march last year. This is a fact, there is nothing to argue. Russia's winter offensive is literally slower than a snails pace.

Please quote the statement that I wrote that you think it's propaganda. I'll do the same: > Russia has gone backwards for a year now. This is false, Russia went backwards, and then went forwards. Maybe you meant to say "has gone backwards with respect to where it was last year". That is true.

Thank you for acknowledging what I wrote is true. When you have two interpretations of what someone write, and one is obviously true and the other is a strawman, please don't choose to argue against the false interpretation. It's against HN's guidelines.

Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#98

Post by DiscoDays »

dreen wrote: post #19
sovietmudkipz wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m confused about what group of people you’re wanting to offer this to. The Russians who already left Russia to dodge the draft probably don’t need help leaving Russia. The people critical of Putin and who are in Russia, and the people who don’t want to be a part of the war and who are in Russia would probably appreciate being able to more easily leave. What do you mean when you say “vulnerable?” Is it just verbal f…

I have a Russian friend working in IT in Poland and he fears deportation. Unfortunately these things are reportedly happening, the sentiment should be anti-Putin but ends up being anti-Russian, mostly thanks to Russians like these: https://t.me/glavredinfo/61841

> Unfortunately these things are reportedly happening, the sentiment should be anti-Putin but ends up being anti-Russian, mostly thanks to Russians like these: https://t.me/glavredinfo/61841

If you don't mind me asking, why should the sentiment be anti-Putin? What makes you think that the war is not being supported by a significant fraction (if not majority) of the Russian population?

Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#99

Post by mcv »

medo-bear wrote: post #71
hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It will not be the end of the war, but the West, and especially Europe, will have an aggressive bully at its borders who already proved it can murder and torture people ruthlessly. So the economy will focus on arms race once again until someone in Russia finally understands it doesn't make any sense.

that agressive bully was much further west 30+ years ago and western europe managed fine then

> that agressive bully was much further west 30+ years ago

And Putin wants all of that back.

> western europe managed fine then

But eastern Europe didn't manage fine, and they're the ones now pushing western Europe into putting more effort into stopping Putin.

Western Europe mostly just wants to trade with Putin. This is most visible in Germany of course (technically central Europe, but the old east-west divide is suddenly relevant again), but also France. They've been slow to accept that Putin is not really a trade partner but an aggressor. They ignored it when Putin destroyed Chechnya. They ignored it when he took chunks out of Georgie. They ignored it when Putin took Crimea. Only when he tried to take Donbass did they finally start to see there might be a problem. Meanwhile Poland and the Baltics have been pointing out that Putin is a threat for two decades now. They were undeniably right to join NATO.

Re: Russia confiscates passports of senior officials to stop defections

#100

Post by mcv »

lm28469 wrote: post #18
smcl wrote: post #9

I commented somewhere a few weeks back[0] that we should probably be making it easier for Russians who are vulnerable (those who left during the mobilisation push, are vocally critical of Putin, or who simply want to not be part of it) and want to defect. There's not a great deal we can do to make it easier on their end - presumably there are some controls on the Russian side on the way out - but if someone does make…

> but if someone does make it to the UK ... we should help them do so. Didn't brexit happen exactly to fight that ?

That was about Poles, not Russians.
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