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President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

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Re: President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

#121

Post by ClumsyPilot »

danielheath wrote: post #77
the_gipsy wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't Ukraine have a lot more to lose over time? Russia can just flatten the terrain, or ultimately nuke. The reverse isn't possible.

Nukes are a possibility, but MAD has stopped us all using them for many years so far. As far as conventional arms go: Russia has quite a few planes, tanks, and artillery; however, so long as the USA wills it, the Ukraine will have more anti-air missiles, more anti-tank munitions, and more long-range rockets. In any long-range fight, being able to locate your enemy is key; the pentagons ability to identify the locatio…

Does MAD really protect Ukraine?

Edit: suppose the old man has properly lost it.

If Putin drops a tactical nuke on a Ukranian military position, will Nato really respond in kind? Seems like damned if you do, damned if you don't situation.

Re: President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

#123

Post by azangru »

camjw wrote: post #65
_ph_ wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Ukraine can do it, if it gets supplied with the weapons to do it. Even with the weapons they got so far, they managed to hurt the Russian military a lot - hence the mobilization. They got some very powerful weapons, but still limited in number and choice. Just delivering long-range ammunition for HIMARS in large numbers might be enough to break any Russian offensive as all supply and all fixed positions were easy…

Calling Ukraine "The Ukraine" is a Russian tactic to make Ukraine seem less like a country and more like a region. Quoting from wikipedia: > However, since Ukraine's declaration of independence in 1991, [calling Ukraine "The Ukraine"] has become politicised and is now rarer, and style guides advise against its use. US ambassador William Taylor said that using "the Ukraine" implies disregard for Ukrainian sovereignty.…

> Calling Ukraine "The Ukraine" is a Russian tactic...

This is just wrong. If you search for the word Ukraine on the Russian government site kremlin.ru (there is an English-language version), you will find that this word is used there without the article. I am sure you'll get the same results if you search RT's web site.

The article isn't the Russians' doing, especially given that there aren't any articles in most Slavic languages, including Russian. It is a historical happenstance of the English language, probably back from the time when the name Ukraine was perceived as meaning borderland. People using it probably do so because they learnt the word decades ago.

Re: President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

#124

Post by DoingIsLearning »

koonsolo wrote: post #50
TheWoodsy wrote: post #12

Their main propaganda news channel has already said (incorrectly) that they are already fighting NATO and US troops in the breakaway areas. Is it time to make this a reality? I really don't see it ending without it happening. russia has shown that it has no regard for the suffering of any troops of any nationality. So purely from a population perspective, Ukraine will fail eventually unless they can effectively force…

Russians are very inconsistent in their lying. On one hand they say they are already fighting NATO troops, and on the other hand they say that NATO needs to stay away else they will use all means possible. I was in favour that NATO would secure the skies, but that is now too late I guess. Ukraine didn't even receive the latest and best equipment such as battle tanks. Once they receive those (I'm confident they will),…

> I was in favour that NATO would secure the skies

'Securing' skies is a term that has been repeated a lot but in practice it means potentially shooting down Russian aircrafts to 'secure' a corridor.

This would mean a NATO member doing an act of war against Russia _without_ the purpose of defending a NATO member state.

The main argument is where do you draw the line? Why did NATO not provide air support for Georgia in South Ossetia, or for Crimea in 2014 but now does so for Donetsk in 2022?

In my opinion doing so would just give Russian propaganda a stronger argument that NATO is intended on attacking Russia rather than securing it's member states.

Re: President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

#125

Post by krapp »

tazjin wrote: post #98
spaceman_2020 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia was already always going to lose that "superpower" tag the moment the world shifted from hard industrial goods to consumer goods and technology. The first computer, the growth of the Japanese consumer goods industry, and Silicon Valley likely did as much to collapse the Soviet Union as anything else - they were simply out of the picture the moment we started creating software and portable stereos and personal…

Yeah, it's great how Javascript simply replaced industrial processes and our society no longer needs natural resources - only more stars on Github.

Haven't you heard? We're essentially post-scarcity now. Everything is free except developer time. /s

Re: President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

#126

Post by MrRiddle »

TheWoodsy wrote: post #12

Their main propaganda news channel has already said (incorrectly) that they are already fighting NATO and US troops in the breakaway areas. Is it time to make this a reality? I really don't see it ending without it happening. russia has shown that it has no regard for the suffering of any troops of any nationality. So purely from a population perspective, Ukraine will fail eventually unless they can effectively force…

No post body was provided.

Re: President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

#127

Post by trhway »

s8s8discourse wrote: post #81
rozab wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are you talking about? Ukraine has clearly demonstrated its ability to make significant territorial gains in the previous weeks. How on earth are you drawing this conclusion?

I presume he is thinking on the basis of Russia deploying another 200,000 troops and the effect that may have on undoing the gains of late (whether it will or not is another matter...). Extending that thought process, if a partial mobilisation realises 200,000 troops to fight, then the next logical step after that fails is a full mobilisation with pundits suggesting up to 1,000,000 "soldiers". There is some merit in…

>Russia deploying another 200,000 troops

It is a very hard task even to just deploy, let alone with any gain. In February after months and months of training Russia has deployed to Ukraine about that number of the best forces it had (like Kantemirovskaya tank division). We've seen how it went.

The newly mobilized forces, even after 2-3 months of announced training, will be an order of magnitude worse with worse hardware (that if China doesn't help - there is a reason Putin made the announcement right after the Shanghai Organization summit, may be China promised something, though that would most probably accelerate US hardware to Ukraine). Deploying such forces to a battlefield, especially a one like in Ukraine - as they say it is much more harsh than even Chechen war - one risks loosing them as they come. For now Russia announced plans to use them initially in the 2nd/3rd lines of defense.

As an example - during recent Harkiv counter-offensive by Ukraine Russia was trying to stop Ukraine by throwing in significant new, recently recruited, additional forces without any staging, battle order forming, etc. - those forces were just destroyed as they came by Ukraine as a result.

Giving Ukraine more and better weapons will nullify any Russian number advantage and thus is the shortest path to end this war.

Re: President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

#128

Post by sharikous »

threatofrain wrote: post #30
_V_ wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd guess that this will end much sooner than it will come to pure population numbers on RUS/UA side of things. But the prospect of full blown WW3 is now much more real than it was a month ago, that's for sure.

World war? Between what systems of alliance? Does China want to stand with Russia? Esp. if nukes fly as Russia has threatened, what nation will ally themselves with Russia in a full-scale global conflict?

World War in the sense of nuclear weapons and the whole West at war.

Even if it stays that way - Russia against the West - and even if on paper Russia will lose since they are alone - nukes can fly especially over Europe. I'd understand why someone would call that a World War.

There is also a formality in the definition of war vs "special operation". When Russia formally declares war against Ukraine, the West will be considered a cobelligerent if they supply Ukraine with weapons. The partial mobilization is a step towards that

Re: President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

#129

Post by DennisP »

88840-8855 wrote: post #70
MasterYoda wrote: post #28

I really hope the russian/kreml/putin war against Ukraine will end in a epic failure for them. I also hope that frozen russian assets in west can be confiscated to build up Ukraine again, russia has to be accountable and pay for all madness and horrific things they have done.

Oh yeah, super good idea. We had fantastic experience with humiliated nations before. It worked so well for Germany after WW1 /s FACT: the end of this war must be positive for the Russian people, no matter whether Russia loses or wins the military operation. Putin came to power because the West didnt help the former Soviet republics. If Russia is left alone humiliated again then we will have the next anti-western sys…

The worst that will happen to Russia is that they get pushed all the way out of the country they invaded, and maybe lose various assets they have in other foreign countries. Nobody's foolish enough to try to make Russia flat-out surrender, like Germany in WWI.

Caution is certainly warranted but it doesn't seem productive to reward Russia for invading another country.

Re: President Putin has announced a partial mobilization in Russia

#130

Post by the_gipsy »

Neil44 wrote: post #97
yodsanklai wrote: post #13

Stupid question, but what does Putin want exactly? what will end the war?

I partly understand where they're coming from with the 'evil west' moving right into their back yard. The US got pretty upset when the shoe was on the other foot in the Cuban Missile Crisis. But this is all way to out of hand now, it should have been sorted diplomatically, there's no obvious route to de-escalation that anyone finds acceptable.

Macron tried, but other european leaders have their heads stuck in their arse (cater only to their own bubble). USA is happy to sell arms and undermine european and russian economies.
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