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Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

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Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#171

Post by mrguyorama »

MattPalmer1086 wrote: post #132
adastra22 wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Civilian rockets and military/strategic rockets are not even remotely similar. Totally different technology driven by vastly different needs. Russia hasn’t had a technological edge in military rocketry since the 1950’s.

I believe they used a hypersonic missile before the US has fielded theirs?

No, that's wrong.

The Kinzhal is just a normal ballistic missile. If it is "hypersonic", so were the missiles the US has sitting in bunkers.

China has the first real "hypersonic" weapon.

Besides, Russia's super awesome hypersonic missile that will totally kill the west is regularly intercepted by the Patriot platform. Because it's just a normal ballistic missile, which is what the Patriot is designed to intercept.

Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#172

Post by mrguyorama »

throwaway_dang wrote: post #76
adastra22 wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is an informed statement. The Russian military had ALWAYS operated on grift and cronyism, all the way back to the napoleonic wars. When shit hits the fan, as in Crimea, WW1, WW2, and Ukraine, it turns out all those paper capabilities don’t exist. Even in the height of the Cold War, ICBM silos in Russia were often flooded and inoperable. Nuclear weapons are extremely sensitive and maintenance heavy devices. They ha…

Russia has its own satellite network, its own rockets, the most advance missiles in the world (and demonstrated usage), has continually bombed Kiev and other parts of Ukraine .. but sure, let's listen to you spout your detached-from-reality comments about nuclear war. Contrast this with many "advanced" nations such as UK, EU, Australia etc. that can't even get a rocket into space. There was a period recently where th…

>the most advance missiles in the world

Uh, by what metric?

>has continually bombed Kiev and other parts of Ukraine

Yeah, with primarily low sophistication weapons invented by a country that has to build everything from scratch in bunkers. This is only possible because Ukraine does not have much in terms of anti-air missile systems and cannot police its airspace.

Meanwhile, Kyiv is giving back plenty of half-assed weapons systems, including multiple jury-rigged light sport aircraft that Russia was unable to keep out of their airspace.

Both combatants are basically children playing with toys right now.

>There was a period recently where the US was relying on Soyuz rockets to get into space.

At no point was the US relying on Soyuz rockets to "get to space". The entire time the US was using Soyuz to ferry astronauts to the collaborative space station we were launching unmanned payloads with multiple launch vehicles, and the military has at no point lost the ability to put payloads into orbit.

Meanwhile in Russia:

>Despite the Russian claims that the missile is on 'combat alert', since its 2022 flight test, it [Sarmat] has experienced four failed tests, the most recent on 21 September 2024.

Russia is not the Soviet Union.

In terms of their nuclear vehicles, I'd bet on enough of them working to be a deterrent, but there's lots of open questions about what percentage. Russia has been running even their Rocket Force on a remarkably small budget compared to the number of warheads they are supporting. Unless they have magical efficiency, they are likely skimping somewhere, and in a military rife with outright fraud and every step of the chain pocketing money that is supposed to be used for procurement, why should we believe the Rocket Force is free of that behavior?

Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#173

Post by ponector »

js8 wrote: post #119
NicoJuicy wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah. Russia is boxing way beyond it's weight. It will collapse like in 1991 if we would even just put some tanks at the border ( eg. At Finland, Poland). ( Russia's banks are pretty vulnerable atm. )

I don't think so. I have russian coworkers who visited their family in Russia recently. They say there is more investment in infrastructure in Russia since the war. Basically, Russian oligarchs cannot invest abroad so they have to do it at home. So there are signs that the war helped Russia to resolve its "dutch disease" (a situation where a state relying on natural resource such as oil stunts its economic growth in…

Economy is so good that they have 20% interest rate. So good that they are cutting workweek, furloughing workers on the biggest car and truck factories. So good that they are limiting petrol sales to 20l per person.

Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#174

Post by mrguyorama »

docdeek wrote: post #97
adastra22 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes a lot more than one nuke that works. They would need hundreds of strikes, probably thousands to ensure they aren’t immediately annihilated in response. There is a game theory to nuclear warfare, and dropping one city buster on a nuclear armed adversary is the sovereign equivalent of suicide-by-cop.

If this is the case, do France and the UK even have a nuclear deterrent? They have just over 500 weapons total between them - is there any chance that they are able to “ensure that they aren’t immediately anihalated” by a Russian response?

Uh yes?

For reference, that number of nuclear weapons is where China decided to draw the line as a nuclear deterrence against the US until recently.

A hundred modern nuclear weapons is plenty to fucking ruin a country, but no, it doesn't not take "just one". Most western countries would survive say, a smuggled terrorist nuke (or 4) just fine. Angry and mourning, but fine.

France alone has enough deterrent in their nuclear weapons. The UK has theirs in submarines, to ensure even if you magically erased the entire British Islands, you still take tens of nukes up the ass.

Nuclear deterrence is not complicated, and it's pretty well understood in public. I don't know why so many people here are so wildly off base.

Meanwhile, all this was always intended to be roughly "backup" to the US's absurd stockpile, including tons of literal gravity drop nukes so we can cosplay Dr Strangelove as the world ends. And the ending of the IRBM treaty means the US has recently told our defense industry that it gets to play with the cool rockets again.

Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#175

Post by mrguyorama »

js8 wrote: post #119
NicoJuicy wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah. Russia is boxing way beyond it's weight. It will collapse like in 1991 if we would even just put some tanks at the border ( eg. At Finland, Poland). ( Russia's banks are pretty vulnerable atm. )

I don't think so. I have russian coworkers who visited their family in Russia recently. They say there is more investment in infrastructure in Russia since the war. Basically, Russian oligarchs cannot invest abroad so they have to do it at home. So there are signs that the war helped Russia to resolve its "dutch disease" (a situation where a state relying on natural resource such as oil stunts its economic growth in…

No, you are misreading the situation. Russia is spending a lot of money and effort and resources internally because it has a near total wartime economy now.

That is not a good thing. Nobody can eat a tank. You can't plow a field with a howitzer. Your economy suffers when you can make more money being a frontline soldier than you can being a skilled worker. Every single Shahed they build is a waste!

And Russia's demographics are fundamentally broken, even before they got hundreds of thousands of Russian young men killed.

They can't keep it going forever. Even if they won the war today, there would be serious repercussions. Russia is lucky they have a good central bank to manage these problems but that isn't magic.

Russia is burning dollars and real human lives for very little gain, again, even if Ukraine capitulated today. Putin already lost the war. Even gaining all of Ukraine, with a pacified populace, would be somewhat Pyrrhic, and just stave off problems.

Meanwhile, Russia's weapons export market, which was significant and meaningful, is just gone. Nobody wants what they sell anymore, and they can't make enough to export some of it anyway.

Also meanwhile, they have not fixed their "dutch disease" since Russia's economy is still entirely reliant on selling gas to people, and what little trade they had other than that is gone.

Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#176

Post by jacquesm »

js8 wrote: post #17

I am not sure what European "leaders" expected. Many of them support Ukraine militarily in the war, so yes, EU is in fact in war with Russia, through Ukraine as a proxy. I oppose the military support to Ukraine. I think it's responsibility of the stronger party, here NATO, to seek deescalation. I also disapprove that the military support for Ukraine was decided undemocratically, without any consideration whether this…

> I oppose the military support to Ukraine.

That makes you a russia supporter in my book.

Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#177

Post by jacquesm »

piva00 wrote: post #73
js8 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To my knowledge, these things are never put forward as an election topic or referendum. There is no discussion with citizens, it's always a fait accompli, we have to do it for national security sort of thing. The blowback is not discussed. I am from Czechia, and Russians attacked Vrbětice munition factory, because it supplied Ukraine. That's the reason. But in media it's always portrayed without this context. FWIW, I…

It shouldn't be a referendum. Representative democracies are supposed to work this way, a government is elected, and they represent their electorate. If the electorate disagrees with the actions the government took they will be voted out the next election cycle, in between it's in the hands of the elected government to make decisions in these matters. > FWIW, I am not opposed to humanitarian and economic help to Ukra…

And more people to use against other countries, because for sure they would enlist every able bodied Ukrainian by keeping their family hostage. They've done this since day #1 in the occupied parts of Ukraine.

Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#178

Post by dgfitz »

js8 wrote: post #142
af78 wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ukraine was left out of NATO. When Russia first invaded in 2014, European leaders looked the other way. Claims that there plans for Ukraine to join NATO and that Russia felt threatened and was forced to attack are just lies to attempt to justify this war. At the time fictions like "Russian-backed separatists" were made up to deny the reality: that it was a foreign invasion. Yet all the signs were there: for example,…

Look it up, in 2007 G.W.Bush invited Ukraine and Georgia to NATO. Also look up PNAC. Unfortunately, there was little interest from the U.S. side to end the cold war - they had to be a "world policeman". Yes EU leaders called for deescalation, that is true. But the U.S., the most important NATO member, did not. There is a 2018 report from RAND that suggests Ukraine should be used as a tool to weaken Russia. The Ukrain…

Why would the US want to fight a proxy war with Russia? Before the recent Ukraine invasion, nobody really cared about Russia. They were just kind of around, cheating at the Olympics was like the big news if anyone talked about Russia.

What does Russia have that US would want to fight a proxy war over? Certainly isn’t technology or natural resources.

Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#179

Post by MattPalmer1086 »

mrguyorama wrote: post #171
MattPalmer1086 wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I believe they used a hypersonic missile before the US has fielded theirs?

No, that's wrong. The Kinzhal is just a normal ballistic missile. If it is "hypersonic", so were the missiles the US has sitting in bunkers. China has the first real "hypersonic" weapon. Besides, Russia's super awesome hypersonic missile that will totally kill the west is regularly intercepted by the Patriot platform. Because it's just a normal ballistic missile, which is what the Patriot is designed to intercept.

I was referring to the Oreshnik, not the Kinzhal. But I'm no missile expert.

Re: Europe Can No Longer Ignore That It's Under Russian Attack

#180

Post by js8 »

dgfitz wrote: post #178
js8 wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Look it up, in 2007 G.W.Bush invited Ukraine and Georgia to NATO. Also look up PNAC. Unfortunately, there was little interest from the U.S. side to end the cold war - they had to be a "world policeman". Yes EU leaders called for deescalation, that is true. But the U.S., the most important NATO member, did not. There is a 2018 report from RAND that suggests Ukraine should be used as a tool to weaken Russia. The Ukrain…

Why would the US want to fight a proxy war with Russia? Before the recent Ukraine invasion, nobody really cared about Russia. They were just kind of around, cheating at the Olympics was like the big news if anyone talked about Russia. What does Russia have that US would want to fight a proxy war over? Certainly isn’t technology or natural resources.

The military industrial complex in the U.S. is constantly lobbying the American government to start and participate in wars. So after Afghanistan, some other place had to be found where to cause trouble, so that ḿilitary contracts can be made.

Now that Ukrainian resolve to fight is cooling off, you can see Trump administration planning more wars - in Palestine, Yemen, Iran, Venezuela..

These operations benefit wealthy class in the U.S. (the profit from government contracts) as well as a fat layer of middle class Americans who are involved in making wars.

Every country that exports weapons has this incentive, including Russia, but the U.S. is by far the largest country producing weapons it doesn't need internally. International arms trade should be IMHO completely banned, because it gives (capitalist) countries strong motivation to cause wars. It's a negative externality.

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