Ukraine and the Russian invasion, 2022-24

[Nylock]

Does Tucker Carlson actually believe the shit he comes out with?

Nope. See the latest revelations from the dominion trial for details of his (and other fox news "big names'") duplicity.

 

[Artaxerxes]

Do some homework?

I did!

 

[DownwardDog]

I'd link you to the Bellingcat report mentioned in the article I posted originally but you'd probably dismiss it.

Maybe the plane just did that?

Bellingcat says that the Buk came from the 53rd not that the 53rd did the shootdown. DPR sepratists in leather jackets and adidas trackies pressed the button.

 

[Dystopiary]

TopCat and anyone else who's interested, there's a transcript of the MH17 judgement hearing, operative paragraphs, summary of the day in court etc here:

MH17 trial | District Court of The Hague

The Netherlands, Malaysia, Australia, Belgium and Ukraine are working together to conduct the international criminal investigation of the cause of the crash of flight MH17 and those thought to be responsible. On the basis of the criminal investigation the Dutch Public Prosecution Service (OM) took the decision on 19 June 2019 to prosecute the suspects.

The District Court of The Hague has delivered the judgment in the MH17 criminal case at Schiphol Judicial Complex (JCS) at Badhoevedorp (The Netherlands) on Thursday, 17 November 2022. The judgment in extenso, operative paragraphs, transcript of the MH17 judgment hearing and livestream footage of the verdict can be found on this page.

Guilty -

• Igor Girkin, the military leader of the so-called Donetsk People's Republic, was convicted of deploying the missile and seeking Russian help
• Sergei Dubinsky was found to have ordered and overseen the transport of the Buk missile launcher
• Leonid Kharchenko was found to have overseen the Buk, acting on Dubinsky's instructions.

Oleg Pulatov was acquitted, although the judges found he knew about the missile.



MH17: Three guilty as court finds Russia-controlled group downed airliner

from gosub on the Another Malaysian airliner crashed in Ukraine thread, Bellingcat open source evidence:

MH17 - The Open Source Evidence - bellingcat

 

[Raheem]

This looks potentially not good. Less than an hour before the anniversary, Moscow time.

 

[Chz]

I think a lot of us expected this all along, but thought maybe it was too cynical an approach even for Russians.

Short take: Eventually the West will run out of ammunition, which is not a renewable resource. Whereas warm bodies are and Russia has loads of those.

 

[Rimbaud]

I think a lot of us expected this all along, but thought maybe it was too cynical an approach even for Russians.

Short take: Eventually the West will run out of ammunition, which is not a renewable resource. Whereas warm bodies are and Russia has loads of those.

How long can they keep sending people into the meat grinder before they mutiny?

Edit- Also if that is really the plan it's a bad one. Russia doesn't have unlimited human resources, it has an ageing and shrinking population, and up to a million Russians have fled the country since the war in addition to nearly 150,000 killed. It isn't China or India or even the US, it is barely in the top 10 countries by population and is only a little more populous than Mexico and Japan. Throwing away significantly more young lives than they have already is going to seal Russia's fate as an irrelevance far more than Ukraine joining NATO would.

 

[ska invita]

How long can they keep sending people into the meat grinder before they mutiny?

Edit- Also if that is really the plan it's a bad one. Russia doesn't have unlimited human resources, it has an ageing and shrinking population, and up to a million Russians have fled the country since the war in addition to nearly 150,000 killed. It isn't China or India or even the US, it is barely in the top 10 countries by population and is only a little more populous than Mexico and Japan. Throwing away significantly more young lives than they have already is going to seal Russia's fate as an irrelevance far more than Ukraine joining NATO would.

population ukraine 43million, population russia 143 million.
plus its a brutal dictatorship so good luck dodging the draft.
it seems like war propaganda is broadly effective within russia also.
of course its all madness and a massive russian fuck up, probably they couldve got away with it if they just salami sliced along bits in the south east, but now they are committed and economy and arms production is on a war footing i wouldnt bank on russia just running out of steam

 

[Rimbaud]

population ukraine 43million, population russia 143 million.
plus its a brutal dictatorship so good luck dodging the draft.
it seems like war propaganda is broadly effective within russia also.
of course its all madness and a massive russian fuck up, probably they couldve got away with it if they just salami sliced along bits in the south east, but now they are committed and economy and arms production is on a war footing i wouldnt bank on russia just running out of steam

It's a big difference obviously but it's not THAT big a difference - Ukraine is basically in a total war scenario of national defense with defenders' advantage and increasingly advanced weaponry, while Russia has other security concerns beyond Ukraine and can't throw everything at them. Suppose Georgia decides to take back Abkhazia and South Ossetia? Or Japan takes some of those disputed islands back?

 

[ska invita]

i thought this was a good summation

Win, lose, stalemate or a shock: how might the Ukraine war end?

Five scenarios for the end of the war, from a Russian or Ukrainian breakthrough to a frozen conflict

www.theguardian.com

although these are the lines that really stand out for me, and chime with what ive been trying to say on this thread for a while now

"In reality, if Ukraine is going to force Russia from all its occupied territory, it is likely to take several more offensives, many months at least, and a dramatic change in Kremlin thinking. The worry is that even this is overly optimistic, although it is the strategy that western leaders appears to be selling to their publics. “There is a real problem here in that we may be over-encouraged by Ukraine’s early successes in counterattacking last year,” said James Nixey, a Russia expert at the Chatham House thinktank."

 

[Idris2002]

Does anyone out there know of any accurate estimates of comparative casualties?

In another part of the forest I saw some simps, feebs and three-time losers arguing that Ukraine was losing 8 soldiers for ever 1 Russian casualty, result: "in your face NATOcels, Putins' attritional strategy is working".

I hope it's not working, but I'd also like to know if there's any source, of any kind, that might even have a smidgen of reliability when it comes to that one.

 

[Idris2002]

i thought this was a good summation

Win, lose, stalemate or a shock: how might the Ukraine war end?

Five scenarios for the end of the war, from a Russian or Ukrainian breakthrough to a frozen conflict

www.theguardian.com

although these are the lines that really stand out for me, and chime with what ive been trying to say on this thread for a while now

"In reality, if Ukraine is going to force Russia from all its occupied territory, it is likely to take several more offensives, many months at least, and a dramatic change in Kremlin thinking. The worry is that even this is overly optimistic, although it is the strategy that western leaders appears to be selling to their publics. “There is a real problem here in that we may be over-encouraged by Ukraine’s early successes in counterattacking last year,” said James Nixey, a Russia expert at the Chatham House thinktank."

There's been mood music for a while about Ukraine maybe having to settle for a loss of some eastern territories in return for ending the war. In reality it would do nothing of the sort, and would only kick the can down the road at best. Everything will hinge on the next month or two, and on how well Ukraine does and how badly Russia performs.

 

[redsquirrel]

Does anyone out there know of any accurate estimates of comparative casualties?

In another part of the forest I saw some simps, feebs and three-time losers arguing that Ukraine was losing 8 soldiers for ever 1 Russian casualty, result: "in your face NATOcels, Putins' attritional strategy is working".

I hope it's not working, but I'd also like to know if there's any source, of any kind, that might even have a smidgen of reliability when it comes to that one.

The US military estimated about 100,000 dead for both Russia and Ukraine three months back
I've not seen anything more reliable and more recent.

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

Short take: Eventually the West will run out of ammunition, which is not a renewable resource. Whereas warm bodies are and Russia has loads of those.

Ammo is not renewable but people are?

Ammo takes from minutes to make, a lump of meat to be turned to fertilizer takes over 18 years.

 

[Supine]

An expert on the radio this morning was saying it’d take europe about two years to move to a war economy for making ammunition in the quantities required. Not sure what his thinking was though.

 

[Yossarian]

The US military estimated about 100,000 dead for both Russia and Ukraine three months back
I've not seen anything more reliable and more recent.

More recent, don't know if more reliable:

On Norwegian TV on Jan. 22, Gen. Eirik Kristoffersen, Norway’s defense chief, said estimates were that Russia had suffered 180,000 dead and wounded, while Ukraine had 100,000 killed or wounded in action along with 30,000 civilian deaths. General Kristoffersen, in an email to The New York Times through his spokesman, said that there is “much uncertainty regarding these numbers, as no one at the moment are able to give a good overview. They could be both lower or even higher.”

Senior U.S. officials said this week that they believe the number for Russia is closer to 200,000.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/02/us/politics/ukraine-russia-casualties.html

 

[Bahnhof Strasse]

An expert on the radio this morning was saying it’d take europe about two years to move to a war economy for making ammunition in the quantities required. Not sure what his thinking was though.

It is estimated 12 BILLION rounds of ammunition is sold each year in the USA.

Not sure the US needs to move to a war economy...

 

[agricola]

There's been mood music for a while about Ukraine maybe having to settle for a loss of some eastern territories in return for ending the war. In reality it would do nothing of the sort, and would only kick the can down the road at best. Everything will hinge on the next month or two, and on how well Ukraine does and how badly Russia performs.

I suppose whether the question there is whether kicking the can down the road would be worth it, compared to throwing the dice - its not only Russia who would get to rest, learn, refit and rearm and the argument around the Donbas and Crimea (that they were arbitrarily given to Ukraine during Soviet times and that there is some independent evidence* to suggest the population of those areas might genuinely want closer ties with / be a part of Russia) is the argument Putin has with the most justification to it (obviously not enough to justify what he's done) - so anything beyond that would be much harder for "the world" to accept (especially if it was "the world" who had come up with and guaranteed that peace plan - eg: if Lula's proposal led to a peace).

* of course not the recent referendums

 

[Chz]

So long as Ukraine has territory under dispute, they can't join NATO. Their objective here is to get their territory back and try to join the Atlantic alliance as quickly as possible.

 

[Pickman's model]

Not sure the US needs to move to a war economy...

you can't pop those rounds of ammo in a howitzer or mlrs and expect them to work

 

[TopCat]

Does anyone out there know of any accurate estimates of comparative casualties?

In another part of the forest I saw some simps, feebs and three-time losers arguing that Ukraine was losing 8 soldiers for ever 1 Russian casualty, result: "in your face NATOcels, Putins' attritional strategy is working".

I hope it's not working, but I'd also like to know if there's any source, of any kind, that might even have a smidgen of reliability when it comes to that one.

Ukraine itself has only released "figures" for Russian injured and dead, plus Ukrainian civilian numbers. Nothing from them about their own injured and dead and they are the only authority on this.

 

[Pickman's model]

very interesting article by anatol lieven - in the guardian of all places - For years, Putin didn’t invade Ukraine. What made him finally snap in 2022? | Anatol Lieven

 

[TopCat]

very interesting article by anatol lieven - in the guardian of all places - For years, Putin didn’t invade Ukraine. What made him finally snap in 2022? | Anatol Lieven

Yeah I read that. Definitely a good piece. The Guardian has been doing a little reporting lately on how the world is not united with the "West's" war and has started reporting on why.

 

[cupid_stunt]

So long as Ukraine has territory under dispute, they can't join NATO. Their objective here is to get their territory back and try to join the Atlantic alliance as quickly as possible.

BiB - exactly and something Putin ensured couldn't happened after the 2014 invasion, hence his excuse of Ukraine's possible NATO membership as one of the main reasons for this war was and is nothing more than complete bollocks, despite a tiny number of complete idiots on here swallowing that bullshit.

 

[ska invita]

Not sure the US needs to move to a war economy...

The US IS a war economy

 

[ska invita]

So long as Ukraine has territory under dispute, they can't join NATO. Their objective here is to get their territory back and try to join the Atlantic alliance as quickly as possible.

They've already joined NATO effectively.

 

[strung out]

the argument around the Donbas and Crimea (that they were arbitrarily given to Ukraine during Soviet times)

Only true for Crimea, not Donbas.

 

[strung out]

They've already joined NATO effectively.

Why aren't there NATO troops in Ukraine then?

 

[Pickman's model]

BiB - exactly and something Putin ensured couldn't happened after the 2014 invasion, hence his excuse of Ukraine's possible NATO membership as one of the main reasons for this war was and is nothing more than complete bollocks, despite a tiny number of complete idiots on here swallowing that bullshit.

from the guardian article i link to above. which doesn't make it seem such a batshit idea after all, the bit about the us-ukraine strategic partnership

 

[kebabking]

So long as Ukraine has territory under dispute, they can't join NATO. Their objective here is to get their territory back and try to join the Atlantic alliance as quickly as possible.

My own little outlook on NATO-Ukraine relations is that there are plenty of NATO member states who would be quite happy to see that rule sail off into the shredder. Rules are made by people , and people can change them.

The (settled?) view out here is that if there's any kind of pausing of this conflict that isn't an outright Ukrainian military victory, then Russia will eventually - and not long term eventually - be back for what it wasn't able to achieve in Ukraine, and with a real hard on for the Eastern states, as well as Finland. The betting is that Putin will survive if there's a 'frozen conflict/partition' type result , but not a straightforward loss.

The other settled view out here - people I speak to from Finland to Romania - is that if a) the weapons transfers, and b) Ukrainian membership of NATO had been in place in February 2022, then not one Ukrainian would be dead. That is a view that is very widespread within NATO and the accession states, and that includes the US. That a country has been laid waste, and a quarter to a third of a million people are dead, and another 10 million are refugees and IDP's, because NATO refused to draw a red line on a map is something that weighs very heavily on the military, political, and diplomatic elites from the Arctic to the Med, and from Washington to Tallin.