Ukraine and the Russian invasion, 2022-25

[Bahnhof Strasse]

South of France is a much more expensive place to go on holiday to than Turkey though.

No when the daughter's partner has a house and business there it isn't.

 

[Spymaster]

… what exactly is the repercussion that is feared?

 

[elbows]

the nuclear threat was repeated in retaliation for economic sanctions and mean words.
That's the thing, he could decide to do that anyway.
So everyone is just betting that he won't as long as we just make sure those Polish fighter jets are transferred in some super cunning way etc. That's stopped making sense to me.

Judgement calls in high places are made about which nuclear threats are considered credible and which arent. For long periods of time there have been certain conventions that were reasonably well understood and adhered to in terms of which acts carried the genuine and immediate risk of a large war involving nuclear weapons. On the public rhetorical front those lines have already been a bit blurred by Russia in this conflict, but I anticipate that behind the scenes certain assumptions about the credibility of threats and the genuine risks that are really in play. Lets hope none of those assumptions are faulty.

 

[nogojones]

what's this then, looks like, we might just decide to start shooting your aircraft down if you carry on giving Ukraine weapons.
View attachment 313717

They wont attack us unless we do [some specific thing] is seeming less and less logical to me.

I'm getting strong KH vibes from her

 

[bimble]

ok. He might nuke us all if he gets really cross, i get it. Sending weapons is not perceived as a risk, because it pisses him off but not as much. Just really struggling to accept that this is just the way it is.

 

[eoin_k]

... That's stopped making sense to me.

Looks like you aren't the only one to think that way, since the whole cunning plan has been called off.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Erm, yes, that was my point. There are rules, and sometimes those rules do get broken. Some countries/armies don't 'play by the rules' which is indicative that the civilian population, hospitals, schools, places of worship, ceasefires on humanitarian evacuation routes, journalists are considered fair game and so it's not a 'red herring' to address the issue of what type of weapons are being used and where, because in that kind of situation, the situation is worse - if that's imaginable.

Some people seem to be putting words in my mouth and projecting on me a kind of attitude of 'that's all right then' regarding the use of conventional weapons against civilians.

Didn't mean to imply anything along these lines by my earlier post. Apologies. FTR I can't recall disagreeing with you about anything and that only applies to about four other people on here.

 

[gosub]

Is this

ok. He might nuke us all if he gets really cross, i get it. Sending weapons is not perceived as a risk, because it pisses him off but not as much. Just really struggling to accept that this is just the way it is.

this Ukrain an formation display team you're talking about ? The ones that have been stuck in Poland since this all started

 

[prunus]

I'm getting strong KH vibes from her

Spoiler tags, please!

 

[dilute micro]

It could be fatal to assume Putin sees the world the same as everyone else and would respond rationally to a show of force which would mean defeat of his imperial dreams.

 

[contadino]

Looks like you aren't the only one to think that way, since the whole cunning plan has been called off.

Bet it hasn't. It's just being done behind closed doors now.

 

[Pickman's model]

Bet it hasn't. It's just being done behind closed doors now.

behind hermetically sealed nuclear bunker doors

 

[Pickman's model]

It could be fatal to assume Putin sees the world the same as everyone else and would respond rationally to a show of force which would mean defeat of his imperial dreams.

there are many rationalities and i think it the height of conceit to believe ours the only 'correct' one

 

[platinumsage]

WMD in Iraq?

 

[dilute micro]

there are many rationalities and i think it the height of conceit to believe ours the only 'correct' one

I think popping off nukes - tactical or big ones - isn't rational just because Russia bit off more than it could chew.

 

[steeplejack]

Largely agree with what you’ve written but I think the main point I’m emphasising here (and where I disagree with you) is that cracking down on everyone under 50 is going to be a very tall order for the state.

Belarus managed it rather nicely for the last two years- if you are a vocal dissident there you face three options: being jailed for ever and a day, exile, or being found having unexpectedly "committed suicide" in the local forest. Your fourth option, which most unsurprisingly take, is bitterness and silence.

Whilst Russia clearly is a much vaster country with a huge population, the security apparatus is well embedded from the very top of the government, and savage. You can;t expect a viable political alternative to emerge from a coalition of oldschool leftist idealists to liberatrian bitcoin bros to agree on anything let alone pull together a credible alternative to Putin or indeed one that isn't jailed / posioned /exiled / voluntarily silenced.

I accept that, as someone else pointed out, there might be a rural/city dimension. I also think that you are right that there will be mass flight and in the short term it’s going to be terrifying and difficult. But, fundamentally, Putin can’t erase a developed culture, transnational networks, lived experience and concomitant assumptions and aspirations easily. It’s harder still if others in authority lack the stomach for the task and aren’t signed up to the vision of winding society back.

Well it all depends on how long Putin himself has, and if there's any substance to the rumours that he is terminally ill hence his action now. I don't give much credence to those rumours. The people who may take over from him aren't much better. People in Russia with some knowledge and access to business / political elites expect this blowback from this to last minimum 3/5 years. In that window Putin absolutely can erase these connections by simply inventing Russian substitutes for them or prohibiting them on pain of long prison sentences. The very companies that are withdrawing from Russia are damaging the very communication networks that a political opposition would need to grow.

Lastly, if we don’t have hope and belief in the people and especially the youth where do you go? That’s why I think it’s important to emphasise the point and amplify and give a platform to their voices

I don't think anyone would want anything other than to give these young foilk a platform and voice. It's great that they are being platformed in some cases and given sympathetic hearings in liberal western seminar rooms / opposition web platforms. This coverage and support helps us in our understanding of their persepctive, much more than it helps them make progress politically.

Putin's attempt at a 1930s style crackdown and repression of the under-50s in this 3-5 year window absolutely will succeed. Oddly what may lift the repression is not any action by youthful idealists but unexpected blowback from sanctions in the global economy for the West (Well, I think we've all had enough of this Vladimir, don't you?), coupled with the Chinese making ever louder noises of disapproval as the conflict is simply bad for business. These are the kinds of people he listens to.

The tragic young folk singing on their way to a savage beating / worse at the local police station- he doesn't even hear them. A man that can toss away 12000 servicemen's lives in a couple of weeks of fighting, and who knows how many civilian lives, sends cluleless young boys to the front in a literal bin lorry, the way you and I would throw away an empty crisp packet- simply doesn't even notice this stuff, let alone care. That's the maddening thing- this isn't a war of lofty ideals or revolutionary struggle, it's a dead-eyed war of pure greed launched by people who already have enough wealth individually and for their multiple wives / mistresses/chidren, to last a thousand lifetimes.

I'm not trying to be LLETSA / RD2003 here- just feel we should be addressing the facts as they are rather than as we'd like them to be. I would love for this post to be bookmarked and used as perpetual ridicule fodder for me, once the tribunes of the youthful masses have hung Putin's bullet-riddled carcass upside down from a lamp-post in the Urals in 6 months time, and have sent his oligarchs, greasers and servile catchfarts from Lavrov to Nabiullina to an eternal sentence in a cumbling jail in Sovetskaya Gavan. We both know this is not happening.

 

[Pickman's model]

I think popping off nukes - tactical or big ones - isn't rational just because Russia bit off more than it could chew.

and by your own lights you'd be right. however, if you'd paid attention to russian nuclear doctrine you'd know that they see things differently and have done for some years now. and to my mind they have made a quite rational calculation, as you can see from the unwillingness of nato / the united states to take on russia over ukraine. you can find out more on russian nuclear thinking here Escalate to De-Escalate: Russia's Nuclear Deterrence Strategy

 

[dilute micro]

I don't know how many more times I'm going to open this thread on my phone and see the original post about a new military buildup and think Oh no!. And then it hits me.

 

[Pickman's model]

I don't know how many more times I'm going to open this thread on my phone and see the original post about a new military buildup and think Oh no!. And then it hits me.

maybe lazy llama can suggest a settings change as i never get taken to page 1 on a computer or phone

 

[bimble]

and by your own lights you'd be right. however, if you'd paid attention to russian nuclear doctrine you'd know that they see things differently and have done for some years now. and to my mind they have made a quite rational calculation, as you can see from the unwillingness of nato / the united states to take on russia over ukraine. you can find out more on russian nuclear thinking here Escalate to De-Escalate: Russia's Nuclear Deterrence Strategy

good link.
so their own current code of conduct "allows for nuclear weapons use “in response to large-scale aggression utilizing conventional weapons in situations critical to the national security of the Russian Federation.”
That sounds very broad.

 

[Pickman's model]

good link.
so their own current code of conduct "allows for nuclear weapons use “in response to large-scale aggression utilizing conventional weapons in situations critical to the national security of the Russian Federation.”
That sounds very broad.

of course, they want to have some scope for uncertainty as to their intentions

 

[dilute micro]

and by your own lights you'd be right. however, if you'd paid attention to russian nuclear doctrine you'd know that they see things differently and have done for some years now. and to my mind they have made a quite rational calculation, as you can see from the unwillingness of nato / the united states to take on russia over ukraine. you can find out more on russian nuclear thinking here Escalate to De-Escalate: Russia's Nuclear Deterrence Strategy

Still it's baby with the bath water though. Even a tactical nuke in Ukraine is going to cause lots of problems for everybody even if it doesn't start the big one.

 

[contadino]

and by your own lights you'd be right. however, if you'd paid attention to russian nuclear doctrine you'd know that they see things differently and have done for some years now. and to my mind they have made a quite rational calculation, as you can see from the unwillingness of nato / the united states to take on russia over ukraine. you can find out more on russian nuclear thinking here Escalate to De-Escalate: Russia's Nuclear Deterrence Strategy

It'll have to be addressed at some point. Unless it is, we'll be back in the same situation in another few years but with different translators.

 

[Pickman's model]

Still it's baby with the bath water though. Even a tactical nuke in Ukraine is going to cause lots of problems for everybody even if it doesn't start the big one.

frankly by the time the russians even think about letting off a nuclear weapon shit will already have hit the fan. as it has, in ukraine.

 

[bimble]

fucking hell. the Russian Embassy in the Uk has a twitter account and it is using it to do this.

 

[MickiQ]

If you look at various flight tracker apps, you can see flights taking off from near where the Turkish Bayraktar drones are manufactured, on their way to the Ukraine-Poland border

Turkey are probably offering a buy one get one free offer by now, I suspect Bayraktar are going to be putting out the "We Are Hiring" sign pretty soon.

Yes!

The Swiss keep invading them as well

• On 14 October 1968,[6] five Swiss artillery shells accidentally hit Liechtenstein's only ski resort, Malbun. The only recorded damages were to a few chairs belonging to an outdoor restaurant.[7]
• On 26 August 1976, just before midnight, 75 members of the Swiss Army and a number of packhorses mistakenly took a wrong turn and ended up 500 metres into Liechtenstein at Iradug, in Balzers. The Liechtensteiners reportedly offered drinks to the Swiss soldiers.[7]
• On 5 December 1985, anti-aircraft missiles fired by the Swiss Army landed in Liechtenstein amid a winter storm, causing a forest fire in a protected area. Compensation was paid.[8]
• On 13 October 1992, following written orders, Swiss Army recruits unknowingly crossed the border and went to Triesenberg to set up an observation post. Swiss commanders had overlooked the fact that Triesenberg was not on Swiss territory. Switzerland apologized to Liechtenstein for the incident.[9]
• On 3 March 2007, a company of 171 Swiss soldiers mistakenly entered Liechtenstein, as they were disoriented and took a wrong turn due to bad weather conditions. The troops returned to Swiss territory after they had travelled more than 2 km into the country. The Liechtenstein authorities did not discover the incursion and were informed by the Swiss after the incident. The incident was disregarded by both sides. A Liechtenstein spokesman said, "It's not like they invaded with attack elicopters".[10][11]

 

[A380]

what's this then, looks like, we might just decide to start shooting your aircraft down if you carry on giving Ukraine weapons.
View attachment 313717

They wont attack us unless we do [some specific thing] is seeming less and less logical to me.

Adding to my decision that if I or my kids do fly in the next year to only do so on a Chinese airline…

 

[teuchter]

Largely agree with what you’ve written but I think the main point I’m emphasising here (and where I disagree with you) is that cracking down on everyone under 50 is going to be a very tall order for the state. I accept that, as someone else pointed out, there might be a rural/city dimension. I also think that you are right that there will be mass flight and in the short term it’s going to be terrifying and difficult. But, fundamentally, Putin can’t erase a developed culture, transnational networks, lived experience and concomitant assumptions and aspirations easily. It’s harder still if others in authority lack the stomach for the task and aren’t signed up to the vision of winding society back.

Unfortunately watching what's happening in Hong Kong doesn't make me feel too optimistic.

Maybe that's different because the Chinese state is so huge relative to the local population; I don't know.

 

[Pickman's model]

Unfortunately watching what's happening in Hong Kong doesn't make me feel too optimistic.

Maybe that's different because the Chinese state is so huge relative to the local population; I don't know.

he said putin couldn't do it easily. and i don't think the chinese have found it too easy in hong kong either. but if you look at what they've done and what they're doing in xinjiang then you'd know the chinese state are quite determined to get their own way.

 

[JimW]

...



I don't think anyone would want anything other than to give these young foilk a platform and voice. It's great that they are being platformed in some cases and given sympathetic hearings in liberal western seminar rooms / opposition web platforms. This coverage and support helps us in our understanding of their persepctive, much more than it helps them make progress politically.

...

Resonates with what I've seen here - China has been enormously successful at closing down any civic space, and where they've met pushback it's all been in the older sorts of networking - at thw mass workplace, among peasant communities with well-embedded kinship networks etc., the younger generation of workers in the the third sector etc in town are linked more widely but it's shallow and via technology the state controls.