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OT: World Politics

MindzEye said:

View: https://x.com/JuliaDavisNews/status/1664317879527915529
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This is obviously tragically hilarious, but it speaks to a truth that Leqoc has brought up a bunch of times over the years. A truth that really does put the spotlight on the "but Nato" lie.

Nato attacking Russia was never a serious threat to the regime. Even if we were politically unified and on board with invading Russia (we're not and never will be), offensive operations against a force the size of Russias would generate losses that are just politically untenable for western nations not facing existential threats. This is before even adding the threat of nuclear retaliation into the math.

But...the promise of nutella, paved roads, and indoor plumbing is a threat to the regime. Seeing the "Little Russians" get it while 70-80% of Russia is too backwards and poor to have it was absolutely a medium or long term threat to the regime. Ukraine getting pumped full of EU money and built up to EU standards within a generation was a massive, massive threat to the Putin regimes ability to maintain its hold over ordinary Russians.

Having Ukraine be next to be transformed was a threat.

small-romanian-city-before-and-after-eu-funds-v0-dkudnri02x9d1.jpg


The EU has a bag of infrastructure standards and they shovel money towards member countries until it's built. Public transit, bike and walking paths, etc, etc.
 
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What's the end game for Ukraine? Keep pushing inside Russia until Putin gives up, withdraws from occupied Ukraine? Or are they going to keep pushing until Putin also gives up Crimean? Or is Ukraine going to try to take away Russian territory and expand Ukraine?
 
CTheBigPicture said:
What's the end game for Ukraine? Keep pushing inside Russia until Putin gives up, withdraws from occupied Ukraine? Or are they going to keep pushing until Putin also gives up Crimean? Or is Ukraine going to try to take away Russian territory and expand Ukraine?
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I can’t imagine that officially annexing any occupied Russian territory is the plan.

Best I can figure is:

  • Attacking soft spots on the Russian border and inside Russia is a better way to bleed & degrade Russian forces than throwing soldiers at entrenched WW1 style defensive Russian positions in Eastern Ukraine.

  • By demonstrating a willingness and ability to attack & hold territory inside Russia proper, they’ll hopefully divert Russian forces and assets out of Ukraine.

  • Taking the war into Russia further harms Putin’s strongman image in Russia and boosts morale back home in Ukraine.

  • Every Russian settlement, town & city that gets turned into a smoking ruin of a war zone is hopefully one less inside Ukraine that’ll suffer the same fate.

  • They seem to be capturing scores of young Russian conscripts & Kadryov’s Chechens—who can either be kept out of the fight, or exchanged for Ukrainian POW’s

  • If this ever does reach a stage where serious negotiations are being done to end the conflict (which I can’t imagine happening unless Putin dies/is killed/is overthrown in a palace coup), holding Russian territory hostage strengthens Ukraine’s negotiating position
 
CTheBigPicture said:
What's the end game for Ukraine? Keep pushing inside Russia until Putin gives up, withdraws from occupied Ukraine? Or are they going to keep pushing until Putin also gives up Crimean? Or is Ukraine going to try to take away Russian territory and expand Ukraine?
Click to expand...
I mean we've spent a couple of years wondering what the end game is for Russia, so turnabout is fair play I suppose.

I heard someone say recently (can't remember if it was in a tweet or video) that this could in theory be a good thing for the negotiations. I heard the same thing about the Griner negotiations, once she got a lengthy sentence it was the "start" of the endgame. I guess there's something in the Russian mindset that may want grandiose things exchanged both ways. Maybe it ends up being we withdraw from Russia and you withdraw from Crimea, and maybe split some land somewhere just to give the Russians the chance to say they "got" something out of this.

Or it's another 2 years of stalemate, at this point it could go in any direction.
 
I think there's only two ways out of this that are full Ukie victories and then a gradient of bad, all the way to full Russian victory.

Full Ukie victories:

- Politicial Regime collapses first: Enough bad news and results have piled up that Putin is disposed of internally. This would probably require the Ukies to retake a fairly significant amount of territory back. With Crimea being the one that means the most culturally/politically to this regime.

- Military collapses first: A combination of logistics breaking beyond repair, equipment losses, and battlefield defeats renders the military unable to continue meaningful combat operations. This seems wild to even consider, but we've already seen that level of collapse in the battle for the Black Sea. It's really not as crazy as it sounds. Russia is heavily dependent on rail infrastructure for it's logistics and that's breaking. It's heavily reliant on inherited stocks of equipment from it's Soviet grand daddy and they're starting to show signs of running dry.

Varying gradient of shit:

- Some sort of negotiated settlement where both sides are exhausted, trade territory back and forth between each other and go to a somewhat temporary standoff at a newly established set of borders. From the Ukie standpoint this ranges from terrible (current borders minus newly controlled Russian territory) to about as close to acceptable as you would ever get (return of Crimea, Kherson, & Zap....Russia takes whatever Donbas territory it holds). This becomes a massive failure if it doesn't allow for fast track Ukie integration into at least the EU as it would just move the chains for Russia and allow them to pick this up in 5-7 years when they've had a chance to reload on weapons.
 
MindzEye said:
This is obviously tragically hilarious, but it speaks to a truth that Leqoc has brought up a bunch of times over the years. A truth that really does put the spotlight on the "but Nato" lie.

Nato attacking Russia was never a serious threat to the regime. Even if we were politically unified and on board with invading Russia (we're not and never well be), offensive operations against a force the size of Russias would generate losses that are just politically untenable for western nations not facing existential threats. This is before even adding the threat of nuclear retaliation into the math.

But...the promise of nutella, paved roads, and indoor plumbing is a threat to the regime. Seeing the "Little Russians" get it while 70-80% of Russia is too backwards and poor to have it was absolutely a medium or long term threat to the regime. Ukraine getting pumped full of EU money and built up to EU standards within a generation was a massive, massive threat to the Putin regimes ability to maintain its hold over ordinary Russians.

Having Ukraine be next to be transformed was a threat.

small-romanian-city-before-and-after-eu-funds-v0-dkudnri02x9d1.jpg


The EU has a bag of infrastructure standards and they shovel money towards member countries until it's built. Public transit, bike and walking paths, etc, etc.
Click to expand...

Yup. Vlad Vexler is very succinct about this: this is about regime survival. There is no threat to Russia. None.

The Ukrainians only had to look across the border to Poland to see the benefits of the EU and aspire for the same. Maidan was the event that put the KGB Mafia into survival mode. They saw a Mussolini/Ceausescu/Gadaffi future, a logical outcome of their brutal mafia regime.

It’s interesting that Tony Blair, at G8 meetings, sensed there was something no quite right about Putin. It’s as if Putin knew he couldn’t live up to their political standards.
 
lecoqsportif said:
Yup. Vlad Vexler is very succinct about this: this is about regime survival. There is no threat to Russia. None.

The Ukrainians only had to look across the border to Poland to see the benefits of the EU and aspire for the same. Maidan was the event that put the KGB Mafia into survival mode. They saw a Mussolini/Ceausescu/Gadaffi future, a logical outcome of their brutal mafia regime.

It’s interesting that Tony Blair, at G8 meetings, sensed there was something no quite right about Putin. It’s as if Putin knew he couldn’t live up to their political standards.
Click to expand...
Interesting history of Taiwan who took a "different path" without it being forced upon them by inner/outside forces:


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AvWUHqsvjKw&t=8s
 
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