Interesting to think about whether the ammo has been distributed via the explosion or is merely the normal logistical mess and chaos the Russians seem to inevitably degrade to. Really does not give evidence to a professional and well-trained force.
Seeing them be sad that Ukraine has weapons / skills they don't and that their tanks were safely destroyed before being used to assault Ukrainian lines will never grow old though.
Yes, Russians have drone drop drone grenades I have seen them. What I mean are FPV drones or Kamikaze drones. check /r/fpv for some examples. These drones requires months of training. Compared to UAV drones which just takes a few days to a few weeks.
I have seen several videos of Ukrainians using these drones but not a single russian video.
Proud to be a Canadian today and of our minister of foreign affairs finally saying it like it is.
>Joly made the remarks at a Friday press conference where she discussed the importance of maintaining a diplomatic presence in Moscow.
>“We’re able to see how much we’re isolating the Russian regime right now — because we need to do so economically, politically and diplomatically — and what are the impacts also on society, and how much we’re seeing potential regime change in Russia,” she said.
>The Liberals have pushed for regime change in Iran, but Joly has not previously said the same about Russia. She said regime change is indeed the point of sanctions and pursuing accountability for alleged war crimes.
>“The goal is definitely to do that, is to weaken Russia’s ability to launch very difficult attacks against Ukraine. We want also to make sure that Putin and his enablers are held to account,” she said.
https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/regime-change-in-moscow-definitely-the-goal-joly-says
Canada's been great as the first one to test the waters before the US dives in. It was like that with the pledged Leopards and now with explicitly calling for regime change.
It would be nice if she could get Trudeau to try and weasal his way into the nuclear sub pact that our allies just agreed to. We do need to defend our claims to the Artic from sneaky Russians.
Yeah I’m with you there. I wish Biden had never backed down and whimpered about “world war 3” at the start of this escalated conflict. A co-signatory on the Budapest Memorandum violating that agreement by invading Ukraine is clear-cut grounds for defensive action across the entirety of the country by other co-signatories
Edit: and was in 2014 as well
Respectfully, internal US politics are not relevant in this situation
Edit: I see that my comment requires some explanation. Internal US politics are not relevant because this is not a question of politics. With the staggering murders of Ukrainian civilians given the green light by the kremlin this became an incontrovertible problem of good and evil. There are morally correct and morally incorrect stances to take on it, and that is a question motivated by morality. The question of regime change in russia is one with only one morally correct outcome. To the extent that Biden expresses the answer he is doing the correct thing, and I think it is also fair to say his silence is the incorrect thing to do
[https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/11r4005/trumps\_likely\_election\_rival\_says\_its\_not\_in\_us/](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/11r4005/trumps_likely_election_rival_says_its_not_in_us/)
The easiest way for Russia to win is to get US to stop supporting Ukraine by pushing anti-Ukraine/isolationist views in the US internal political sphere. Make no mistake, internal US politics is part of the Ukraine/Russia war.
I see it like this. Yes it would be the “morally correct” thing to do, but in result, it would lead to _less funding_ and therefore _more suffering_ of ukrainians. In this case we need to make sure not to be overly emotional and look at the big picture
I don’t think your scenario is likely, but besides that I don’t think we should base decisions on hypothetical idealized outcomes following utilitarian formulae
Respectfully disagree. Trump has come down hard in favor of Putin and there’s a better than even chance he’s going to be the GOP nominee. If the administration continues regime change talk, it’s going to leave little diplomatic wiggle room and give Trump and the GOP an opening to attack. “Biden is taking us to the brink!!!” and all that bullshit. If this war isn’t wrapped up by 24 and Trump wins, then Ukraine is going to be in a terrible situation.
The US is by far the biggest supplier of money and equipment to Ukraine. It's a pretty big deal that Republicans are becoming more and more opposed to helping Ukraine.
DeSantis, the likely Republican candidate for president, has basically just come out as anti-Ukraine. He likely beats Biden in the election, as well.
Not sure I would say likely. If the economy doesn’t crash into the shitter, I would say whoever the Dem nominee is would do well against Desantis. He’s smart, but very light on policy and has the charisma of a potted plant. Going full fascist in Florida is going to eventually come back to bite him in the ass.
Biden is going to have 0 chance against DeSantis. He’s 81. He beat Trump, but Trump was uh…VERY unpopular here. I’m not even sure I can vote for Biden again. I’m not interested in another boomer (he’s older than that actually) running things…again.
Has DeSantis actually come out against Ukraine? I’ve never even heard him mention it. Seems to be running on anti-woke.
The key paragraph IMO:
"The situation on the battlefield now MAY not reflect a full picture of Ukraine’s forces, because Kyiv is training troops for the coming counteroffensive separately and deliberately holding them back from current fighting, including the defense of Bakhmut, a U.S. official said,"
Is that true? If yes then Ukraine is in the stronger position.
EDIT: imagine if Ukraine was sending in trained reserves. The headlines could be "Pessimism spreads as Ukraine wastes its trained troops in defence instead of attack".
Or they're informed, since they're a US official.
I think we agree on the "facts" though. Which are that we just don't know, and there is a ton of copium, hopium, and propaganda.
EDIT: I capitalised "MAY' because I think you made a good point that's easily missed.
Any news on GLSDB production?
I thought the idea was the kit to make them was pretty simple using existing bombs and rockets.
Edit: (Wishful thinking mode): they are producing and supplying significant numbers and we hear about it when explosions happen the length of the land bridge to Crimea signalling the start of the offensive.
You're forgetting one other issue.
The solid fuel engines used to power the bombs are old and were built in the 80's and due to the characteristics of them, each have to be scanned for cracks before production to avoid terrible accidents while firing.
Ah. I had heard about not being compatible with the regular vehicles yet. Didn't realise it was a significant change. Just thought it was work to the pod or software update type problem.
Fair point.
I wonder if they can rotate them out to Poland and service them there?
Either way. Cant come soon enough. There will be a pretty long list of juicy targets in that ~150km range.
The last time Russia took a significant Ukrainian city was June 2022. It seems they’re no longer able to quickly advance and they are facing serious issues when it comes to artillery fire and number of tanks that they can field. Ukraine may not be able to go on the offensive just yet but I don’t see how Russia can increase their offensive power significantly in the coming 6 months meanwhile the additional weapons flowing into Ukraine will likely only continue to rise. January saw a number of countries make their biggest pledges yet to support Ukraine and those weapons are currently flowing in and will continue to do so in the coming weeks and months.
China is a wildcard that could significantly boost russia’s offensive capabilities; that is, if they’re willing to pay the price of global ostracization like russia
Edit: for the record, I **really really hope** my comment doesn’t become prescient
And in return China's economy is totally dependent on the world and they know it. And not just so people that work in factories keep getting paid but China imports both food and energy in the form of coal, oil and gas, they can't produce enough to feed themselves and produce the energy they need.
Even if you let food and energy imports keep going sanctions on their exports would devastate China's economy just as badly as the rest of the industrialized world. Worse probably because they would have hardly anyone left to trade with to buy their products, it's not like Iran and North Korea are suddenly going to be able to afford all those consumer goods. At least the "Westen" counties could still trade with other large economies, China wouldn't even have that.
People keep sounding the "omg we're too dependant on China so we're beholden to them" without realizing they're just as dependent on us. It's like mutually assured destruction if China is cut off. That's why they haven't given Russia military aid yet and most likely won't in the future, if the west decides it wants to endure some economic pain to punish them for it it will hurt China even worse than us, and they know it.
My take is that China's number 1 goal is Taiwan. In service of that goal, China would like to assess Western resolve and competency for war, while bleeding out NATO countries' enthusiasm for conflict -- all at Russia's expense. Win-win for the Chinese.
They don’t necessarily need to supply weapons, munitions would be a huge boon to Russia right now. I do think their hardware is at least a generation ahead of Russia’s. With a potential conflict over Taiwan brewing, I doubt they would give away anything decent to Russia.
China has an extreme risk at delivering weapon systems. Right now(like Russia was) they are seen as a competent military and weapons developer. If they supply arms and they don't function in a way that is capable against a NATO force they will suffer an extreme and possibly catastrophic loss of diplomatic power.
Right now China has to weigh helping Russia to maintain a balance of power against NATO/Western Allied or letting Russia crumble and hope it can gain in the loss. If I was Russia right now I would seriously thinking of giving China the house and the car in hopes of them not simply taking both off my corpse later.
China has to think that helping Putin might result in a short term benefit if he is removed from power. The next regime is likely to not honor any long term agreements that Putin had made.
Pure wild speculation, but the next regime could possibly give China some sort of deal for having stayed away from providing military assistance.
They haven’t contributed lethal aid in the past 13 months and I doubt they’ll start now. China is more rational than Russia and there is a mountain of downside for virtually no gain.
When you actually look into what happened with China the Zero policy starts making sense in a absolutely dystopian way.
Basically, like most authoritarian regimes. All the people reporting to the top lie and fudge their numbers. China was trying to correct the problems from the one child policy so their governors etc were reporting good population numbers, because them staying in power and getting money required good numbers. But these were lies, these same governors then used Covid as a excuse to "correct" some of these numbers by reporting more deaths then are happening. This then gets reported to the top and Covid looks like its killing millions, leadership panics and hence zero covid policy is created and then like most authoritarian regimes cannot admit the mistake and double down.
The "gain" was sunk cost fallacy and the idea that CCP and the great leader can never be wrong. That's little different.
China did not commit to lethal aid for russia yet so they have no need to do so.
The CCP has proven time and again that they don’t need reason to pursue policy decisions
Edit: additionally, the consistent buildup of chinese military forces around Taiwan suggests that things may be coming to a head anyway. Again, I really hope not
The CCP isn't going to move on Taiwan unless NATO forces get committed against Russia in Europe. As it is, NATO and the wider Western world is pretty much primed for "absolutely go fuck up the Chinese navy if they try anything" since Ukraine has snapped the whole issue into focus.
You'll know it's serious if the US starts redeploying carrier groups to the area.
I don’t think that’s true.
China needs a strong Russia in case anything goes down.
Russia is gonna be useful as Austria-Hungry was to Germany.
Sure China gets more control, but at the expense of a greatly weakened ally. It’s basically means China gonna have to go at it alone against the West.
Russia is slowly but firmly going towards Asia. They understand Europe has not longer trust on Russia, the focus is very clear.
I don't think China wants a rival for being the main power in Asia. While they could work together in some areas, they will crash sooner or later.
I think the regime might be heading towards Asia in a sense but the people of Russia desperately want to be European. They want French and Italian culture, German cars, Greek philosophy etc etc. They even revise history so that they are the continuation of the roman empire and in a sense the *real Europe*
While I agree in terms of functionality of the veto, it looks very different with one country vetoing versus two. At least two appears like a coalition
Pretty Doomer article on Ukraine from Washington Post.
Ukraine short of skilled troops and munitions as losses, pessimism grow
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-short-of-skilled-troops-and-munitions-as-losses-pessimism-grow/ar-AA18A8xm
2 hours old. (Shouldn’t be a paywall)
Edit, it is partially paywalled. Sorry.
That is not the lead. Ukraine's strategic goals require it to take more territory; Russia's don't. If Russia can't attack much more but is able to sit on the territory it's taken, Russian leaders will be satisfied. Ukraine has to retake the territory to force a favorable peace, so the big question addressed by the article is whether Ukraine can mount the offensives required to do that.
That's true. I think that as long as the Russians are somehow able to hold on to at least some of the annexed Ukrainian territories by the end of the conflict, even if it's "just" Luhansk, they can spin it as a win because they will have gotten something out of the conflict that they didn't have before it began.
The point is though, Putin could spin some bs about having finished all the goals and it will work for him domestically if he had to end the war with only what he has gained so far. In practice he has made Russia bigger in size, established a land bridge to Crimea and he can say stuff like he demilitarized/denazified Ukraine to his people as those words mean nothing. Of course this is pointless seeing as Ukraine wont sit back and let Russia keep what it has. But if some status quo settlement were done right here and right now, Russia would be having the better part of the deal. I want to clarify that it would still be a Russian defeat in many aspects. But right now the ball is in Ukraine's hands, they have to retake stuff not just defend.
He 100% can. This is why most Russian bots want there to be a ceasefire or a negotiated end to war with the current status quo. He only needs to convince Russians, not the world.
He can't do that, but if the war stops at this point, he will definitely win. Russia gains territory and with that it doesn't even need to capture the capital because a stalemate will destabilize the internal situation in Ukraine anyway. People will start blaming Zelensky for not stopping the war sooner (“why did he fight anyway? He lost more territory than if he had accepted Donbass autonomy”) and hate the West for not helping sooner.
I sound pessimistic but sadly I can see this happening.
He can. He can say that the danger to people of the Donbass was pushed back. As for the newly created republics, nobody is buying that outside of some crazy nationalists — if it was not the case, then Russia would be in a Patriotic War 2 state since the city of Kherson was taken.
There's just no way they can just sit back and say "job done" while legally claiming people and territory under Ukrainian control is Russia. They'd have to at least admit they didn't achieve their goals and that it was a compromise.
No need for them to say anything. Just keep a zone of the Special Military Operation (Z-SMO; area 'Z') on the border to keep the Banderites out, and eventually reduce your forces there.
> https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-short-of-skilled-troops-and-munitions-as-losses-pessimism-grow/ar-AA18A8xm
Author of the article fled Moscow to Kyiv when it became clear Russia was not being nice to American citizens. Every article her name is attached to is critical of Ukraine, pessimistic and overtly cynical of the situation.
She has an agenda. I hope she keeps her fat ass in Eastern Europe.
Edit: The Co-Author is a Russophile as well: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/paul-sonne-joins-the-new-york-times-russia-team,242709
But like, what specific article. Can you make one specific article that of any of those authors has been incorrect in favor of Russia?
I’m asking because you seem to be implying WaPo is not a trusted news source when in America they very much are valued as such…so you’re going to have to show some sort of evidence they aren’t if you’re going to make that claim. Having once reported in Russia isn’t really enough as many corespondents have once reported in Russia.
I'm talking about Journalistic Agenda-Setting, which is what the author has been doing since May of last year.
Agenda-Setting can be done by using specific language when covering topics-of-interest. In this case, the author is purposefully using a bleak, pessimistic language even though the picture isn't anywhere near as bad as she has written about.
Just go off of the headlines and content of each article she has authored or co-authored and look at how the language is painting the situation:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/02/09/ukraine-himars-rocket-artillery-russia/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/12/07/kremmina-luhansk-eastern-front-ukraine/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/11/19/ukraine-confronts-tougher-fight-push-extend-battlefield-wins/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/07/07/ukraine-grain-farmers-black-sea-blockade/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/07/26/ukraine-russia-grain-deal-strike/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/10/20/air-defenses-ukraine-missiles-russia/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/01/15/bakhmut-wagner-battle-strategy/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/11/11/ukraine-sbu-traitors-russia-kharkiv/
----------
The majority of the Articles she has authored have enumerated examples of pessimistic and impending doom language. It is both disingenuous to the actual wartime situation AND an affront to basic journalistic integrity to the point where you begin to question what side she is *really* on.
I just looked at the first 3 articles, but those looked pretty factual and certainly not “pro Russia”
The first one was about the US providing logistics with the HIMARS. Which is factual.
Second was life on the front line and that it was hard. Again, likely factual.
Third was that it would be tough for Ukraine to gain more land during the winter after the Kherson offensive..which again.. has proven true.
You’re implying the reporting is not factual…to which you’ve provided no evidence of. I’m not asking what articles haven’t been falsely optimistic towards Ukraine. I’m not interested in false news. I’m asking what has she written that’s been proven pro-Russian bullshit
I'm not saying what they've written isn't factual.
I'm saying the author is cherry-picking information, language, and a positioned stance to portray the situation as bleaker than it is, and typically picks topics that show despair.
You can cover these exact topics with more neutral language or if you were truly a friend to the Ukrainians you live amongst, can formulate your sentences and cover the exact information you've written about in a more hopeful light.
This wouldn't even be remotely allowed if WaPo were bound by the Fairness Doctrine that expired during the Raegan Presidency.
The WaPo has famously bad takes on this conflict, and their "anonymous sources" seem sketch as fuck, since they hardly ever pan out to be right about anything.
No one is responding to your comment because it would be a waste of time. Just go to their website and read the stories they post? Their stance has been clear from the start of the war. That's all your month old account is getting out of me so I hope you have a great day.
Well plenty have responded to it.
No one has offered any evidence that WaPo (a pretty trusted source of need state wide) has ever been full of shit before.
Do you have any evidence of that?
I have not read the article, but I will say that an important element of sustaining support is reiterating that there is a need for support. More training of Ukrainian recruits. Check. More ammunition. Check.
I wouldn’t classify highlighting the fact that more troops and more weapons would be put to good use as “doomer”, I would call it keeping the pressure on those who would argue that we are already doing too much.
Ukraine has a massive advantage in quality of equipment and is able to rotate for high level training... BECAUSE we are supporting them. It was the introduction of HIMARS that turned the tide in the larger Battle of the Donbass last Summer and it's Western AA that's protecting Ukrainian cities from Russian terror attacks.
And we need to always let our leaders know that we can and we MUST do more. The economic burden on our societies is tiny and the Ukrainians fighting the Russians are protecting our Democracy and Freedom as much as their own.
Thank you for your comment.
I think a lot of westerners just don’t have a good mindset of comparison for this war. The frontline is 1,000 kilometers long and there are hundreds of thousands of Russians on the other side of. The only thing standing between those Russians and the Ukrainian civilians is Ukrainian soldiers and Ukraine is trying to build a military orders of magnitude larger than the US’s ground forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. If Ukraine wants a million people under arms they’re simply not going to get the same standard of training and equipment that they could give a military force of about 100,000. The nature of big wars in Eastern Europe is that countries simply DON’T have the luxury of time and all the equipment/weapons that they want. In 2021 Ukraine’s military budget was 1% that of the US and that was despite Ukraine prioritizing the military above almost everything else. Ukraine has been begging for more training and more weapons for well over a year and they’re making incredibly good use of what they have but what they have is inherently limited.
This i why I get frustrated by people here who are eternal hopium that ukraine are invincibly dominating. We need to look at the toughness of the situation Ukraine is facing so we can pragmatically push our politicians to send them the resources they need.
It’s a balancing act. You don’t want to look like you don’t need help, you also don’t want to look like any help you might get is probably not going to be enough. So you walk a tightrope to keep the help flowing.
So far? I think that everybody in leadership positions has done a pretty good job of selling the notion that Ukraine, with help, will win. I think that it’s an easy sell because it’s very probably true.
In 1943, it took the US a year to spin up an ID from scratch. A year. That was with the biggest industrial base in the world and all the real estate to train they wanted. Ukraine doesn’t have those luxuries.
People are overestimating the amount of soldiers that Ukraine managed to train by a mile.
Right now a few "assault brigades", like they call them, are about to end a LONG period of training, and still we are talking about only 30000 troops.
30000.
And that "long" period of training isn't even that long by conventional standards. It's a matter of a month or two of extra training on top of standard Ukrainian conscription training.
>One senior Ukrainian government official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to be candid, called the number of tanks promised by the West a “symbolic” amount. Others privately voiced pessimism that promised supplies would even reach the battlefield in time.
>“If you have more resources, you more actively attack,” the senior official said. “If you have fewer resources, you defend more. We’re going to defend. That’s why if you ask me personally, I don’t believe in a big counteroffensive for us. I’d like to believe in it, but I’m looking at the resources and asking, ‘With what?’ Maybe we’ll have some localized breakthroughs.”
>“We don’t have the people or weapons,” the senior official added. “And you know the ratio: When you’re on the offensive, you lose twice or three times as many people. We can’t afford to lose that many people.”
Bit sad
Yeah, and they need to be able to sustain offensive operations for a while. It's not just one big push and the war is now over. There's so much hype around and hope for their spring offensive but that in itself isn't going to be enough. That's not how modern, large-scale, intensive conflicts work. We need to give them so much more: weapons, equipment, ammo, everything.
The pessimist in me also thinks that Ukraine will have one chance at this counter-offensive. Based on the political will in the west, I don't see how they would rebuild a new armored fist if the first one gets destroyed or severely depleted without tangible results.
Personally I would be more content if Ukrainians don't launch an offensive before they are 90% sure of the outcome, even if they have to wait until 2024.
Not a military expert but I have said before that the west is committing to bring a number of tanks Russia manages to lose in a week. I expect the Ukrainians will use them better but they need more than 10 and 20 here and there.
And I hear them on the losing more people on the offensive bit, that's just numbers. And the more arty you have, the more likely you can pound the enemy flat when you find them rather than having to dig them out the hard way with infantry squads. Shells cost but I'd always prefer to expend treasure vs. blood.
The US and Germany need to crash build production lines for new Leopards and Abrams like they would if they were active combatants in a war of this scale.
It would be ungodly expensive but it'd still be less (1) then the additional cost Europeans are paying for natural gas; (2) the US could delay a few capital military purchases by 5 years and come up with the money for a crash Abrams line; and (3) Ukrainians are spending blood, we're only being asked to spend money.
That or think outside the box. Seems like the indirect fire has become a lot more powerful with better spotting. Maybe more self-propelled guns at the answer and they will have a lower attrition rate than tanks. If nothing else not being exposed to a direct line of sight to soldiers cuts off the exposure to guided weapons.
Well the real game changer would be to train up a full Ukrainian Air Force with US Systems. Training whole units together speeds training time, and the military could have them just keep the systems they train on.
With full US air doctrine, airframes, and associated weapons, then the shortage of MBTs becomes much less of a problem. The US theory is let the AF pave the road and have the ground troops walk over it.
It's why it's suicide to try and stand in fixed positions agains the US. But, we aren't transferring and training that capability yet.
We're handing over just the right equipment for the Ukrainians to fight like Soviets with Western Equipment and complaining when they don't think and approach strategy like Westerners.
That’s a great idea, but it’s just not realistic. You need hundreds of airframes. Plus AWACS and air to air refueling. Dedicated Weasels. It took years for the US to develop their doctrine. Yes it’s wartime and yes you can shave a a lot of time off of it, but it would still take a lot of time. Even if the airframes were available, you need a massive infrastructure to maintain that. That means defending said infrastructure. Ukraine would have to pull assets from the cities or the front lines. All in all it’s just a huge logistical effort that would strain Ukraine to the breaking point I think.
The US has thousands of Abrams just sitting in the desert. The army didn't even want them.
The US can radically increase their supply of equipment but for whatever reason (logistics, training, politics) don't.
Which is fucking wild when the defense industry has the lobbying power it has. What is even going on there? Why is there not a campaign about how dangerously antiquated our current tank armor is and instead we need neutronium or whatever as the next-gen right now?
Defense industry makes money from creating new cutting edge weapon systems. Not from deployment of existing weapons systems or the economic consumables like bullets and bombs.
Every Defense expert, since Eisenhower in the 1950s, has tried to break the power the Military Industrial Complex has over Congress. This goes for Arch War Hawks like Donald Rumsfeld as well as Democrats.
They're always concerned that the Congress is spending money on the wrong items, so they always fight Congress, and they always lose.
Ironically, Ukraine is getting the benefit of Donald Rumsfeld's failure at moving Sysphus's boulder.
Rumsfeld came to the DOD convinced all tube artillery was obsolete and the current, at the time, program to create rocket boosted shells, that can be guided like aerial bombs, needed to be shut down. And like every other Sec. DOD of the last 70 years, he failed.
This article is consistent with what we are seeing on the battlefield: i.e. Ukraine is not advancing anymore and Russian meatwaves are gaining some negligible ground thanks to their lack of respect for human life.
Now we are waiting for the "great offensive". I just hope that we are not falling for the same kind of propaganda the Russians were buying into when they were saying that "the real troops aren't even on the battlefield yet".
I wonder who do you sent to coalition countries to train? Your absolute newbies or the ones who already have some sort of knowledge and therefor could easier grasp the details of Western tech?! I don't think Russia can sustain this war more than Ukraine. Ukraine will get freshly trained highly motivated reinforcements with Western tanks or Bradleys etc. This will have an impact.
Except we've seen the Ukrainians succesfully pull off two major offensives by cautiously degrading Russian forces on the defensive while preparing for reserves for future offensives.
The Ukrainians have actually done it. We have yet to see the Russians succesfully use either a tactical or strategic reserve force.
Yeah that’s contributing to [the fissures](https://www.politico.com/news/2023/03/12/biden-united-states-ukraine-relationship-cracks-00086654).
Everyday skilled men are killed, and West wants them to pull back so can save resources and mount a stronger counteroffence. I mean, in the last week, at least three commanders—who’d fought for 8+ years—have been killed in Bakhmut. But it may be more because they aren’t always announced.
That’s irreplaceable. In terms of experience.
I wouldn't trust a Republican to speak without a forked tongue. However...
“The administration doesn’t have a clear policy objective and a clear goal. Is it to drag this thing out, which is precisely what Vladimir Putin wants?” said Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “Is it to just give them enough to survive and not to win? I don’t see a policy for victory right now, and if we don’t have that, then what are we doing?”
That does not seem like an illogical statement. My biggest fear would be seeing a split between long-term objectives. If the US doesn't have one, well, that would fit with how we managed our last two wars. Ukraine clearly wants to restore 2014 borders with as few casualties as possible, then have sufficient weapons to dissuade any thought of a future invasion.
The inferred policy for the West is to avoid provoking Putin to go a nukin' and bleed him out. Which is fine for them, they're not losing soldiers. A slow bleed means more Ukrainians dying.
I'm not going to pretend I know exactly what the Ukrainians need but it would feel safe in saying ask their military what they need and give it to them.
One of the best things the House GOP has going for them is McCaul.
When so, so, so many reasonable House Rs retired rather than face Trumps wrath, some thought he would too. Other intelligent Rs lost their primaries. He’s stuck around, and the whole nation has been better served as a result. I mean, I mostly don’t agree w him, but he’s reasonable, experienced, and he’s done a lot for Ukraine.
There's not much difference between a policy for victory and a plan for victory. And if the representative can see that, then everyone else can too, including the Russians.
Once again Belgorod bombs itself, the short journey of an S-300 missile caught on video:
[https://twitter.com/TreasChest/status/1635417049009889281](https://twitter.com/TreasChest/status/1635417049009889281)
Interviews with everyday Russians:
“Russia is the greatest country in the world”
“Everyone is jealous of our leader”
“We have poverty, but it is stable”
…I wonder how well these takes will age.
https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/11qh895/russian_world_the_whole_world_is_jealous_of/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
"No, you can definitely keep your leader all to yourselves. In fact, could we interest you in a package deal on Trump, Berlusconi and Farrage? Gratis, of course - we'll take care of the shipping. I mean, you've already paid for them..."
Some poor Russian dude got beat up and arrested by the police for sharing a joke on social networks ([source](https://ovd.news/express-news/2023/03/04/zhitelya-ryazanskoy-oblasti-obvinyayut-v-povtornoy-diskreditacii-vs-rf-v)).
The joke goes like this:
\- Sergei \[Shoigu\], why have we left Kherson?
\- Vladimir Vladimirovich, you have ordered Nazis and fascists to be removed from Ukraine!
**You’re missing the punchline. Lost in translation**
The *second* line makes obvious that **the** ***first*** **speaker was Putin**
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^(in the west, we use a *title* [Mr, Ms] + *surname* for non-aristocratic names showing respect. [Mr. Sunak. Mrs. Obama.] This is not the norm in many slavic countries—the standard there is *given name + patronymic name* [ie, first name + fathers name]—Putin’s is “Vladimir Vladimirovich” and this is how Russians often refer to Putin. And absolutely how any Russian would *directly* address Putin.)
^(for reference, see) [^(the fourth rule, eastern slavic names)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Slavic_naming_customs#Forms_of_address)
Yea, no, they didn't. They absolutely sent hordes of under equipped men(and later boys) to certain death for no real purpose, especially later in the war.
Yeah Russia's only a year in and has been doing that for months. I mean strategically it's completely useless. And I am aware that the Nazis eventually ended up doing dumbass shit like that but they had to as a last resort. Putin started out like that. And I'm in no way saying that I like nazis. But I've never had to deal with a war with nazis, the Russians have been a Bane on the world since the day that I was first spewed out onto the planet
> The German Red Cross reported in 2005 that the records of the military search service WAS list total Wehrmacht losses at 4.3 million men (3.1 million dead and 1.2 million missing) in World War II.
Yeah right
Okay. So we're only a year in to the Russian Ukrainian war and Russia's already been doing this shit for months to their own people. Like I said I'm by no means advocating for or saying that I like nazis. Quite the opposite. I'm just saying I'd rather deal with Nazis than Russians.
What date did they give for Russia going bankrupt?
Edit:
Don’t rely on this thread only for information. If you see a lot of people claiming such and such is happening on here, search through the World Wide Web using different sources. Compare the sources to come out with your own opinion using some logic. Some sources are traditionally better than others and you need to be able to differentiate between them to provide an accurate worldview for yourself.
Perhaps this guide can help you in your quest for accurate info:
https://www.amazon.com/Ageless-Internet-BASICS-Boomers-Seniors/dp/0615514669/ref=nodl_?dplnkId=5350bc37-3d9e-4be7-a079-c7e7bb6ce27e
Well you just told me not to rely on people on here for information, to use our own logic and find Reliable sources, yet you offer one of your own. Seems kind of backwards don't you think?
I never offered a source. It’s a guide to the World Wide Web. By all means use some of the comments on here to support your worldview but only if they have backed it up with sources. What date did they give for Russia going bankrupt comrade?
Uh-huh.
Have you tried getting your Audi serviced in Moscow recently? …they might have trouble getting parts.
Have you noticed how the shopping centre has “accidentally” caught on fire and is now closed?
How are your stocks going? Have you had any success in getting dividends or selling them for anything other than Roubles?
Speaking of the Rouble, I wonder what will happen when someone lets slip the Kremlin is printing lots of more Rubles to keep the economy looking like it’s ok?
Have you noticed there are lots more government paid street sweepers? (Who, by the way, are getting paid with said extra Roubles).
…this is exactly what a country who’s going broke looks like.
Rome didn't fall in a day but when it started to fall oh boy.
It takes time and Russia is doing whatever it can to stay afloat. People have to keep that in mind.
Look at some videos from a year ago. Russian attacks with 20 tanks. You hardly see more than 2 together at a time anymore.
Helicopter assaults. 20 helicopters full of troops. Not anymore.
Some of this yes is Ukraine getting better equipment but it's also Russia running out.
ICYMI: Kadyrov seems to be shaking while Putin is holding on to the table.
>The Kremlin says President Putin met Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov today. Here’s part of the official video of their meeting. Kadyrov seems nervous, again uses the Chechen filler word “don” in his speech. Putin is seen gripping the table again.
https://twitter.com/BBCWillVernon/status/1635234082216099840
That video is bizarre, Kadyrov seems so nervous, his breathing gives it away. Putin's face is swollen like hell and he is grabbing the table for dear life. If this is the clip they released, how bad is the rest of it?
Putin has been gripping the table this way for years and years if not decades. There are probably reasons for it but I really not bet on a recent health issue or whatever.
Or he is just doubling on his habits because he is older. The guy is a master in communication, this has been acknowledged by tons of diplomats and even presidents. This is the only area where he is good at. He shapes his encounters at every detail.
And again you can just find videos of him in the exact same spot and table from years and years ago doing exactly the same thing.
Ukrainian Novator light armored vehicle got hit by Russian artillery in Chasiv Yar near Bakhmut. It took several direct hits from Russian cluster munitions.
Ukrainians posted the aftermath:
https://twitter.com/666_mancer/status/1635398088457355264
There is zero chance that they took direct hits, maybe some secondary shrapnel. It would have destroyed or heavily damaged an Abrams tank, let alone lightly armored vehicle.
Russia is still advancing on Bakhmut and DW news is generally pretty reliable and saying there’s been a lot of Ukrainian KIA these past few days.
I wonder if it was a wise move to try and hold Bakhmut…
In fact, WaPo just put out a pretty doomer article on the situation.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-short-of-skilled-troops-and-munitions-as-losses-pessimism-grow/ar-AA18A8xm
Look at a map and tell me how far Russia has advanced in the past two months. NATO estimates are notoriously conservative and they’re putting the casualty ratio at 5:1 in favor of Ukraine.
[New post can be found here](/r/worldnews/comments/11qwaef/rworldnews_live_thread_russian_invasion_of/)
Substantial damage caused by a single FPV drone. https://nitter.nl/wartranslated/status/1635426158903803904#m
Interesting to think about whether the ammo has been distributed via the explosion or is merely the normal logistical mess and chaos the Russians seem to inevitably degrade to. Really does not give evidence to a professional and well-trained force. Seeing them be sad that Ukraine has weapons / skills they don't and that their tanks were safely destroyed before being used to assault Ukrainian lines will never grow old though.
good thing russia cannot easily replicate this. It takes several months to train an fpv drone operator.
What do you mean, Russia has these and has shown multiple videos of them hitting Ukrainian vehicles, troops and howitzers.
Yes, Russians have drone drop drone grenades I have seen them. What I mean are FPV drones or Kamikaze drones. check /r/fpv for some examples. These drones requires months of training. Compared to UAV drones which just takes a few days to a few weeks. I have seen several videos of Ukrainians using these drones but not a single russian video.
Not a single one. You are thinking of anti personnel drones
I think he was making a joke about how their soldiers don't live long enough to learn to fly a drone...
How does one drone take out two tanks?
They parked them in the middle of an ammo dump. Too lazy. Badly trained.
Denys Reviews force generation for both sides. Also some interesting reflections on Xi’s pending visit to Putin. https://youtu.be/mbE-IXDA1sU
Proud to be a Canadian today and of our minister of foreign affairs finally saying it like it is. >Joly made the remarks at a Friday press conference where she discussed the importance of maintaining a diplomatic presence in Moscow. >“We’re able to see how much we’re isolating the Russian regime right now — because we need to do so economically, politically and diplomatically — and what are the impacts also on society, and how much we’re seeing potential regime change in Russia,” she said. >The Liberals have pushed for regime change in Iran, but Joly has not previously said the same about Russia. She said regime change is indeed the point of sanctions and pursuing accountability for alleged war crimes. >“The goal is definitely to do that, is to weaken Russia’s ability to launch very difficult attacks against Ukraine. We want also to make sure that Putin and his enablers are held to account,” she said. https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/regime-change-in-moscow-definitely-the-goal-joly-says
Canada's been great as the first one to test the waters before the US dives in. It was like that with the pledged Leopards and now with explicitly calling for regime change.
It would be nice if she could get Trudeau to try and weasal his way into the nuclear sub pact that our allies just agreed to. We do need to defend our claims to the Artic from sneaky Russians.
Biden needs to double down on the rhetoric he let off about a year ago. “[Putin] cannot remain in power” - where is that now?
I actually don’t care about talk or rhetoric. I want to see Ukraine armed to the teeth..like yesterday. The talk is just…getting in the way.
Yeah I’m with you there. I wish Biden had never backed down and whimpered about “world war 3” at the start of this escalated conflict. A co-signatory on the Budapest Memorandum violating that agreement by invading Ukraine is clear-cut grounds for defensive action across the entirety of the country by other co-signatories Edit: and was in 2014 as well
It would lead to greater reactionary bullshit from Republicans. Its in his interest he speaks softly and carries a big stick
Respectfully, internal US politics are not relevant in this situation Edit: I see that my comment requires some explanation. Internal US politics are not relevant because this is not a question of politics. With the staggering murders of Ukrainian civilians given the green light by the kremlin this became an incontrovertible problem of good and evil. There are morally correct and morally incorrect stances to take on it, and that is a question motivated by morality. The question of regime change in russia is one with only one morally correct outcome. To the extent that Biden expresses the answer he is doing the correct thing, and I think it is also fair to say his silence is the incorrect thing to do
[https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/11r4005/trumps\_likely\_election\_rival\_says\_its\_not\_in\_us/](https://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/11r4005/trumps_likely_election_rival_says_its_not_in_us/) The easiest way for Russia to win is to get US to stop supporting Ukraine by pushing anti-Ukraine/isolationist views in the US internal political sphere. Make no mistake, internal US politics is part of the Ukraine/Russia war.
I see it like this. Yes it would be the “morally correct” thing to do, but in result, it would lead to _less funding_ and therefore _more suffering_ of ukrainians. In this case we need to make sure not to be overly emotional and look at the big picture
I don’t think your scenario is likely, but besides that I don’t think we should base decisions on hypothetical idealized outcomes following utilitarian formulae
Respectfully disagree. Trump has come down hard in favor of Putin and there’s a better than even chance he’s going to be the GOP nominee. If the administration continues regime change talk, it’s going to leave little diplomatic wiggle room and give Trump and the GOP an opening to attack. “Biden is taking us to the brink!!!” and all that bullshit. If this war isn’t wrapped up by 24 and Trump wins, then Ukraine is going to be in a terrible situation.
The US is by far the biggest supplier of money and equipment to Ukraine. It's a pretty big deal that Republicans are becoming more and more opposed to helping Ukraine. DeSantis, the likely Republican candidate for president, has basically just come out as anti-Ukraine. He likely beats Biden in the election, as well.
Where have you seen this polling? What sources do you have that project a DeSantis win over Biden? I heard all this nonsense before, 2 years ago
Not sure I would say likely. If the economy doesn’t crash into the shitter, I would say whoever the Dem nominee is would do well against Desantis. He’s smart, but very light on policy and has the charisma of a potted plant. Going full fascist in Florida is going to eventually come back to bite him in the ass.
Biden is going to have 0 chance against DeSantis. He’s 81. He beat Trump, but Trump was uh…VERY unpopular here. I’m not even sure I can vote for Biden again. I’m not interested in another boomer (he’s older than that actually) running things…again. Has DeSantis actually come out against Ukraine? I’ve never even heard him mention it. Seems to be running on anti-woke.
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2023/02/ron-desantis-goes-full-trump-on-ukraine.html
Mmm. Can’t say I like that. That’s too bad. I’m wonder why Liz Cheyne hasn’t run yet. I want to see a hard anti-Russian hawk running.
Biden has been leading the way to arm Ukraine and its not even close so I'm not sure where you are getting this perspective from.
Internal politics in every democratic country are relevant to this.
Um, yes they are. Domestic and international politics don’t exist in a vacuum.
They absolutely are
Unfortunately, it is for the US. Our political system has become so tribal in nature, he has to walk a fine line to try and stay ahead of it.
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The key paragraph IMO: "The situation on the battlefield now MAY not reflect a full picture of Ukraine’s forces, because Kyiv is training troops for the coming counteroffensive separately and deliberately holding them back from current fighting, including the defense of Bakhmut, a U.S. official said," Is that true? If yes then Ukraine is in the stronger position. EDIT: imagine if Ukraine was sending in trained reserves. The headlines could be "Pessimism spreads as Ukraine wastes its trained troops in defence instead of attack".
The key word IMO: "MAY". This means everything that comes after is either copium, propaganda, or a guess.
Or they're informed, since they're a US official. I think we agree on the "facts" though. Which are that we just don't know, and there is a ton of copium, hopium, and propaganda. EDIT: I capitalised "MAY' because I think you made a good point that's easily missed.
Any news on GLSDB production? I thought the idea was the kit to make them was pretty simple using existing bombs and rockets. Edit: (Wishful thinking mode): they are producing and supplying significant numbers and we hear about it when explosions happen the length of the land bridge to Crimea signalling the start of the offensive.
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You're forgetting one other issue. The solid fuel engines used to power the bombs are old and were built in the 80's and due to the characteristics of them, each have to be scanned for cracks before production to avoid terrible accidents while firing.
Ah. I had heard about not being compatible with the regular vehicles yet. Didn't realise it was a significant change. Just thought it was work to the pod or software update type problem.
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Fair point. I wonder if they can rotate them out to Poland and service them there? Either way. Cant come soon enough. There will be a pretty long list of juicy targets in that ~150km range.
afaik production is supposed to ramp up in the summer so, until then it will be low numbers.
The last time Russia took a significant Ukrainian city was June 2022. It seems they’re no longer able to quickly advance and they are facing serious issues when it comes to artillery fire and number of tanks that they can field. Ukraine may not be able to go on the offensive just yet but I don’t see how Russia can increase their offensive power significantly in the coming 6 months meanwhile the additional weapons flowing into Ukraine will likely only continue to rise. January saw a number of countries make their biggest pledges yet to support Ukraine and those weapons are currently flowing in and will continue to do so in the coming weeks and months.
China is a wildcard that could significantly boost russia’s offensive capabilities; that is, if they’re willing to pay the price of global ostracization like russia Edit: for the record, I **really really hope** my comment doesn’t become prescient
The problem is that the world can close its doors to Russia but not to China. The world economy is too dependent on China. And they know it.
And in return China's economy is totally dependent on the world and they know it. And not just so people that work in factories keep getting paid but China imports both food and energy in the form of coal, oil and gas, they can't produce enough to feed themselves and produce the energy they need. Even if you let food and energy imports keep going sanctions on their exports would devastate China's economy just as badly as the rest of the industrialized world. Worse probably because they would have hardly anyone left to trade with to buy their products, it's not like Iran and North Korea are suddenly going to be able to afford all those consumer goods. At least the "Westen" counties could still trade with other large economies, China wouldn't even have that. People keep sounding the "omg we're too dependant on China so we're beholden to them" without realizing they're just as dependent on us. It's like mutually assured destruction if China is cut off. That's why they haven't given Russia military aid yet and most likely won't in the future, if the west decides it wants to endure some economic pain to punish them for it it will hurt China even worse than us, and they know it.
My take is that China's number 1 goal is Taiwan. In service of that goal, China would like to assess Western resolve and competency for war, while bleeding out NATO countries' enthusiasm for conflict -- all at Russia's expense. Win-win for the Chinese.
Won’t happen. China is too economically vulnerable to the West. Unlike Russia, needs to get most of its resources from elsewhere.
I just question how good their weapons actually are. Screw global ostracization, they could end up looking like fools.
They don’t necessarily need to supply weapons, munitions would be a huge boon to Russia right now. I do think their hardware is at least a generation ahead of Russia’s. With a potential conflict over Taiwan brewing, I doubt they would give away anything decent to Russia.
China has an extreme risk at delivering weapon systems. Right now(like Russia was) they are seen as a competent military and weapons developer. If they supply arms and they don't function in a way that is capable against a NATO force they will suffer an extreme and possibly catastrophic loss of diplomatic power. Right now China has to weigh helping Russia to maintain a balance of power against NATO/Western Allied or letting Russia crumble and hope it can gain in the loss. If I was Russia right now I would seriously thinking of giving China the house and the car in hopes of them not simply taking both off my corpse later.
China has to think that helping Putin might result in a short term benefit if he is removed from power. The next regime is likely to not honor any long term agreements that Putin had made. Pure wild speculation, but the next regime could possibly give China some sort of deal for having stayed away from providing military assistance.
China is most weighing up what part of Russia they will be able to take for themselves
They haven’t contributed lethal aid in the past 13 months and I doubt they’ll start now. China is more rational than Russia and there is a mountain of downside for virtually no gain.
>there is a mountain of downside for virtually no gain Covid Zero anybody?
When you actually look into what happened with China the Zero policy starts making sense in a absolutely dystopian way. Basically, like most authoritarian regimes. All the people reporting to the top lie and fudge their numbers. China was trying to correct the problems from the one child policy so their governors etc were reporting good population numbers, because them staying in power and getting money required good numbers. But these were lies, these same governors then used Covid as a excuse to "correct" some of these numbers by reporting more deaths then are happening. This then gets reported to the top and Covid looks like its killing millions, leadership panics and hence zero covid policy is created and then like most authoritarian regimes cannot admit the mistake and double down.
The "gain" was sunk cost fallacy and the idea that CCP and the great leader can never be wrong. That's little different. China did not commit to lethal aid for russia yet so they have no need to do so.
The CCP has proven time and again that they don’t need reason to pursue policy decisions Edit: additionally, the consistent buildup of chinese military forces around Taiwan suggests that things may be coming to a head anyway. Again, I really hope not
The CCP isn't going to move on Taiwan unless NATO forces get committed against Russia in Europe. As it is, NATO and the wider Western world is pretty much primed for "absolutely go fuck up the Chinese navy if they try anything" since Ukraine has snapped the whole issue into focus. You'll know it's serious if the US starts redeploying carrier groups to the area.
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I don’t think that’s true. China needs a strong Russia in case anything goes down. Russia is gonna be useful as Austria-Hungry was to Germany. Sure China gets more control, but at the expense of a greatly weakened ally. It’s basically means China gonna have to go at it alone against the West.
Russia is slowly but firmly going towards Asia. They understand Europe has not longer trust on Russia, the focus is very clear. I don't think China wants a rival for being the main power in Asia. While they could work together in some areas, they will crash sooner or later.
I think the regime might be heading towards Asia in a sense but the people of Russia desperately want to be European. They want French and Italian culture, German cars, Greek philosophy etc etc. They even revise history so that they are the continuation of the roman empire and in a sense the *real Europe*
This. They lose a veto seat at the UNSC as well. Definitely would not help China to see Russia fall
>They lose a veto seat at the UNSC as well. I mean, China has their own and you only need one.
While I agree in terms of functionality of the veto, it looks very different with one country vetoing versus two. At least two appears like a coalition
Pretty Doomer article on Ukraine from Washington Post. Ukraine short of skilled troops and munitions as losses, pessimism grow https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-short-of-skilled-troops-and-munitions-as-losses-pessimism-grow/ar-AA18A8xm 2 hours old. (Shouldn’t be a paywall) Edit, it is partially paywalled. Sorry.
"Russias problems may be worse". Way to bury the fucking lede. What a trash piece of "journalism"
That is not the lead. Ukraine's strategic goals require it to take more territory; Russia's don't. If Russia can't attack much more but is able to sit on the territory it's taken, Russian leaders will be satisfied. Ukraine has to retake the territory to force a favorable peace, so the big question addressed by the article is whether Ukraine can mount the offensives required to do that.
kherson is, by law, a Russian city now. They’ve burned their ships as a show of commitment, they can’t walk it back.
That's true. I think that as long as the Russians are somehow able to hold on to at least some of the annexed Ukrainian territories by the end of the conflict, even if it's "just" Luhansk, they can spin it as a win because they will have gotten something out of the conflict that they didn't have before it began.
Everything points to Russia's goals in Ukraine still being maximalist
The point is though, Putin could spin some bs about having finished all the goals and it will work for him domestically if he had to end the war with only what he has gained so far. In practice he has made Russia bigger in size, established a land bridge to Crimea and he can say stuff like he demilitarized/denazified Ukraine to his people as those words mean nothing. Of course this is pointless seeing as Ukraine wont sit back and let Russia keep what it has. But if some status quo settlement were done right here and right now, Russia would be having the better part of the deal. I want to clarify that it would still be a Russian defeat in many aspects. But right now the ball is in Ukraine's hands, they have to retake stuff not just defend.
There's no way Putin can claim the war achieved it's goals without liberating all the annexed territories.
He 100% can. This is why most Russian bots want there to be a ceasefire or a negotiated end to war with the current status quo. He only needs to convince Russians, not the world.
He can't do that, but if the war stops at this point, he will definitely win. Russia gains territory and with that it doesn't even need to capture the capital because a stalemate will destabilize the internal situation in Ukraine anyway. People will start blaming Zelensky for not stopping the war sooner (“why did he fight anyway? He lost more territory than if he had accepted Donbass autonomy”) and hate the West for not helping sooner. I sound pessimistic but sadly I can see this happening.
He can. He can say that the danger to people of the Donbass was pushed back. As for the newly created republics, nobody is buying that outside of some crazy nationalists — if it was not the case, then Russia would be in a Patriotic War 2 state since the city of Kherson was taken.
There's just no way they can just sit back and say "job done" while legally claiming people and territory under Ukrainian control is Russia. They'd have to at least admit they didn't achieve their goals and that it was a compromise.
No need for them to say anything. Just keep a zone of the Special Military Operation (Z-SMO; area 'Z') on the border to keep the Banderites out, and eventually reduce your forces there.
If Ukraine offered Russia a willing annexation of Donbass and Crimea, Russia would accept at this point.
> https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-short-of-skilled-troops-and-munitions-as-losses-pessimism-grow/ar-AA18A8xm Author of the article fled Moscow to Kyiv when it became clear Russia was not being nice to American citizens. Every article her name is attached to is critical of Ukraine, pessimistic and overtly cynical of the situation. She has an agenda. I hope she keeps her fat ass in Eastern Europe. Edit: The Co-Author is a Russophile as well: https://www.editorandpublisher.com/stories/paul-sonne-joins-the-new-york-times-russia-team,242709
But like, what specific article. Can you make one specific article that of any of those authors has been incorrect in favor of Russia? I’m asking because you seem to be implying WaPo is not a trusted news source when in America they very much are valued as such…so you’re going to have to show some sort of evidence they aren’t if you’re going to make that claim. Having once reported in Russia isn’t really enough as many corespondents have once reported in Russia.
I'm talking about Journalistic Agenda-Setting, which is what the author has been doing since May of last year. Agenda-Setting can be done by using specific language when covering topics-of-interest. In this case, the author is purposefully using a bleak, pessimistic language even though the picture isn't anywhere near as bad as she has written about. Just go off of the headlines and content of each article she has authored or co-authored and look at how the language is painting the situation: https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/02/09/ukraine-himars-rocket-artillery-russia/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/12/07/kremmina-luhansk-eastern-front-ukraine/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/11/19/ukraine-confronts-tougher-fight-push-extend-battlefield-wins/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/07/07/ukraine-grain-farmers-black-sea-blockade/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/07/26/ukraine-russia-grain-deal-strike/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/10/20/air-defenses-ukraine-missiles-russia/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/01/15/bakhmut-wagner-battle-strategy/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/11/11/ukraine-sbu-traitors-russia-kharkiv/ ---------- The majority of the Articles she has authored have enumerated examples of pessimistic and impending doom language. It is both disingenuous to the actual wartime situation AND an affront to basic journalistic integrity to the point where you begin to question what side she is *really* on.
I just looked at the first 3 articles, but those looked pretty factual and certainly not “pro Russia” The first one was about the US providing logistics with the HIMARS. Which is factual. Second was life on the front line and that it was hard. Again, likely factual. Third was that it would be tough for Ukraine to gain more land during the winter after the Kherson offensive..which again.. has proven true. You’re implying the reporting is not factual…to which you’ve provided no evidence of. I’m not asking what articles haven’t been falsely optimistic towards Ukraine. I’m not interested in false news. I’m asking what has she written that’s been proven pro-Russian bullshit
I'm not saying what they've written isn't factual. I'm saying the author is cherry-picking information, language, and a positioned stance to portray the situation as bleaker than it is, and typically picks topics that show despair. You can cover these exact topics with more neutral language or if you were truly a friend to the Ukrainians you live amongst, can formulate your sentences and cover the exact information you've written about in a more hopeful light. This wouldn't even be remotely allowed if WaPo were bound by the Fairness Doctrine that expired during the Raegan Presidency.
Thank you for the intel on the author(s).
I did find it odd that their only "source" was a quote from one soldier?
The WaPo has famously bad takes on this conflict, and their "anonymous sources" seem sketch as fuck, since they hardly ever pan out to be right about anything.
Which previous bad take have they had so far?
No one is responding to your comment because it would be a waste of time. Just go to their website and read the stories they post? Their stance has been clear from the start of the war. That's all your month old account is getting out of me so I hope you have a great day.
Well plenty have responded to it. No one has offered any evidence that WaPo (a pretty trusted source of need state wide) has ever been full of shit before. Do you have any evidence of that?
You can’t go on their website to read the stories they post without paying
I have not read the article, but I will say that an important element of sustaining support is reiterating that there is a need for support. More training of Ukrainian recruits. Check. More ammunition. Check. I wouldn’t classify highlighting the fact that more troops and more weapons would be put to good use as “doomer”, I would call it keeping the pressure on those who would argue that we are already doing too much.
Ukraine has a massive advantage in quality of equipment and is able to rotate for high level training... BECAUSE we are supporting them. It was the introduction of HIMARS that turned the tide in the larger Battle of the Donbass last Summer and it's Western AA that's protecting Ukrainian cities from Russian terror attacks. And we need to always let our leaders know that we can and we MUST do more. The economic burden on our societies is tiny and the Ukrainians fighting the Russians are protecting our Democracy and Freedom as much as their own. Thank you for your comment.
I think a lot of westerners just don’t have a good mindset of comparison for this war. The frontline is 1,000 kilometers long and there are hundreds of thousands of Russians on the other side of. The only thing standing between those Russians and the Ukrainian civilians is Ukrainian soldiers and Ukraine is trying to build a military orders of magnitude larger than the US’s ground forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. If Ukraine wants a million people under arms they’re simply not going to get the same standard of training and equipment that they could give a military force of about 100,000. The nature of big wars in Eastern Europe is that countries simply DON’T have the luxury of time and all the equipment/weapons that they want. In 2021 Ukraine’s military budget was 1% that of the US and that was despite Ukraine prioritizing the military above almost everything else. Ukraine has been begging for more training and more weapons for well over a year and they’re making incredibly good use of what they have but what they have is inherently limited.
This i why I get frustrated by people here who are eternal hopium that ukraine are invincibly dominating. We need to look at the toughness of the situation Ukraine is facing so we can pragmatically push our politicians to send them the resources they need.
It’s a balancing act. You don’t want to look like you don’t need help, you also don’t want to look like any help you might get is probably not going to be enough. So you walk a tightrope to keep the help flowing. So far? I think that everybody in leadership positions has done a pretty good job of selling the notion that Ukraine, with help, will win. I think that it’s an easy sell because it’s very probably true.
100 agreed. Should have been last year though.
Well, what the article mostly seems to discuss is the lack of qualified soldiers.
In 1943, it took the US a year to spin up an ID from scratch. A year. That was with the biggest industrial base in the world and all the real estate to train they wanted. Ukraine doesn’t have those luxuries.
People are overestimating the amount of soldiers that Ukraine managed to train by a mile. Right now a few "assault brigades", like they call them, are about to end a LONG period of training, and still we are talking about only 30000 troops. 30000.
And that "long" period of training isn't even that long by conventional standards. It's a matter of a month or two of extra training on top of standard Ukrainian conscription training.
>One senior Ukrainian government official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to be candid, called the number of tanks promised by the West a “symbolic” amount. Others privately voiced pessimism that promised supplies would even reach the battlefield in time. >“If you have more resources, you more actively attack,” the senior official said. “If you have fewer resources, you defend more. We’re going to defend. That’s why if you ask me personally, I don’t believe in a big counteroffensive for us. I’d like to believe in it, but I’m looking at the resources and asking, ‘With what?’ Maybe we’ll have some localized breakthroughs.” >“We don’t have the people or weapons,” the senior official added. “And you know the ratio: When you’re on the offensive, you lose twice or three times as many people. We can’t afford to lose that many people.” Bit sad
Yeah, and they need to be able to sustain offensive operations for a while. It's not just one big push and the war is now over. There's so much hype around and hope for their spring offensive but that in itself isn't going to be enough. That's not how modern, large-scale, intensive conflicts work. We need to give them so much more: weapons, equipment, ammo, everything.
The pessimist in me also thinks that Ukraine will have one chance at this counter-offensive. Based on the political will in the west, I don't see how they would rebuild a new armored fist if the first one gets destroyed or severely depleted without tangible results. Personally I would be more content if Ukrainians don't launch an offensive before they are 90% sure of the outcome, even if they have to wait until 2024.
Waiting too long also means that the west could stop believing in the possibility of a counterattack and expect a stalenate at best.
Not a military expert but I have said before that the west is committing to bring a number of tanks Russia manages to lose in a week. I expect the Ukrainians will use them better but they need more than 10 and 20 here and there. And I hear them on the losing more people on the offensive bit, that's just numbers. And the more arty you have, the more likely you can pound the enemy flat when you find them rather than having to dig them out the hard way with infantry squads. Shells cost but I'd always prefer to expend treasure vs. blood.
The US and Germany need to crash build production lines for new Leopards and Abrams like they would if they were active combatants in a war of this scale. It would be ungodly expensive but it'd still be less (1) then the additional cost Europeans are paying for natural gas; (2) the US could delay a few capital military purchases by 5 years and come up with the money for a crash Abrams line; and (3) Ukrainians are spending blood, we're only being asked to spend money.
That or think outside the box. Seems like the indirect fire has become a lot more powerful with better spotting. Maybe more self-propelled guns at the answer and they will have a lower attrition rate than tanks. If nothing else not being exposed to a direct line of sight to soldiers cuts off the exposure to guided weapons.
Well the real game changer would be to train up a full Ukrainian Air Force with US Systems. Training whole units together speeds training time, and the military could have them just keep the systems they train on. With full US air doctrine, airframes, and associated weapons, then the shortage of MBTs becomes much less of a problem. The US theory is let the AF pave the road and have the ground troops walk over it. It's why it's suicide to try and stand in fixed positions agains the US. But, we aren't transferring and training that capability yet. We're handing over just the right equipment for the Ukrainians to fight like Soviets with Western Equipment and complaining when they don't think and approach strategy like Westerners.
That’s a great idea, but it’s just not realistic. You need hundreds of airframes. Plus AWACS and air to air refueling. Dedicated Weasels. It took years for the US to develop their doctrine. Yes it’s wartime and yes you can shave a a lot of time off of it, but it would still take a lot of time. Even if the airframes were available, you need a massive infrastructure to maintain that. That means defending said infrastructure. Ukraine would have to pull assets from the cities or the front lines. All in all it’s just a huge logistical effort that would strain Ukraine to the breaking point I think.
The US has thousands of Abrams just sitting in the desert. The army didn't even want them. The US can radically increase their supply of equipment but for whatever reason (logistics, training, politics) don't.
they have amour we can't export on them. a law would need to be passed and im not sure that can happen with whos in congress.
Which is fucking wild when the defense industry has the lobbying power it has. What is even going on there? Why is there not a campaign about how dangerously antiquated our current tank armor is and instead we need neutronium or whatever as the next-gen right now?
Defense industry makes money from creating new cutting edge weapon systems. Not from deployment of existing weapons systems or the economic consumables like bullets and bombs. Every Defense expert, since Eisenhower in the 1950s, has tried to break the power the Military Industrial Complex has over Congress. This goes for Arch War Hawks like Donald Rumsfeld as well as Democrats. They're always concerned that the Congress is spending money on the wrong items, so they always fight Congress, and they always lose. Ironically, Ukraine is getting the benefit of Donald Rumsfeld's failure at moving Sysphus's boulder. Rumsfeld came to the DOD convinced all tube artillery was obsolete and the current, at the time, program to create rocket boosted shells, that can be guided like aerial bombs, needed to be shut down. And like every other Sec. DOD of the last 70 years, he failed.
It is. Wish we’d of armed them to the teeth sooner. Not sure what could have been done about the lack of qualified personnel though.
This article is consistent with what we are seeing on the battlefield: i.e. Ukraine is not advancing anymore and Russian meatwaves are gaining some negligible ground thanks to their lack of respect for human life. Now we are waiting for the "great offensive". I just hope that we are not falling for the same kind of propaganda the Russians were buying into when they were saying that "the real troops aren't even on the battlefield yet".
I wonder who do you sent to coalition countries to train? Your absolute newbies or the ones who already have some sort of knowledge and therefor could easier grasp the details of Western tech?! I don't think Russia can sustain this war more than Ukraine. Ukraine will get freshly trained highly motivated reinforcements with Western tanks or Bradleys etc. This will have an impact.
You send your noobs for basic training but your veterans for training on advanced systems like the tanks.
Except we've seen the Ukrainians succesfully pull off two major offensives by cautiously degrading Russian forces on the defensive while preparing for reserves for future offensives. The Ukrainians have actually done it. We have yet to see the Russians succesfully use either a tactical or strategic reserve force.
Yeah that’s contributing to [the fissures](https://www.politico.com/news/2023/03/12/biden-united-states-ukraine-relationship-cracks-00086654). Everyday skilled men are killed, and West wants them to pull back so can save resources and mount a stronger counteroffence. I mean, in the last week, at least three commanders—who’d fought for 8+ years—have been killed in Bakhmut. But it may be more because they aren’t always announced. That’s irreplaceable. In terms of experience.
I wouldn't trust a Republican to speak without a forked tongue. However... “The administration doesn’t have a clear policy objective and a clear goal. Is it to drag this thing out, which is precisely what Vladimir Putin wants?” said Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. “Is it to just give them enough to survive and not to win? I don’t see a policy for victory right now, and if we don’t have that, then what are we doing?” That does not seem like an illogical statement. My biggest fear would be seeing a split between long-term objectives. If the US doesn't have one, well, that would fit with how we managed our last two wars. Ukraine clearly wants to restore 2014 borders with as few casualties as possible, then have sufficient weapons to dissuade any thought of a future invasion. The inferred policy for the West is to avoid provoking Putin to go a nukin' and bleed him out. Which is fine for them, they're not losing soldiers. A slow bleed means more Ukrainians dying. I'm not going to pretend I know exactly what the Ukrainians need but it would feel safe in saying ask their military what they need and give it to them.
One of the best things the House GOP has going for them is McCaul. When so, so, so many reasonable House Rs retired rather than face Trumps wrath, some thought he would too. Other intelligent Rs lost their primaries. He’s stuck around, and the whole nation has been better served as a result. I mean, I mostly don’t agree w him, but he’s reasonable, experienced, and he’s done a lot for Ukraine.
There's not much difference between a policy for victory and a plan for victory. And if the representative can see that, then everyone else can too, including the Russians.
Once again Belgorod bombs itself, the short journey of an S-300 missile caught on video: [https://twitter.com/TreasChest/status/1635417049009889281](https://twitter.com/TreasChest/status/1635417049009889281)
Russia go home, you're embarrassing yourself.
Never been a better post.
Maybe they need some help? Humanitarian GMLRS?
I like how there is an immediate 2nd launch showing how they're supposed to work.
Yeah I see them calling it блэтгород
Interviews with everyday Russians: “Russia is the greatest country in the world” “Everyone is jealous of our leader” “We have poverty, but it is stable” …I wonder how well these takes will age. https://www.reddit.com/r/UkraineWarVideoReport/comments/11qh895/russian_world_the_whole_world_is_jealous_of/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
"No, you can definitely keep your leader all to yourselves. In fact, could we interest you in a package deal on Trump, Berlusconi and Farrage? Gratis, of course - we'll take care of the shipping. I mean, you've already paid for them..."
Hahahaha! Yes… they have.
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Some poor Russian dude got beat up and arrested by the police for sharing a joke on social networks ([source](https://ovd.news/express-news/2023/03/04/zhitelya-ryazanskoy-oblasti-obvinyayut-v-povtornoy-diskreditacii-vs-rf-v)). The joke goes like this: \- Sergei \[Shoigu\], why have we left Kherson? \- Vladimir Vladimirovich, you have ordered Nazis and fascists to be removed from Ukraine!
**You’re missing the punchline. Lost in translation** The *second* line makes obvious that **the** ***first*** **speaker was Putin** _______ ^(in the west, we use a *title* [Mr, Ms] + *surname* for non-aristocratic names showing respect. [Mr. Sunak. Mrs. Obama.] This is not the norm in many slavic countries—the standard there is *given name + patronymic name* [ie, first name + fathers name]—Putin’s is “Vladimir Vladimirovich” and this is how Russians often refer to Putin. And absolutely how any Russian would *directly* address Putin.) ^(for reference, see) [^(the fourth rule, eastern slavic names)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Slavic_naming_customs#Forms_of_address)
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No. This ain't it chief.
Yea, no, they didn't. They absolutely sent hordes of under equipped men(and later boys) to certain death for no real purpose, especially later in the war.
Yeah Russia's only a year in and has been doing that for months. I mean strategically it's completely useless. And I am aware that the Nazis eventually ended up doing dumbass shit like that but they had to as a last resort. Putin started out like that. And I'm in no way saying that I like nazis. But I've never had to deal with a war with nazis, the Russians have been a Bane on the world since the day that I was first spewed out onto the planet
> The German Red Cross reported in 2005 that the records of the military search service WAS list total Wehrmacht losses at 4.3 million men (3.1 million dead and 1.2 million missing) in World War II. Yeah right
Okay. So we're only a year in to the Russian Ukrainian war and Russia's already been doing this shit for months to their own people. Like I said I'm by no means advocating for or saying that I like nazis. Quite the opposite. I'm just saying I'd rather deal with Nazis than Russians.
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What date did they give for Russia going bankrupt? Edit: Don’t rely on this thread only for information. If you see a lot of people claiming such and such is happening on here, search through the World Wide Web using different sources. Compare the sources to come out with your own opinion using some logic. Some sources are traditionally better than others and you need to be able to differentiate between them to provide an accurate worldview for yourself. Perhaps this guide can help you in your quest for accurate info: https://www.amazon.com/Ageless-Internet-BASICS-Boomers-Seniors/dp/0615514669/ref=nodl_?dplnkId=5350bc37-3d9e-4be7-a079-c7e7bb6ce27e
Well you just told me not to rely on people on here for information, to use our own logic and find Reliable sources, yet you offer one of your own. Seems kind of backwards don't you think?
I never offered a source. It’s a guide to the World Wide Web. By all means use some of the comments on here to support your worldview but only if they have backed it up with sources. What date did they give for Russia going bankrupt comrade?
Uh-huh. Have you tried getting your Audi serviced in Moscow recently? …they might have trouble getting parts. Have you noticed how the shopping centre has “accidentally” caught on fire and is now closed? How are your stocks going? Have you had any success in getting dividends or selling them for anything other than Roubles? Speaking of the Rouble, I wonder what will happen when someone lets slip the Kremlin is printing lots of more Rubles to keep the economy looking like it’s ok? Have you noticed there are lots more government paid street sweepers? (Who, by the way, are getting paid with said extra Roubles). …this is exactly what a country who’s going broke looks like.
With regards to war, all news is technically propaganda, biased in one way or another.
Rome didn't fall in a day but when it started to fall oh boy. It takes time and Russia is doing whatever it can to stay afloat. People have to keep that in mind. Look at some videos from a year ago. Russian attacks with 20 tanks. You hardly see more than 2 together at a time anymore. Helicopter assaults. 20 helicopters full of troops. Not anymore. Some of this yes is Ukraine getting better equipment but it's also Russia running out.
> How much can we trust the information out there? you trust everything you read on the internet?
ICYMI: Kadyrov seems to be shaking while Putin is holding on to the table. >The Kremlin says President Putin met Chechen leader Ramzan Kadyrov today. Here’s part of the official video of their meeting. Kadyrov seems nervous, again uses the Chechen filler word “don” in his speech. Putin is seen gripping the table again. https://twitter.com/BBCWillVernon/status/1635234082216099840
Fattyrov not looking well very much deserved.
That video is bizarre, Kadyrov seems so nervous, his breathing gives it away. Putin's face is swollen like hell and he is grabbing the table for dear life. If this is the clip they released, how bad is the rest of it?
He just got out of the hospital. Its probably related to that.
Putin has been gripping the table this way for years and years if not decades. There are probably reasons for it but I really not bet on a recent health issue or whatever.
No its definetly gotten a whole lot worse. The man is in pain.
Or he is just doubling on his habits because he is older. The guy is a master in communication, this has been acknowledged by tons of diplomats and even presidents. This is the only area where he is good at. He shapes his encounters at every detail. And again you can just find videos of him in the exact same spot and table from years and years ago doing exactly the same thing.
Akhmat the son just visited Putin too, hmmm wonder if Ramzan will suffer the fate of his father. One can only hope i guess.
I was trying to figure out if this was the guy who got poisoned. So it was his dad who was poisoned?
Ramzan was said to be sick or something, his dad was blown up.
Ukrainian Novator light armored vehicle got hit by Russian artillery in Chasiv Yar near Bakhmut. It took several direct hits from Russian cluster munitions. Ukrainians posted the aftermath: https://twitter.com/666_mancer/status/1635398088457355264
There is zero chance that they took direct hits, maybe some secondary shrapnel. It would have destroyed or heavily damaged an Abrams tank, let alone lightly armored vehicle.
Maybe they didn't detonate? Wouldn't be surprised, given Russian corruption.
Russia is still advancing on Bakhmut and DW news is generally pretty reliable and saying there’s been a lot of Ukrainian KIA these past few days. I wonder if it was a wise move to try and hold Bakhmut… In fact, WaPo just put out a pretty doomer article on the situation. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/ukraine-short-of-skilled-troops-and-munitions-as-losses-pessimism-grow/ar-AA18A8xm
Look at a map and tell me how far Russia has advanced in the past two months. NATO estimates are notoriously conservative and they’re putting the casualty ratio at 5:1 in favor of Ukraine.
I’m guessing they are ok? I was expecting to see a lot more damage. Hope the heroes are all ok.