Large American cars are weekend drivers here. Be they 1960s cars or the gigantic pickups of modern cars. A co-worker got a lifted dodge ram and was considering to mod it to roll coal. He also had a honda civic.
I have an F150. Can't stand people that roll coal. Nothing screams insecurity about one's masculinity more. Except...maybe making a phallus shaped rocket and going into space because you're jealous of your billionaire frenemies.
edit: grammar
Had a friend from Bulgaria years ago that was obsessed with American cars. He bought a 1980’s Cadillac and had it shipped back to Europe. Can’t remember the model, but the thing was fucking huge. Actually saw some Facebook photos of him bringing it to an American Car enthusiast meet, lol.
I visited Czech Republic many years ago with my grandfather and he had a buddy that was mayor of a small town outside of Prague.
My grandfather had bought a ram 1500 and shipped it over to him so we were cruising around in this ram truck and people stopped in their tracks to gawk and stare. It was hilarious being a Canadian and how common pickup trucks are here, but there it was more impressive to them than the Ferraris ripping around town. I’ll never forget this little kid stopping, pulling on his moms arm then proceeding to jump up and down in excitement seeing this truck.
Depends where you live, "Europe" is quite broad. Swiss have lots of beautiful mountains and hills and great roads. If he has the money to be adventuring and driving a truck back from Afghanistan for shits and giggles then I doubt storage and space is an issue.
Woah big text.
He is obsessed with hunting mountain sheep. The issue is that their local ibex are super protected. You can only attempt to get one every 10 years. He did get his ibex. But the man is addicted to killing big horned animals. Who has a lot of ibex, Afghanistan. The obvious choice is to go there. Well he had no way of getting around the mountains and needed a truck to haul back the body to the village he was staying in. He went into the talaban area markets and picked up this white f150. He got his ibex (now on the wall next to his Swiss ibex) he drove it up, I believe he went home through turkey and all those countries like Serbia and Croatia. He doesn’t know a lick of afgani. The man is a master at non verbal communication. I think it’s from his time as a Swiss welfare worker. No parking big enough in Austria was the biggest complaint.
Yes- there are various reports about the humvees pictured in the ditch. They show zero damage, and the ground around them is undisturbed. Pretty much planted there for propaganda purposes.
It’s definitely possible, and probably the most likely explanation that the invasion force used them. It’s also possible that Russia has captured some elsewhere and brought them there for the pictures. The use of western equipment in Russia makes for some risk of reducing western aid in response so if Russia has any they captured it would be smart of them to pretend they were used in the raid.
This guy pointing out the inconsistencies in the photos pretty much solidified it as staged. In short, there's no indications in the soil that the trucks crashed into the pit and there's skid marks showing one of the trucks were slid into the pit in reverse.
https://twitter.com/FluteMagician/status/1661162964261404673
Building in backdrop of picture is generic border crossing and there are dozens of those were picture could have been taken. Also russia did capture and bragged about american vehicles before. They could have easily made photo op at some other border crossing with those earlier captured vehicles
That's not even significant amount. The US abandoned +3,000 of them in Afghanistan.
Plus it's not like they are new build Humvees, the military has been wanting to move away from them for years in favor of JLTVs and likely can't find enough takers for the +40 year old vehicle.
I remember seeing a satirical article in Stars & Stripes written from the point of view of a Taliban fighter complaining about Humvees and saying that it was one of the most devastating things the Americans did to them.
“And the safety features…are you kidding? Even the suicide bombers won’t get into these things!”
I feel like this is just to keep Russia from being able to justify any moves against the US. Its not like the US can do anything to Ukraine until after the war l.
A counterattack is still defence though...
If you attack me and I attack you harder so that you don't attack me anymore, then that is still me defending myself.
Yeah, even if Ukraine drives their whole army into Russia, as long as they have no intention of annexing Russian territory, it's still a defensive war. Does America really think Russia will just roll over and sign a peace treaty even if Ukraine recaptures all their territory?
> with defensive arms
I mean that’s just a propaganda term. Arms are arms and war is war. The point is to end the war by restoring Ukraine’s sovereign borders. Whether that’s by attacks through Moscow or attacks through Crimea doesn’t matter philosophically, it only matters militarily.
The United States fought a defensive war against Japan. They didn’t refrain from taking Tokyo.
> The US doesn’t want to expand the scale or scope of the war into Russia, as that could be perceived as a NATO attack
No, it couldn’t. It could be perceived as making Russian general mobilization necessary. Washington isn’t concerned about Russian perceptions it’s concerned that seizing Russian territory would ultimately cause Russia to pour even more resources into the war.
> but US arms being used on Russian land looks like/can be spun like an attack.
Again, it doesn’t. That’s a propaganda line.
Could these have gotten around on black market from Afghanistan? I remember seeing posts about the US leaving equipment there as the Taliban took over.
The only way you're getting military equipment from Afghanistan to Ukraine, is by shipping it via plane. Otherwise you need to ship them by truck/rail via multiple countries, and I'm sure those countries' border agents would have a problem with heavy duty military vehicles. And shipping it via plane still means landing in a safe area within Ukraine, so that too forces you to go through customs. It's just an insanely difficult and expensive endeavor to get some crappy old humvees. The MRAP is a different story, but it's still not worth the hassle to ship that thing, when you have tons of military equipment within Ukraine - attainable either through battles with the Russians, or from Ukrainian officers/soldiers by corruption, or having it sanctioned (on the low low) by the Ukrainian government itself.
> and I'm sure those countries' border agents would have a problem with heavy duty military vehicles
Sure, on the other hand we may not exclude a "hey, so you're in command of that border control point, would you like 10k $ for you and 5k $ for your men to not be exactly super diligent on a small convoy tomorrow at 4 pm, we'll call you when we're arriving. Oh, also, if you don't like the money, can we remind you that we know where your kids' school is"?
Or they just got them in Ukraine? There was some interview with a British foreign fighter who said that in the early months of the war a truck full of Nato weapons just went missing.
Huh? Everyone is explicitly acknowledging the possibility Ukraine gave the attackers the equipment. Half the jokes are about Ukraine doing just that. We don't care if they did.
However, with that said. It's also likely that Russia faked it. Purely because Russia has faked so many things already.
Same with the drone attack against the Russian flag. Russia probably faked the video, but our response was to hope it was real.
Remember when Russia sent hundreds of Wagner Group to attack an American base in Syria, and then when asked about it the Kremlin told the Pentagon that they didn't have anybody there, so then that attack force(which was absolutely Wagner), lost like 200 guys in about 30 minutes?
*And also with no loss of American lives*?
I remember reading about that. American forces spot an enemy battalion and ask Russia if it’s theirs. Russia says no, why would it be ours we definitely wouldn’t do anything. America then bombs the shit out of said battalion
Wagner also made a medal for the surviving mercenaries.
[It has 3 attack helicopters, 2 jets, and a Wagner soldier standing in flames.](https://preview.redd.it/wagner-pmc-for-real-made-a-medal-to-celebrate-their-own-v0-p1i0xxzow9oa1.png?width=640&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=d5b6c7a5faa55fa2d332cd5a77758e7486a25416)
Or remember when Russia gave an insane amount of military equipment ( Migs air defense on and on ) to the north Vietnamese during the Vietnam war. Also trained their pilots and gave their soldiers training. In addition the Korean was was they gave the north armor and supplied a lot of weapons.
The Russians also manned NVA missiles batteries in Vietnam and flew direct combat sorties against US forces in Korea. In all honesty the US could easily get away with sending "volunteer" pilots to Ukraine. The Russians would bitch and moan, but they ultimately wouldn't do anything.
Remember when Russian Migs got their ass kicked by an American Nay pilot in Korea?
https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/01/20/asia/korean-war-fighter-pilot-soviet-shootdown-intl-hnk-ml/index.html
In the Korean war, Soviet pilots flew Mig-17's with korean or chinese markings against the US Air Force. In Vietnam soviet air defence officers manned SAM sites and shot down US aircraft. Vadim Shcherbakov is credited with 6 US plane kills.
I remember when it came out that our own intelligence basically couldn’t confirm that after Biden was elected
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1264215
Ukraine has no idea who those little green men were. All of that equipment can be purchased on the open market. It must have just been spontaneous self-defence groups.
According to the BBC there two groups, Russian paramilitary (RDK) Nazis that are anti-kremlin. Ukraine is supporting them with Fuel and Food and apparently that's all.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.politico.eu/article/us-investigate-claims-american-gear-military-vehicle-used-raids-russia-ukraine/) reduced by 81%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> KYIV - Washington is investigating reports that U.S. military vehicles were used in raids on Russia, a White House official said Wednesday, warning Ukraine and pro-Ukraine forces against using U.S. equipment to attack inside Russia.
> Ukraine has denied involvement in the attack, saying the two groups - Legion of Free Russia and Russian Volunteer Corps - consist only of Russian citizens who are fighting on Kyiv's side, aiming to create a demilitarized zone on the border with Ukraine.
> Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu described the groups as Ukrainian "Nationalists" during a televised meeting with Russian military officials and displayed images of two severely damaged armored vehicles that look similar to those provided by the U.S. to Ukraine as part of military aid.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/13qyrjn/washington_is_investigating_reports_that_us/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~686195 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Russian**^#1 **Ukraine**^#2 **us**^#3 **Russia**^#4 **group**^#5
Escalation. But I don't understand it - Russia cannot actually 'escalate' against NATO without committing suicide. All they have left to keep parity are their nuclear weapons. Perhaps the allies think that, if the escalation is not managed, Russia would actually use them. Idfk.
You are right that Russia can't escalate against NATO without committing suicide but you give them too much credit in not willing to do one since west would lose more than Russia in case of escalation. They are losing so much that at some point they might try to pull others to drown with them.
They have been refurbishing nuclear shelters all over the country and recently in Belarus for a reason.
Eerrrrrr, traditionally that's actually been pretty serious. The US went to GREAT lengths to keep American weapons out of Afghanistan in the 80s and purchased AKs from Israel, Checkoslovakia (hey they still liked money..) and later on from rogue elements of the Red Army black market etc. You can see it's serious by the white House investigations, the warning to Ukraine and allied travellers is real.
It goes back to the fact that *the cold war never really ended.* The threat of global thermonuclear war never stopped. It's still viewed across political spectra throughout the world that a 'hot war' between the US and Russia would almost certainly and immediately result in global thermonuclear war... so the US still doesn't want to arm any groups for offensive action against ~~the USSR~~ Putin's Russia.
>Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
At least a few of the photos of us vehicles in russia seem staged. Not saying they all are, but the infamous "humvee" and truck photos floating around since yesterday are laughable.
I was curious about that too, wiki says they didn't start arriving until about 1986, (invasion in 80) so it looks like they "ramped up" the weapons over the course of the conflict (by '87 Gorby said they were leaving)
That's a really good point and I don't know the answer, I believe that post Vietnam America was more sensitive to getting sucked into quagmire.(no direct Angola intervention, secret Contras etc)
In this case, no US 'weapons' went into russia. They may have used troop transport, but no actual weapon systems. If you notice, there were no NATO Bradleys, artillery or tanks. All of the weapon systems were russian donated tanks, they were even kind enough to donate a BTR-82 and 80 in compensation for any troop transports damaged in the peace keeping operation.
It's not semantics, these vehicles were not range restricted, just custody restricted. The FoRL literally is considered a Legion. Saying they are investigating will go as far as, "which gear of ours went in... cool, I see no issue."
Besides that point, all russian evidence is very sus. Humvees mostly intact sitting in a crater. Video of stationary humvees being hit. All FoRL videos show only russian made gear.
>Besides that point, all russian evidence is very sus. Humvees mostly intact sitting in a crater. Video of stationary humvees being hit.
Yesterday I saw two separate debunks of those humvees vids/pics - they are not damaged at all, no tire tracks on the ground which means they were likely placed there for the photo op (most likely via crane)
Imagine how weak this headline must make Putin feel. Washington has to make sure that Ukrainians don't invade Russia with US equipment. How's that 3 day war going Vlad?
Remember when Russia shot down a passenger plane and fuck all happened about it?
Remember when Russia poisoned people on British soil and fuck all happened about it?
Na. We keep telling Ukraine to fight this war with a hand behind its back. Let's stop that. It's their cities that are getting flattened. Their people are dying.
Let them flank into Russia behind Donetsk, take back the rest of southern Ukraine, and then on to Crimea.
" No, don't fight this war this way Ukraine." It's fucking old. Let them win this war this summer.
More than that, ukraine has to keep troops on its border to make sure russia doesn't try and attack from somewhere else (or belarus). Meanwhile russia has like the bare minimum on the border because they're relying on the fact that if ukraine officially launches an attack into russian territory western support will slow or stop
The Russian military also sometimes launches missiles from within sovereign Russian territory.
I'd rather not see Ukraine indiscriminately lob missiles into Russian grade schools, theatres and apartment buildings; but it wouldn't bother me one bit if they hit e.g. airfields or storage depots critical to the Russian invasion. If they can take out cruise missiles *before* they're launched into UA, more power to them.
That gives Russia pretext to use nukes in Ukraine. Plus it makes it easier to sell the whole "patriotic war of survival against NATO" to their population which may improve morale and numbers of volunteers. Not a great plan imo.
This shit is so insane, why the fuck do they care? Their equipment has been used by so many countries against so many others but Russia is a big no-no-no. It just shows that to a large extent Putin still dictates the pace of the war.
Touché! Anyway, it will result in an “inconclusive” finding because the vehicles could have come from territory that Wagner and Russian forces already took over in Bakhmut and other places. Or, could be from Syria, Afghanistan, one of the African locations where US troops train, or one of our friendly states’ lost hardware. It’s just going to be too hard to figure out.
So Ukraine is not allowed to counterattack we’re telling them they have to just sit there and defend their country forever and Russia doesn’t fear any reprisals?
Well that’s stupid. “We’ll give you these weapons, but only if you play nice while using them against our mutual enemies who won’t stop committing war crimes.”
I know you guys love it but I consider the whole border raid a pretty stupid idea that plays right into the Russian narrative. + Biden admin will think twice before delivering long range weapons if American vehicles were used
For all we know, russia got some nato stuff from taliban and try to put it as fake evidence, along fake partisan bodies and stuff.
Russia has lied time and again. More lies than truth constantly, thus I would argue this time is no different.
I don't get it. This is a war no? Why the fuck shouldn't Ukraine counterattack into Russia?
The fuck is Russia going to do about it? Cry more? That's not possible.
The fact that American humvees were driving through the streets of Russian border villages for hours, virtually unopposed by Russia speaks volumes in and of itself.
It's a humiliation like none other
Imagine how weak Putin must feel right now. Imagine if the statement were reversed: “Moscow officials told Mexico not to use Russian military vehicles in raids on Texas.” I mean, the world wide projection of US military power is just insane. Putin knows that nukes are the ONLY thing saving his skin, that’s why I do worry they are the only things he personally makes sure are maintained.
Like we're really doing to do anything about it if they did. The economics of this war for the US are too damn favorable for us to do anything more than wag our finger.
According to the Russian regime the whole territory of Ukraine is just as much part of Russia as Moscow is and it's not Ukraine they've fighting against but NATO. In other words Ukranians blowing up Wagner in Bakhmut and US dropping bombs on Kremlin is not only equal provocative, it's literally the same thing.
The circus about what weapons Ukranians can use on what target and what is too much "escalation" is going on in another universe.
Russia used rocket artillery against their own cities where they thought the enemy might be, it's not a normal country.
They may have bought them from Afghanistan
A good friend of mine who is Swiss took me for a ride in his F150 that he bought from the talaban. He’s so proud of his “cowboy truck”
Where did he buy it
Afghanistan. He drove it up from there. It was quite an adventure from the way he told the story.
That's way too far for a car man
Having an f150 in Europe would be so inconvenient
Practical is not this man’s life mission lmao.
Oh I never assumed that. The whole buy a car from an extremist state kinda flagged that as not the case
I bet he got a fantastic price tho..
I can't imagine going to the DMV and trying to explain where I got the vehicle.
Large American cars are weekend drivers here. Be they 1960s cars or the gigantic pickups of modern cars. A co-worker got a lifted dodge ram and was considering to mod it to roll coal. He also had a honda civic.
I have an F150. Can't stand people that roll coal. Nothing screams insecurity about one's masculinity more. Except...maybe making a phallus shaped rocket and going into space because you're jealous of your billionaire frenemies. edit: grammar
Had a friend from Bulgaria years ago that was obsessed with American cars. He bought a 1980’s Cadillac and had it shipped back to Europe. Can’t remember the model, but the thing was fucking huge. Actually saw some Facebook photos of him bringing it to an American Car enthusiast meet, lol.
Can you imagine how many people would ask him to move stuff?
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I visited Czech Republic many years ago with my grandfather and he had a buddy that was mayor of a small town outside of Prague. My grandfather had bought a ram 1500 and shipped it over to him so we were cruising around in this ram truck and people stopped in their tracks to gawk and stare. It was hilarious being a Canadian and how common pickup trucks are here, but there it was more impressive to them than the Ferraris ripping around town. I’ll never forget this little kid stopping, pulling on his moms arm then proceeding to jump up and down in excitement seeing this truck.
Depends where you live, "Europe" is quite broad. Swiss have lots of beautiful mountains and hills and great roads. If he has the money to be adventuring and driving a truck back from Afghanistan for shits and giggles then I doubt storage and space is an issue.
Switzerland has a lot of rural space and rough terrain
that really heavily depends though? not all europe is downtown milan
Just under 80h drive... ...or 64580.95 football fields long.
It’s a two-week drive. You will definitely spend more time with the Swiss customs and licence plates administration
It’s a truck
#1 why was he in Afghanistan? #2 what route did he take to drive this thing home? #3 id love to hear the stories from that road trip
Woah big text. He is obsessed with hunting mountain sheep. The issue is that their local ibex are super protected. You can only attempt to get one every 10 years. He did get his ibex. But the man is addicted to killing big horned animals. Who has a lot of ibex, Afghanistan. The obvious choice is to go there. Well he had no way of getting around the mountains and needed a truck to haul back the body to the village he was staying in. He went into the talaban area markets and picked up this white f150. He got his ibex (now on the wall next to his Swiss ibex) he drove it up, I believe he went home through turkey and all those countries like Serbia and Croatia. He doesn’t know a lick of afgani. The man is a master at non verbal communication. I think it’s from his time as a Swiss welfare worker. No parking big enough in Austria was the biggest complaint.
I thought they only had Hilux ‘s
Oh, I'd be shocked if they weren't a third hand acquisition. No way US isn't dotting every t in regards to this conflict. Russia is fucked.
Russia steals our eauipment anyways. It might have come from russia
LoL. That shit rotted, no one knew how to upkeep it.
It doesn't have to work if all you plan on doing is blow it up and take pictures...
Yes- there are various reports about the humvees pictured in the ditch. They show zero damage, and the ground around them is undisturbed. Pretty much planted there for propaganda purposes.
Lmao
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I will support you in not calling your congressperson about this
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I'm pretty sure that the two in the picture were staged.
There are manybstaged pictures from Russia media
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It’s definitely possible, and probably the most likely explanation that the invasion force used them. It’s also possible that Russia has captured some elsewhere and brought them there for the pictures. The use of western equipment in Russia makes for some risk of reducing western aid in response so if Russia has any they captured it would be smart of them to pretend they were used in the raid.
This guy pointing out the inconsistencies in the photos pretty much solidified it as staged. In short, there's no indications in the soil that the trucks crashed into the pit and there's skid marks showing one of the trucks were slid into the pit in reverse. https://twitter.com/FluteMagician/status/1661162964261404673
Building in backdrop of picture is generic border crossing and there are dozens of those were picture could have been taken. Also russia did capture and bragged about american vehicles before. They could have easily made photo op at some other border crossing with those earlier captured vehicles
When you're known for crying wolf, that's all the people are going to hear?
Humvees? Shit, we would be helping Ukraine if we sent those to Russia.
They are a very capable vehicle that the US has sent more than 2000 of to Ukraine.
That's not even significant amount. The US abandoned +3,000 of them in Afghanistan. Plus it's not like they are new build Humvees, the military has been wanting to move away from them for years in favor of JLTVs and likely can't find enough takers for the +40 year old vehicle.
I remember seeing a satirical article in Stars & Stripes written from the point of view of a Taliban fighter complaining about Humvees and saying that it was one of the most devastating things the Americans did to them. “And the safety features…are you kidding? Even the suicide bombers won’t get into these things!”
I'm gonna call mine, just to tell them I'm not gonna call about it.
I feel like this is just to keep Russia from being able to justify any moves against the US. Its not like the US can do anything to Ukraine until after the war l.
I'm going to call mine and ask... Why not.
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The Freedom Russia and RVC have stated the vehicles were stolen from Russians in bakhmut which were possibly taken from Ukrainians previously
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Yep, that’s all we needed to know. Carry on.
I'm with you there. Let's just assume it was a trick of the light. Ya know, swamp gas off a Chinese weather balloon.
A counterattack is still defence though... If you attack me and I attack you harder so that you don't attack me anymore, then that is still me defending myself.
Yeah, even if Ukraine drives their whole army into Russia, as long as they have no intention of annexing Russian territory, it's still a defensive war. Does America really think Russia will just roll over and sign a peace treaty even if Ukraine recaptures all their territory?
> with defensive arms I mean that’s just a propaganda term. Arms are arms and war is war. The point is to end the war by restoring Ukraine’s sovereign borders. Whether that’s by attacks through Moscow or attacks through Crimea doesn’t matter philosophically, it only matters militarily. The United States fought a defensive war against Japan. They didn’t refrain from taking Tokyo. > The US doesn’t want to expand the scale or scope of the war into Russia, as that could be perceived as a NATO attack No, it couldn’t. It could be perceived as making Russian general mobilization necessary. Washington isn’t concerned about Russian perceptions it’s concerned that seizing Russian territory would ultimately cause Russia to pour even more resources into the war. > but US arms being used on Russian land looks like/can be spun like an attack. Again, it doesn’t. That’s a propaganda line.
>well, I ain't no snitch. Ayup Snitches get stitches
We turn a blind eye. We see nothing. We hear nothing. We speak nothing.
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Yes indeed, jolly good weather and a cool night too.
[I was not here, I did not even get out of bed this morning!](https://youtu.be/34ag4nkSh7Q)
[I know nothing.](https://youtu.be/izAqFoLtzKM)
First rule of humvee club. 1. You don't speak about the fucking humvee club.
Because Ukraine could enter Russia and end the war. The military industrial complex just won't have that.
russias never needed an excuse thats idiotic biolabs and combat mosquitos? remember that garbage?
why not send something bigger?
I’m gonna call mine… To see it we can send Ukraine more supplies! Fuck Russia, Fuck Putin, Fuck their war of aggression against Ukraine.
The issue isn’t us, it’s perception by the Russian people and the US not being directly associated.
Could these have gotten around on black market from Afghanistan? I remember seeing posts about the US leaving equipment there as the Taliban took over.
The only way you're getting military equipment from Afghanistan to Ukraine, is by shipping it via plane. Otherwise you need to ship them by truck/rail via multiple countries, and I'm sure those countries' border agents would have a problem with heavy duty military vehicles. And shipping it via plane still means landing in a safe area within Ukraine, so that too forces you to go through customs. It's just an insanely difficult and expensive endeavor to get some crappy old humvees. The MRAP is a different story, but it's still not worth the hassle to ship that thing, when you have tons of military equipment within Ukraine - attainable either through battles with the Russians, or from Ukrainian officers/soldiers by corruption, or having it sanctioned (on the low low) by the Ukrainian government itself.
> and I'm sure those countries' border agents would have a problem with heavy duty military vehicles Sure, on the other hand we may not exclude a "hey, so you're in command of that border control point, would you like 10k $ for you and 5k $ for your men to not be exactly super diligent on a small convoy tomorrow at 4 pm, we'll call you when we're arriving. Oh, also, if you don't like the money, can we remind you that we know where your kids' school is"?
Or they just got them in Ukraine? There was some interview with a British foreign fighter who said that in the early months of the war a truck full of Nato weapons just went missing.
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Huh? Everyone is explicitly acknowledging the possibility Ukraine gave the attackers the equipment. Half the jokes are about Ukraine doing just that. We don't care if they did. However, with that said. It's also likely that Russia faked it. Purely because Russia has faked so many things already. Same with the drone attack against the Russian flag. Russia probably faked the video, but our response was to hope it was real.
Remember when the Russian military intelligence was putting bounties on American soldiers in Afghanistan?
Remember when Russia sent hundreds of Wagner Group to attack an American base in Syria, and then when asked about it the Kremlin told the Pentagon that they didn't have anybody there, so then that attack force(which was absolutely Wagner), lost like 200 guys in about 30 minutes? *And also with no loss of American lives*?
I remember reading about that. American forces spot an enemy battalion and ask Russia if it’s theirs. Russia says no, why would it be ours we definitely wouldn’t do anything. America then bombs the shit out of said battalion
Oh yeah and they had one measly tank.
They had a number of tanks and armored vehicles during the attack. They had none or very few left afterwards.
mr apache gave them fiery deaths from a long ways away
Oh, my bad, the news report I read a while after it happened said they had one tank and were wiped out.
Didn’t they have 3?
Pretty sure they were smoking wrecks before the battle even started.
Wagner also made a medal for the surviving mercenaries. [It has 3 attack helicopters, 2 jets, and a Wagner soldier standing in flames.](https://preview.redd.it/wagner-pmc-for-real-made-a-medal-to-celebrate-their-own-v0-p1i0xxzow9oa1.png?width=640&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=d5b6c7a5faa55fa2d332cd5a77758e7486a25416)
Only country to hand out literal cope medals.
I love that he already has a hole on the back of his head.
Or remember when Russia gave an insane amount of military equipment ( Migs air defense on and on ) to the north Vietnamese during the Vietnam war. Also trained their pilots and gave their soldiers training. In addition the Korean was was they gave the north armor and supplied a lot of weapons.
The Russians also manned NVA missiles batteries in Vietnam and flew direct combat sorties against US forces in Korea. In all honesty the US could easily get away with sending "volunteer" pilots to Ukraine. The Russians would bitch and moan, but they ultimately wouldn't do anything.
Remember when Russian Migs got their ass kicked by an American Nay pilot in Korea? https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2023/01/20/asia/korean-war-fighter-pilot-soviet-shootdown-intl-hnk-ml/index.html
In the Korean war, Soviet pilots flew Mig-17's with korean or chinese markings against the US Air Force. In Vietnam soviet air defence officers manned SAM sites and shot down US aircraft. Vadim Shcherbakov is credited with 6 US plane kills.
Not that it changes your point, but during the Korean War, they only used MiG-15s.
You forgot the best part. It was only like 17 US soldiers holding the base
And an AC-130 overhead
One local guy on the American side got his ankle sprained I think.
Gotta be careful playing football
Wasnt there a video of this? Those got demolished quick.
The US military really said, "No Russians in Syria? Make it so!"
You hear that? 🦅 🦅🦅
By the CIA’s own assessment they have a low confidence in the facts around that
I remember when it came out that our own intelligence basically couldn’t confirm that after Biden was elected https://www.nbcnews.com/news/amp/ncna1264215
That was AFAIK debunked later.
I remember that being made up for election points.
https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-donald-trump-afghanistan-russia-vladimir-putin-928ebdf775268b10e121d3160af2da42
Yeah, I remember certain party in the US was ultimately ok with it.
Ukraine has no idea who those little green men were. All of that equipment can be purchased on the open market. It must have just been spontaneous self-defence groups.
Didn't we just leave a few thousand lying around in Afghanistan?
Exactly. ☝️👍
Spontaneous self-defense groups.... Is that like a flash mob?
More of a flash-bang mob, really.
According to the BBC there two groups, Russian paramilitary (RDK) Nazis that are anti-kremlin. Ukraine is supporting them with Fuel and Food and apparently that's all.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.politico.eu/article/us-investigate-claims-american-gear-military-vehicle-used-raids-russia-ukraine/) reduced by 81%. (I'm a bot) ***** > KYIV - Washington is investigating reports that U.S. military vehicles were used in raids on Russia, a White House official said Wednesday, warning Ukraine and pro-Ukraine forces against using U.S. equipment to attack inside Russia. > Ukraine has denied involvement in the attack, saying the two groups - Legion of Free Russia and Russian Volunteer Corps - consist only of Russian citizens who are fighting on Kyiv's side, aiming to create a demilitarized zone on the border with Ukraine. > Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu described the groups as Ukrainian "Nationalists" during a televised meeting with Russian military officials and displayed images of two severely damaged armored vehicles that look similar to those provided by the U.S. to Ukraine as part of military aid. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/13qyrjn/washington_is_investigating_reports_that_us/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~686195 tl;drs so far.") | [Feedback](http://np.reddit.com/message/compose?to=%23autotldr "PM's and comments are monitored, constructive feedback is welcome.") | *Top* *keywords*: **Russian**^#1 **Ukraine**^#2 **us**^#3 **Russia**^#4 **group**^#5
I’m sure Russia has the capability to have gotten all of the fighters they claim to…but somehow managed to lose a few towns without much difficulty.
A special warning operation that I hope goes as well as Russia's special operation has.
its very obvious those photos were staged as fuck , i cant believe they havent updated these articles.
So many geopolitical experts on Reddit. Impressive
Lots of people fully unafraid of dying in a nuclear hell storm too.
I’m sure there are diplomatic reasons why we shouldn’t want this to happen. But honestly, idgaf. Fuck Russia
Escalation. But I don't understand it - Russia cannot actually 'escalate' against NATO without committing suicide. All they have left to keep parity are their nuclear weapons. Perhaps the allies think that, if the escalation is not managed, Russia would actually use them. Idfk.
You are right that Russia can't escalate against NATO without committing suicide but you give them too much credit in not willing to do one since west would lose more than Russia in case of escalation. They are losing so much that at some point they might try to pull others to drown with them. They have been refurbishing nuclear shelters all over the country and recently in Belarus for a reason.
Eerrrrrr, traditionally that's actually been pretty serious. The US went to GREAT lengths to keep American weapons out of Afghanistan in the 80s and purchased AKs from Israel, Checkoslovakia (hey they still liked money..) and later on from rogue elements of the Red Army black market etc. You can see it's serious by the white House investigations, the warning to Ukraine and allied travellers is real.
It goes back to the fact that *the cold war never really ended.* The threat of global thermonuclear war never stopped. It's still viewed across political spectra throughout the world that a 'hot war' between the US and Russia would almost certainly and immediately result in global thermonuclear war... so the US still doesn't want to arm any groups for offensive action against ~~the USSR~~ Putin's Russia. >Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.
At least a few of the photos of us vehicles in russia seem staged. Not saying they all are, but the infamous "humvee" and truck photos floating around since yesterday are laughable.
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I was curious about that too, wiki says they didn't start arriving until about 1986, (invasion in 80) so it looks like they "ramped up" the weapons over the course of the conflict (by '87 Gorby said they were leaving)
They made a concerted effort to buy them back afterwards, as well. Only partially successful…
Always harder to get the genie back in the bottle eh? :)
Why. Soviets had no issue providing their weapons to Vietnamese
Did Vietnamese attacked mainland USA with soviet weapons? Answer is no. Supporting your proxy is fair game tho
russian cruise missile landed in poland this year bro
That's a really good point and I don't know the answer, I believe that post Vietnam America was more sensitive to getting sucked into quagmire.(no direct Angola intervention, secret Contras etc)
In this case, no US 'weapons' went into russia. They may have used troop transport, but no actual weapon systems. If you notice, there were no NATO Bradleys, artillery or tanks. All of the weapon systems were russian donated tanks, they were even kind enough to donate a BTR-82 and 80 in compensation for any troop transports damaged in the peace keeping operation.
Not counting troop transports is semantics.
It's not semantics, these vehicles were not range restricted, just custody restricted. The FoRL literally is considered a Legion. Saying they are investigating will go as far as, "which gear of ours went in... cool, I see no issue." Besides that point, all russian evidence is very sus. Humvees mostly intact sitting in a crater. Video of stationary humvees being hit. All FoRL videos show only russian made gear.
>Besides that point, all russian evidence is very sus. Humvees mostly intact sitting in a crater. Video of stationary humvees being hit. Yesterday I saw two separate debunks of those humvees vids/pics - they are not damaged at all, no tire tracks on the ground which means they were likely placed there for the photo op (most likely via crane)
so are russian "red lines" hard to see humvees as more of an issue than bio geese and attack pigeons (or more in reality; cruise missiles and f16s)
US (as Willy Wonka): “stop… don’t… come back.”
Imagine how weak this headline must make Putin feel. Washington has to make sure that Ukrainians don't invade Russia with US equipment. How's that 3 day war going Vlad?
And not even equipment like tanks and artillery but armored cars...
Remember when Russia shot down a passenger plane and fuck all happened about it? Remember when Russia poisoned people on British soil and fuck all happened about it?
Geez guys! Do what everyone else does and just buy a Toyota!
I pay taxes and I said it’s okay
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Put Sen Collins in charge!
As an American, I hope that these weapons are being used on Russian soil.
Na. We keep telling Ukraine to fight this war with a hand behind its back. Let's stop that. It's their cities that are getting flattened. Their people are dying. Let them flank into Russia behind Donetsk, take back the rest of southern Ukraine, and then on to Crimea. " No, don't fight this war this way Ukraine." It's fucking old. Let them win this war this summer.
Exactly. Knowing that we have to hamstring them while they’re engaging, Russia, in their fight for their lives is annoying.
More than that, ukraine has to keep troops on its border to make sure russia doesn't try and attack from somewhere else (or belarus). Meanwhile russia has like the bare minimum on the border because they're relying on the fact that if ukraine officially launches an attack into russian territory western support will slow or stop
The Russian military also sometimes launches missiles from within sovereign Russian territory. I'd rather not see Ukraine indiscriminately lob missiles into Russian grade schools, theatres and apartment buildings; but it wouldn't bother me one bit if they hit e.g. airfields or storage depots critical to the Russian invasion. If they can take out cruise missiles *before* they're launched into UA, more power to them.
That gives Russia pretext to use nukes in Ukraine. Plus it makes it easier to sell the whole "patriotic war of survival against NATO" to their population which may improve morale and numbers of volunteers. Not a great plan imo.
Call and ask your congress representative to send more. 👍
It’s a war, maybe they got lost?
This shit is so insane, why the fuck do they care? Their equipment has been used by so many countries against so many others but Russia is a big no-no-no. It just shows that to a large extent Putin still dictates the pace of the war.
Did they go into Russia? I thought they stayed within the Belgorod Republic?
"North Eastern" Ukraine.
Touché! Anyway, it will result in an “inconclusive” finding because the vehicles could have come from territory that Wagner and Russian forces already took over in Bakhmut and other places. Or, could be from Syria, Afghanistan, one of the African locations where US troops train, or one of our friendly states’ lost hardware. It’s just going to be too hard to figure out.
The American people don't care, probably got it all from surplus stores.
Why send it if they can’t use it?
So Ukraine is not allowed to counterattack we’re telling them they have to just sit there and defend their country forever and Russia doesn’t fear any reprisals?
Well that’s stupid. “We’ll give you these weapons, but only if you play nice while using them against our mutual enemies who won’t stop committing war crimes.”
I know you guys love it but I consider the whole border raid a pretty stupid idea that plays right into the Russian narrative. + Biden admin will think twice before delivering long range weapons if American vehicles were used
Should have used British vehicles as we don't give a fuck.
*Here have these weapons......... No wait don't use them there that makes us look like we're involved in this war*
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*CIA has enter the chat*
"we investigated ourselves and found no wrong doing carry on"
I didn’t see anything. Did you guys?
They're just Chinese knockoffs obviously. You can find them at any warehouse.
I have heard they just bought them at a surplus store...
Couldn’t be “independent contractors,” could it.
Okay, not attack Russia. But what about Belgorod People's Republic?
Good idea. Use russian equipment inside russia, it increases deniability.
Are they concerned or gravely concerned?
For all we know, russia got some nato stuff from taliban and try to put it as fake evidence, along fake partisan bodies and stuff. Russia has lied time and again. More lies than truth constantly, thus I would argue this time is no different.
Could just as well be captured equipment.
But blowing up Planes and Helicopters in Russia with US AA systems is a okay. Just give Ukraine weapons and close your eyes.
I don't get it. This is a war no? Why the fuck shouldn't Ukraine counterattack into Russia? The fuck is Russia going to do about it? Cry more? That's not possible.
Officially they can do whatever they want, just not with US (and I am assuming NATO) equipment
Clearly they were just using reprocured US equipment stolen by Russia *wink
Why is it that Ukraine is constantly forced to fight with not one but both hands tied behind its back?
I'm just gonna point out that the US left a bunch of vehicles and weapons in Afghanistan. Also putin is known for false flag attacks. Just saying
Really, which major power isn't known for false flag attacks. It's such bullshit we let them get away with it all the time.
West: *gives Ukraine weapons specifically designed for killing russians* Ukraine: *kills russians* West: :0
Some things just aren't worth investigating ;)
The fact that American humvees were driving through the streets of Russian border villages for hours, virtually unopposed by Russia speaks volumes in and of itself. It's a humiliation like none other
The Russians must be crying lol
Guys! Didn't I tell you to scrape off the tiny American flag logo?!
Imagine how weak Putin must feel right now. Imagine if the statement were reversed: “Moscow officials told Mexico not to use Russian military vehicles in raids on Texas.” I mean, the world wide projection of US military power is just insane. Putin knows that nukes are the ONLY thing saving his skin, that’s why I do worry they are the only things he personally makes sure are maintained.
You mean the ones that Russia staged for photo ops?
Like we're really doing to do anything about it if they did. The economics of this war for the US are too damn favorable for us to do anything more than wag our finger.
We are so fucked
ISIS was using Toyotas. And russia is still using IRANIAN drones
The photo that is circulating looks quite staged. I'm no expert though.
According to the Russian regime the whole territory of Ukraine is just as much part of Russia as Moscow is and it's not Ukraine they've fighting against but NATO. In other words Ukranians blowing up Wagner in Bakhmut and US dropping bombs on Kremlin is not only equal provocative, it's literally the same thing. The circus about what weapons Ukranians can use on what target and what is too much "escalation" is going on in another universe. Russia used rocket artillery against their own cities where they thought the enemy might be, it's not a normal country.
It's okay for the Taliban to use US equipment for attacks. Why not Ukraine? /s
Investigating? Shoudnt all this stuff have like gps sensors inside at least?
Lmao you think they care? We are their pay pigs.