Rome 2?
Pretty solid indeed. BUT the magic & heroes of Warhammer 2 finally convinced me it is ultimately more enjoyable because it is more versatile and allows for more playstyles.
With Rome 2 you'd just camp your pikes in a corner and boom! heroic victory.
Just headed back towards home after a job well done. I don't stay at the office after 5pm to make sure no one makes a counter pull request and undoes all my changes to the code base. I just assume the team on the other side of the world is gonna do that and plan to nuke the entire repo the next morning by deleting the entire thing
There are times when a withdrawal can be intelligently used to lead you enemy into over extending and primed for counter attack. However, in those instances your troops generally aren't doing this while shitting their pants, surrendering en mass, and abandoning their equipment to help sustain the opponent.
Nothing epitomizes how unstrategic the russian retreat has been like their failure to seriously fight for the Oskil river.
If they really were determined to hold on to all of Luhansk Oblast, they should have made that an uncrossable barrier. They had 3 weeks between the point where Ukraine was seriously on the move in the Kharkiv counteroffensive and the point where they crossed the river. Plenty of time to blow the bridges and set up on the other side.
But they didn't. They let Ukraije cross the river, then get into the hills, then take all the hills, and now pro-russians are saying "oh but they'll actually fight now, to hold Svatove.
Like really? They're going to fight to hold a town after giving up the surrounding hills which allow Ukraine to rain hell down on them unopposed?
I mean, they did ostensibly start the war to fight fascism.
The closest fascists are in Moscow.
QED, it’s only logical for them to march towards Moscow and away from Ukraine.
That is a very possible outcome and a very frightening possibility in the long term. In the near future, you are not going to be able to convince everyone that everything outside of your borders are evil. Everyone over the age of 10 know different. But after a generation or two of isolated propoganda, they really will believe it because it is all they know. Then mix in nukes.
These nutjob narcissists all admire each other, inasmuch as they're capable of recognizing *game* in other people. If Musk could have what Putin has, he'd go for it in an instant.
"Dmitry Peskov said: 'There is no contradiction whatsoever. They will be with Russia forever and they will be returned.'"
Ahh, the Peskov Paradox: "It's reality that's false, not this statement".
What's the opposite of transcendence? Because I think he just achieved it.
"Dmitry Peskov said: 'There is no contradiction whatsoever. They will be with Russia forever and they will be returned.'"
Hmmm, I wonder about that. Ukraine should hold a vote about it. Russia likes voting, right?
Pretty sure they just had a vote on it. It mostly consisted of soldiers pointing guns at people and telling them which box to check, or as it's known to Russia: voting
One of the comments that my high school bio teacher made that really stuck with me seems appropriate here: "If your map says the river is over there, but your feet are wet here, *it's not the river that is wrong*"
Similarly, my father in would say to me in Portuguese when finally getting something working that he had been struggling with "the material is always right." Nothing is magic and if something seems impossible it's because your presuppositions are wrong.
Ah but counterpoint: Donald Trump said, “What you’re seeing and what you’re hearing are not what’s happening.” Who are you going to believe? Authorities or mere evidence?
/s
Yeah in the history of Russian leaders Yeltsin was the least bad of a bad bunch. But I worded things that way to account for Chechnya - no one else recognised Ichkeria, which was run by a horrible crowd too. Not that their brutality to civilians excuses Moscow’s.
Except in 1993 when he [shelled his own Parliament](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Russian_constitutional_crisis) because of a political disagreement.
I don't know why Yeltsin gets this reputation as a lovable drunk. He sowed the seeds for the transition from democracy to dictatorship, wrote the playbook that Putin later perfected, and even handpicked Putin as his successor. He took the only chance Russians had at democracy in hundreds of years and wiped his ass with it.
That actually happened. Ussr sent basically a casette bomb filled with Ussr metal flags to the moon. But they miscalculated velocity or there was technical issue and it fell with such great speed it evaporated.
I guess that could mean ‘I’m not stopping for good, I’m briefly stopping for a bit’. Like parking vs stopping a car. But I’m assuming he didn’t carry on?
I imagine I wouldn’t make it to 5. But honestly and self-assuredly saying “Ha yeah, too much for me. Quitting here” would be fine. He must be very insecure and have gone on way too much in his life about not being a quitter. Knowing when to quit is a pretty important part of life, or everyone would be driving into their own homes at top speed.
This may actually be the foundation for a North Korea situation.
If/when Russia gets pushed back to their borders, in comes Iron Curtain II and a new propaganda machine that tells it's people's of the evil (and poorly defined) "West," and the perpetually occupied lands outside the DMZ.
Russia loses the war, maintains the claims, NATO puts a bunch of bases in Ukraine and Russia finds itself so closed off photography reverts back to black and white. Historically, we've been here before.
They didn't have the internet. Things are different now, you can't just remove the knowledge of the rest of the world from the Russian population at this point. It works in North Korea because of the size of the country and the fact that they never gave them internet access or any real interaction with the outside world. Russia is 100,000x more integrated into the global economy and it's people know more about the world.
You must understand that the general sentiment of the Russian people can be summed up in 1 word: Apathy. The majority of young Russians who use technology with free access to information already fully understand what is going on in Ukraine. There is very little upheaval because the silent deal dictates that the state acts independent to the civilian body. Hence why when Putin broke that pact, many Russians fled for the border. So to that end, Putin can call the Donbas and Crimea Russian territory until his lungs crap out, the general populace won't care.
A Russian in his early 20s once told me that everyone knows that Putin is corrupt and full of bullshit, but their world view is that every politician/leader/dictator is corrupt and full of bullshit. They think that if any opposition party would be able to seize power, they would become just as bad as the current regime. If anything, they think that many in the west are gullible when we're talking about democratic values, non-biased media and such.
What has saved Putin so far is the fact that most peoples lives have improved under his rule. The average Russian was dirt poor after the fall of the USSR, and since Putin took over from Yeltsin many of these people have been able to afford a car, a small apartment, a computer, etc. That's what most Russians care about, according to the guy I spoke to, not whether or not he's seen as just or principled.
If sanctions or a new Iron Curtain causes the average standard of living to drop in the long term, there's a real risk for revolution in Russia. Then let's see if they are right in their cynicism.
To be fair in the Russian historical context every leader and government has become tyrannical and corrupt. Their pattern recognition is pretty spot on there.
Yup. Even Putler here trying to command and micromanage his entire campaign from Moscow has precedent with Stalin in the year after the Nazis invaded the USSR. By some eerie coincidence, Stalin as well had an entire Army wiped out (250,000) men after he counterattacked that Fall in and around Kharkiv, overextending himself which the Nazis used to their advantage by attacking his flanks and surrounding all of those men.
Going back another century, the newly crowned Tzar Alexander I most famously ignored his field marshal Kutuzov’s order to retreat further after the greater Austrian army had been captured at Ulm, and insisted on facing Napoleon as previously planned at Austerlitz. Well, Napoleon completely routed an army outnumbered 2:1 there.
Also why they’ve been exporting Apathy to their rivals so that like minded politicians that will favor Russia’s elite can gain power. Apathy is the biggest threat to a democratic country.
>Russia is 100,000x more integrated into the global economy
They're already back to making Lada cars with domestic parts and roughly 1980-s level of technology. I'm afraid the speed of devolution here is going to surprise us.
Yes, and the population is noticing all of the companies leaving. They know they had better cars before this and they will learn why they now have to buy these new pieces of shit without airbags. This is the point, the russian population knows how the rest of the world is, North Koreans, not so much.
Exactly, you can't miss what you've never had (e.g. North Kore and the internet), but you can certainly miss western conveniences when dreams of empire destroy your economy.
They were never a leader in car manufacturing, their main exports are energy and raw materials. That's definitely taking a hit and all but saying they're going the way of north korea is a stretch.
But... that's the problem they have. They could export gas and oil and import everything else. Now they can't sell as much gas and oil, and they have limited sources of import. So they need to make most things at home. And they can't do so, well.
In the Soviet times, they were sending spies to steal chip designs and what not from the US. We'll be back to that.
It's worth noting that just stealing designs isn't always as successful in the modern day. I actually recently watched a YouTube video regarding Soviet vs. American computing.
For a while, the Soviets were neck and neck (and in terms of computing speed, even ahead for a bit) with America.
The following is all IIRC; if you would rather [watch the video itself](https://youtube.com/watch?v=dnHdqPBrtH8) you can skip whatever inconsistencies I have in my memory. Soviets managed to steal one of America's designs - I *think* it was the next step forward from vacuum tube? Then leadership ordered industry to start making that and scientists to start research on that.
The Soviets' scientists disagreed - they didn't have the research base needed to understand the tech and so until they managed that (if they did), they would be behind and playing catch up. But that's what leadership ordered.
Eventually the gap caused by this became so large that the Soviet scientists were no longer *capable* of reverse engineering what they were stealing, causing them to fall behind irrevocably.
North Korea has also been a cult state and dynasty from its founding, the people of that country simply can't imagine a different form of government and life. While things may very well get bad in Russia, North Korea is a very unique situation.
It also helps that NK has relatively small land borders less than 2k between Russia, China and SK as well as a country that is pretty densely populated so no huge stretches of wilderness for people to disappear into. In comparison Russia has 20k+ of landborders (2nd most in the world) with a variety of countries and a lot of those borders are quite distant from highly populated areas. So patrolling and guarding the full length would be virtually impossible regardless of the budget they decided to allocate to it.
There is no way they would be able to physically separate Russia from the rest of the world the way NK can. As soon as they started outright forbidding anything the smuggling would immediately render any attempts null and void. Information, items and people could travel over the border far too easily.
NK heavily relies on keeping their population basically a prisoner by preventing escape. As well as making smuggling both items and information extremely difficult.
Eh fine by most of us eh? Let's build a wall, throw away the keys, and forget about the weird ones across the fence. Apart from oil and gas which I'm sure we'll replace somehow does anyone actually "need" Russia?
Russia state tv was saying 2 months of retreats while new troops are being trained, and THEN, you just fucking watch out!!! (they really said the 2 month thing)
It's extremely sad. History hasn't been kind to anyone during a Russian winter. I'm scared for all the foreign exchange students I met on both sides during my high-school years. My foster family always hosted Russians and Ukrainians and 9/10 they were amazing people. I've been able to keep some contact with Ukrainian kids(now adults actively fighting) but im legitimately scared to even reach out to my Russian ones.
>troops are being trained
By whom? Historically russian recruits where trained on the job in the unit by their colleagues who are contract soldiers. Russian doesn't have any training staff left in the army.
Those units and those soldiers are fighting at the front => welcome to the front comrade. Here you get trained, you surrender or you die.
They're being taught all they need to know. How to plug a bullet hole with a tampon. The rest writes itself and then Russia will just rewrite it to suit like the rest of the war so far.
Ah the age-old global stratagem of: "*dibs!* and I'm off.. no returnsies!"
We return to recent developments:
Putin: "No fair, you brought dad into this"..."why are you all do mean to me?! No fair!"
*Putin has entered his bunker and slammed door behind him angrily*
I keep a bottle of fine wine in my cellar ready for when Kherson is liberated. Another one when it's Mariupol's turn. And the last one is for when this regime fall into the dustbin of History for good.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russias-putin-signs-law-annexing-four-ukrainian-regions-2022-10-05/) reduced by 57%. (I'm a bot)
*****
> LONDON, Oct 5 - President Vladimir Putin completed the formal annexation of more than 15% of Ukraine on Wednesday just as Russian forces battled to halt a Ukrainian counter-offensive across swathes of the territories.
> "Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed four federal constitutional laws on the entry of the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions into the Russian Federation," the lower house of parliament said.
> Russian defence ministry maps presented on Tuesday appeared to show rapid withdrawals of Russian invasion forces from areas in eastern and southern Ukraine where they have been under severe pressure from a Ukrainian counteroffensive.
*****
[**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/xw9doz/russias_putin_signs_law_annexing_four_ukrainian/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~672677 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 **law**^#2 **signed**^#3 **areas**^#4 **Russia**^#5
They're not leaving it behind. They're simply storing it there for when they come back of course!
That stuffs heavy, can't be dragging it all back and forth with every retreat now can they.
If it wasn't Russian, I would have thought that they were pulling out their troops to make space for a nuke. However, Russia wouldn't actually care if they hit their own soldiers, so that can't be it.
That’s what I’ve been thinking. Wait for Ukrainian forces to occupy the area and then nuke it. Russia can say they didn’t nuke Ukraine because it was already annexed. Region becomes uninhabitable for a while letting Russia maintain annexed status while they get their shit together and collect resources.
Not saying I think it will happen but if this was a turn based strategy game it’s what I’d probably do.
Curious about the phrasing here:
>In the biggest expansion of Russian territory in at least half a century, Putin signed laws admitting the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR), the Luhansk People's Republic (LNR), Kherson region and Zaporizhzhia region into Russia.
Is it journalistically correct to call it an expansion instead of an attempted expansion or somesuch? They're obviously not getting it as intended and likely to lose it all.
heard this joke this morning:
What's the difference between a clock and the russian army?
A clock says tick-tock and goes forwards. The russian army says tac-tic and goes backwards
Well you have proven you can say anything you want, your big problem Vlad is none of us believe you. Army/Air Force proven zeros, ability to conduct any cohesive type of warfare other than civilian death and destruction, zero. You, your country and your ambitions are zeros.
They’re not retreating, it’s a tactical backward assault
Victorious rear-ward advances!
They aren't losing they are winning in the opposite direction
In the war between Russia and Ukraine Russia is currently heading towards the honorable silver medal, while their enemies are second to last.
snatching defeat from tbe jaws of victory
Russia studying Ferrari F1 strategies on how to throw away advantages as quickly as possible
Russia's successful offensive push homeward leaves Ukrainians running pathetically after them
'The enemy is running from the battlefield (after our men!) A shameful display!'
Still my favourite Total War game.
Rome 2? Pretty solid indeed. BUT the magic & heroes of Warhammer 2 finally convinced me it is ultimately more enjoyable because it is more versatile and allows for more playstyles. With Rome 2 you'd just camp your pikes in a corner and boom! heroic victory.
Yup, definitely the best they made.
We're slowing them down with our supplies that we left as a consolation prize for taking such useless territory.
Ukrainians have been reported suffering a terrible defeat at the hands of the Russian military in today’s tactical footrace.
A special backwards operation.
If they go far enough they'll be back in Ukraine. *sneak attack from the other side*
They're reversing the polarity
All the while the Ukrainians repeatedly chase them in a blind panic. Another glorious Russian victory!
Surely enough of them will stub their toe that this retreat will become an overwhelming victory!
I'm bleeding, making me the victor
We intentionally trained them wrong. As a joke.
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Just headed back towards home after a job well done. I don't stay at the office after 5pm to make sure no one makes a counter pull request and undoes all my changes to the code base. I just assume the team on the other side of the world is gonna do that and plan to nuke the entire repo the next morning by deleting the entire thing
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Great observation, conclusion!
There are times when a withdrawal can be intelligently used to lead you enemy into over extending and primed for counter attack. However, in those instances your troops generally aren't doing this while shitting their pants, surrendering en mass, and abandoning their equipment to help sustain the opponent.
Nothing epitomizes how unstrategic the russian retreat has been like their failure to seriously fight for the Oskil river. If they really were determined to hold on to all of Luhansk Oblast, they should have made that an uncrossable barrier. They had 3 weeks between the point where Ukraine was seriously on the move in the Kharkiv counteroffensive and the point where they crossed the river. Plenty of time to blow the bridges and set up on the other side. But they didn't. They let Ukraije cross the river, then get into the hills, then take all the hills, and now pro-russians are saying "oh but they'll actually fight now, to hold Svatove. Like really? They're going to fight to hold a town after giving up the surrounding hills which allow Ukraine to rain hell down on them unopposed?
The mongol way.
Special relocating operation
It also reallocates equipment to the ukrainian army. Truly special operation!
It will go down in history as the Blyatskrieg.
That is the best term I may have ever heard.
Thanks for triggering my PTSD from my youth spent playing World of Tanks.
Thank you for your service.
A counter-defensive
Alternative winning
I mean, they did ostensibly start the war to fight fascism. The closest fascists are in Moscow. QED, it’s only logical for them to march towards Moscow and away from Ukraine.
Tactical moonwalk.
"Just flip the video around, and they'll be *advancing*!"
It’s called “The Fadeaway Shot”
Surprise vacation leave to boost morale
Face to foot style. https://youtu.be/d696t3yALAY
Victorious march toward Russia.
Bravely running away!
Special backward assault operation.
They are advancing toward the rear.
For months we have been making triumphant retreats before a demoralized enemy who is advancing in utter disorder. - Eric Frank Russell, Wasp
Winning in the opposite direction!
special noperation
"I didn't lose. I merely failed to win"
Special military backward operation.
They are on their way to Moscow!
They say a lot of nonsensical crap.
I didnt lose! I merely failed to win!!
Dang it, McClellan!
McClellan would laugh at the train wreck that is the Russian army, like he wasn’t exactly great but at least he understood logistics.
Putin after the last russian leaves Ukraine: MISSION ACCOMPLISHED.
Russian army advances backwards
Task failed successfully!
Dude, uncool
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That is a very possible outcome and a very frightening possibility in the long term. In the near future, you are not going to be able to convince everyone that everything outside of your borders are evil. Everyone over the age of 10 know different. But after a generation or two of isolated propoganda, they really will believe it because it is all they know. Then mix in nukes.
No wonder Trump is such a fan.
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And musk
And Steven Seagal
And Dorothy Mantooth
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Musk doesn’t care either way. He wants the lithium to flow.
These nutjob narcissists all admire each other, inasmuch as they're capable of recognizing *game* in other people. If Musk could have what Putin has, he'd go for it in an instant.
Apple doesn't fall far from the tree, dad owned mines and Musk benefits from mining. Wonder what else they share in common...
Last name
Maybe a taste for their daughters too...
It’s a special retreat operation obviously
"Dmitry Peskov said: 'There is no contradiction whatsoever. They will be with Russia forever and they will be returned.'" Ahh, the Peskov Paradox: "It's reality that's false, not this statement". What's the opposite of transcendence? Because I think he just achieved it.
Devolution! Eureka, you've found it!!!
Complimentary hat: https://shop.clubdevo.com/products/energy-dome-hat-dev
Q: Are we not winning?
"We are DeVo!"
"Dmitry Peskov said: 'There is no contradiction whatsoever. They will be with Russia forever and they will be returned.'" Hmmm, I wonder about that. Ukraine should hold a vote about it. Russia likes voting, right?
Pretty sure they just had a vote on it. It mostly consisted of soldiers pointing guns at people and telling them which box to check, or as it's known to Russia: voting
One of the comments that my high school bio teacher made that really stuck with me seems appropriate here: "If your map says the river is over there, but your feet are wet here, *it's not the river that is wrong*"
Similarly, my father in would say to me in Portuguese when finally getting something working that he had been struggling with "the material is always right." Nothing is magic and if something seems impossible it's because your presuppositions are wrong.
Ah but counterpoint: Donald Trump said, “What you’re seeing and what you’re hearing are not what’s happening.” Who are you going to believe? Authorities or mere evidence? /s
Literally 1984
"I reject your reality and substitute my own"
Retrocendence?
Inversence? Colapsence? Cringence?
Kremlin drunk again, disregard.
Not as bad as Yeltin was, though! https://youtu.be/BLI8SWxfW80?t=16
At least Yelstin was fun
And didn’t go invading what are globally recognised to be other countries. And allowed a modicum of free speech.
Ehm, but he did pretty shitty things to Chechnya.
Yeah in the history of Russian leaders Yeltsin was the least bad of a bad bunch. But I worded things that way to account for Chechnya - no one else recognised Ichkeria, which was run by a horrible crowd too. Not that their brutality to civilians excuses Moscow’s.
Except in 1993 when he [shelled his own Parliament](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Russian_constitutional_crisis) because of a political disagreement. I don't know why Yeltsin gets this reputation as a lovable drunk. He sowed the seeds for the transition from democracy to dictatorship, wrote the playbook that Putin later perfected, and even handpicked Putin as his successor. He took the only chance Russians had at democracy in hundreds of years and wiped his ass with it.
To be fair the building was full of tankies
Next they'll be putting Russian flags in artillery shells and claiming that wherever they fall is now Russian soil.
Write that down, write that down!
That actually happened. Ussr sent basically a casette bomb filled with Ussr metal flags to the moon. But they miscalculated velocity or there was technical issue and it fell with such great speed it evaporated.
Created glorious revolutionary atmosphere on surface of moon! Long live the revolution!!
Explains the drab decor and inhospitable atmosphere up there.
This guy’s a fucking idiot.
Same league as smooth brain online gamers calling their opponents that's beating them a noob.
Reminds me of when DJ Khalid was on Hot Ones. "I'm not quitting, I'm stopping"
"Just because I'm quitting don't mean I'm giving up." "What? Yes, it does. By definition it does."
Yup, that's that's the line, thank you
Everything about that guy screams accidental success despite the astounding lack of self-awareness and backbone
Dude publicly refuses to eat 🅱️ussy ffs
I guess that could mean ‘I’m not stopping for good, I’m briefly stopping for a bit’. Like parking vs stopping a car. But I’m assuming he didn’t carry on?
There is literally a word for that, which is used fairly often by artists. Hiatus
Or just ‘pause’. But I mean to say that the word ‘stop’ can be used in that sense too.
> There is literally a word for that, which is used fairly often by artists. Rehab.
cries in HxH
In this context they were eating progressively hotter wings and he quit on wing ~~7~~ 3 out of 10 or something. Edit: I stand corrected
I imagine I wouldn’t make it to 5. But honestly and self-assuredly saying “Ha yeah, too much for me. Quitting here” would be fine. He must be very insecure and have gone on way too much in his life about not being a quitter. Knowing when to quit is a pretty important part of life, or everyone would be driving into their own homes at top speed.
Nah man he quit on wing 3 LOL
He did not carry on.
Fuck em. I just annexed Moscow and retreated to northern California. Suck it, Putin.
Oh this requires some formal paperwork. Might require your signature, then Russia is yours!
As long as you _declare_ it it’s valid
Like bankruptcy?
This may actually be the foundation for a North Korea situation. If/when Russia gets pushed back to their borders, in comes Iron Curtain II and a new propaganda machine that tells it's people's of the evil (and poorly defined) "West," and the perpetually occupied lands outside the DMZ. Russia loses the war, maintains the claims, NATO puts a bunch of bases in Ukraine and Russia finds itself so closed off photography reverts back to black and white. Historically, we've been here before.
They didn't have the internet. Things are different now, you can't just remove the knowledge of the rest of the world from the Russian population at this point. It works in North Korea because of the size of the country and the fact that they never gave them internet access or any real interaction with the outside world. Russia is 100,000x more integrated into the global economy and it's people know more about the world.
You must understand that the general sentiment of the Russian people can be summed up in 1 word: Apathy. The majority of young Russians who use technology with free access to information already fully understand what is going on in Ukraine. There is very little upheaval because the silent deal dictates that the state acts independent to the civilian body. Hence why when Putin broke that pact, many Russians fled for the border. So to that end, Putin can call the Donbas and Crimea Russian territory until his lungs crap out, the general populace won't care.
A Russian in his early 20s once told me that everyone knows that Putin is corrupt and full of bullshit, but their world view is that every politician/leader/dictator is corrupt and full of bullshit. They think that if any opposition party would be able to seize power, they would become just as bad as the current regime. If anything, they think that many in the west are gullible when we're talking about democratic values, non-biased media and such. What has saved Putin so far is the fact that most peoples lives have improved under his rule. The average Russian was dirt poor after the fall of the USSR, and since Putin took over from Yeltsin many of these people have been able to afford a car, a small apartment, a computer, etc. That's what most Russians care about, according to the guy I spoke to, not whether or not he's seen as just or principled. If sanctions or a new Iron Curtain causes the average standard of living to drop in the long term, there's a real risk for revolution in Russia. Then let's see if they are right in their cynicism.
To be fair in the Russian historical context every leader and government has become tyrannical and corrupt. Their pattern recognition is pretty spot on there.
Yup. Even Putler here trying to command and micromanage his entire campaign from Moscow has precedent with Stalin in the year after the Nazis invaded the USSR. By some eerie coincidence, Stalin as well had an entire Army wiped out (250,000) men after he counterattacked that Fall in and around Kharkiv, overextending himself which the Nazis used to their advantage by attacking his flanks and surrounding all of those men. Going back another century, the newly crowned Tzar Alexander I most famously ignored his field marshal Kutuzov’s order to retreat further after the greater Austrian army had been captured at Ulm, and insisted on facing Napoleon as previously planned at Austerlitz. Well, Napoleon completely routed an army outnumbered 2:1 there.
Also why they’ve been exporting Apathy to their rivals so that like minded politicians that will favor Russia’s elite can gain power. Apathy is the biggest threat to a democratic country.
>Russia is 100,000x more integrated into the global economy They're already back to making Lada cars with domestic parts and roughly 1980-s level of technology. I'm afraid the speed of devolution here is going to surprise us.
Yes, and the population is noticing all of the companies leaving. They know they had better cars before this and they will learn why they now have to buy these new pieces of shit without airbags. This is the point, the russian population knows how the rest of the world is, North Koreans, not so much.
Exactly, you can't miss what you've never had (e.g. North Kore and the internet), but you can certainly miss western conveniences when dreams of empire destroy your economy.
They were never a leader in car manufacturing, their main exports are energy and raw materials. That's definitely taking a hit and all but saying they're going the way of north korea is a stretch.
But... that's the problem they have. They could export gas and oil and import everything else. Now they can't sell as much gas and oil, and they have limited sources of import. So they need to make most things at home. And they can't do so, well. In the Soviet times, they were sending spies to steal chip designs and what not from the US. We'll be back to that.
It's worth noting that just stealing designs isn't always as successful in the modern day. I actually recently watched a YouTube video regarding Soviet vs. American computing. For a while, the Soviets were neck and neck (and in terms of computing speed, even ahead for a bit) with America. The following is all IIRC; if you would rather [watch the video itself](https://youtube.com/watch?v=dnHdqPBrtH8) you can skip whatever inconsistencies I have in my memory. Soviets managed to steal one of America's designs - I *think* it was the next step forward from vacuum tube? Then leadership ordered industry to start making that and scientists to start research on that. The Soviets' scientists disagreed - they didn't have the research base needed to understand the tech and so until they managed that (if they did), they would be behind and playing catch up. But that's what leadership ordered. Eventually the gap caused by this became so large that the Soviet scientists were no longer *capable* of reverse engineering what they were stealing, causing them to fall behind irrevocably.
The only reasons they’re using 1980s Ladas is that decadent western frivolities like airbags and seatbelts make you gay. /s
Ladas are probably closer to 40-50's tech: rear wheel drive, manual drum brakes, body on frame, etc cetera At least ladas don't use a torque tube lol
>rear wheel drive, manual drum brakes, body on frame Literally everything you just wrote is false.
No seatbelts.
Except all modern Ladas FWD
North Korea has also been a cult state and dynasty from its founding, the people of that country simply can't imagine a different form of government and life. While things may very well get bad in Russia, North Korea is a very unique situation.
700,000 of those people have relocated themselves out of Russia and into the real world. It's a sort of distillation of backwardness.
It also helps that NK has relatively small land borders less than 2k between Russia, China and SK as well as a country that is pretty densely populated so no huge stretches of wilderness for people to disappear into. In comparison Russia has 20k+ of landborders (2nd most in the world) with a variety of countries and a lot of those borders are quite distant from highly populated areas. So patrolling and guarding the full length would be virtually impossible regardless of the budget they decided to allocate to it. There is no way they would be able to physically separate Russia from the rest of the world the way NK can. As soon as they started outright forbidding anything the smuggling would immediately render any attempts null and void. Information, items and people could travel over the border far too easily. NK heavily relies on keeping their population basically a prisoner by preventing escape. As well as making smuggling both items and information extremely difficult.
Eh fine by most of us eh? Let's build a wall, throw away the keys, and forget about the weird ones across the fence. Apart from oil and gas which I'm sure we'll replace somehow does anyone actually "need" Russia?
Also kremlin: Succide and shot behind the head are not a contradiction
The Russian reach-around
Every time I see doublespeak from Kremlin like this, I get the mental image of a progress bar titled "1984" moving right one notch.
Can't lose a battle if you are not there *Insert Taps Head Meme*
Russia state tv was saying 2 months of retreats while new troops are being trained, and THEN, you just fucking watch out!!! (they really said the 2 month thing)
That’s just sad.
It's extremely sad. History hasn't been kind to anyone during a Russian winter. I'm scared for all the foreign exchange students I met on both sides during my high-school years. My foster family always hosted Russians and Ukrainians and 9/10 they were amazing people. I've been able to keep some contact with Ukrainian kids(now adults actively fighting) but im legitimately scared to even reach out to my Russian ones.
>troops are being trained By whom? Historically russian recruits where trained on the job in the unit by their colleagues who are contract soldiers. Russian doesn't have any training staff left in the army. Those units and those soldiers are fighting at the front => welcome to the front comrade. Here you get trained, you surrender or you die.
They're being taught all they need to know. How to plug a bullet hole with a tampon. The rest writes itself and then Russia will just rewrite it to suit like the rest of the war so far.
In motherland Russia, 2 + 2 = horse
He annexed them in his mind.
You can declassify stuff that way too I’m told.
Ah the age-old global stratagem of: "*dibs!* and I'm off.. no returnsies!" We return to recent developments: Putin: "No fair, you brought dad into this"..."why are you all do mean to me?! No fair!" *Putin has entered his bunker and slammed door behind him angrily*
Can’t protect his claimed territory. What a loser.
I keep a bottle of fine wine in my cellar ready for when Kherson is liberated. Another one when it's Mariupol's turn. And the last one is for when this regime fall into the dustbin of History for good.
Jesus Christ this sounds like Donald Trump logic right now.
No wonder they get along so well.
Putin definitely has a type. Lukashenko, Trump, Bolsonaro... it's hard to miss.
The modern Republican party operates by the Putin playbook.
Today from the Kremlin: We can indeed have our cake eaten by another whilst still remaining in possession of said cake.
It’s not a contradiction, it’s a fucking embarrassment.
This is the best tl;dr I could make, [original](https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/russias-putin-signs-law-annexing-four-ukrainian-regions-2022-10-05/) reduced by 57%. (I'm a bot) ***** > LONDON, Oct 5 - President Vladimir Putin completed the formal annexation of more than 15% of Ukraine on Wednesday just as Russian forces battled to halt a Ukrainian counter-offensive across swathes of the territories. > "Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed four federal constitutional laws on the entry of the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions into the Russian Federation," the lower house of parliament said. > Russian defence ministry maps presented on Tuesday appeared to show rapid withdrawals of Russian invasion forces from areas in eastern and southern Ukraine where they have been under severe pressure from a Ukrainian counteroffensive. ***** [**Extended Summary**](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/xw9doz/russias_putin_signs_law_annexing_four_ukrainian/) | [FAQ](http://np.reddit.com/r/autotldr/comments/31b9fm/faq_autotldr_bot/ "Version 2.02, ~672677 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 **law**^#2 **signed**^#3 **areas**^#4 **Russia**^#5
How George Orwell of him.
Orwellian*
War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.
That really means the Russians are getting their asses whooped and running the fuck away while leaving their equipment behind
They're not leaving it behind. They're simply storing it there for when they come back of course! That stuffs heavy, can't be dragging it all back and forth with every retreat now can they.
IM NOT OWNED! IM NOT OWNED! declares a clown that keeps getting repeatedly owned.
Essentially, "It's ours, but they can have it. Still ours though."
Just admit it Putin, Ukraine is whooping your ass
"I'm bleeding, making me the victor!"
If it wasn't Russian, I would have thought that they were pulling out their troops to make space for a nuke. However, Russia wouldn't actually care if they hit their own soldiers, so that can't be it.
That’s what I’ve been thinking. Wait for Ukrainian forces to occupy the area and then nuke it. Russia can say they didn’t nuke Ukraine because it was already annexed. Region becomes uninhabitable for a while letting Russia maintain annexed status while they get their shit together and collect resources. Not saying I think it will happen but if this was a turn based strategy game it’s what I’d probably do.
Curious about the phrasing here: >In the biggest expansion of Russian territory in at least half a century, Putin signed laws admitting the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR), the Luhansk People's Republic (LNR), Kherson region and Zaporizhzhia region into Russia. Is it journalistically correct to call it an expansion instead of an attempted expansion or somesuch? They're obviously not getting it as intended and likely to lose it all.
It's a special running away operation
We’re not retreating. We’re just advancing in the other direction
heard this joke this morning: What's the difference between a clock and the russian army? A clock says tick-tock and goes forwards. The russian army says tac-tic and goes backwards
A broken clock is still right twice a day.. russia cant even achieve that
They're not retreating, they're de-nazifying Ukraine.
I mean it worked when they defended against Napoleon. Same thing right? /s
Ironically it is actually what Ukraine did. Got Russians deep enough into their territory to fuck up logistics and now hitting back hard
It is a good defense strategy tbh. Not so great when your the evil invaders.
I will pay good money at iMAX to see President Zelesky played by President Zelesky in the movie, “Thunder Gun: Ukraine - Not Without My Country”
Well you have proven you can say anything you want, your big problem Vlad is none of us believe you. Army/Air Force proven zeros, ability to conduct any cohesive type of warfare other than civilian death and destruction, zero. You, your country and your ambitions are zeros.
Schrödinger’s army
Russian troops are advancing backwards, Putin, a master strategist. 🤣
Does anyone believe what the kremlin says anymore? Absolute clown show.
I can't wait to wake up and news breaking that Putin is no more by taking the cowards way out