Russian invasion of Ukraine | Fewer tweets, more discussion
- Thread starter Wednesday at Stoke
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Well they don’t need US weapons to hit long range targets. 1,400km from Ukraine…
I think that Trump is going to try to get the US out of this war as soon as possible. He'll put maximum pressure on Zelensky, including threats of cutting military and financial aid, to make a deal with the Russians.
The latter have the economical and military means as well as enough manpower to keep on going for a couple of years. Ukraine doesn't.
In my opinion, Ukraine is going to lose some, if not all the oblasts Putin declared part of Russia and a NATO membership is now all but gone.
What about the Kursk gains then, does that territory become part of Ukraine?
The speck on the map Ukrained gained is in the middle of nowhere, of no strategic importance, and far away from Kursk.
The whole adventure was little more than a PR stunt, a failed distraction destined to relieve the others fronts, tactically brilliant but strategically pointless and harmful in the long run.
So the Russians are more than happy to let Ukraine have it, for now, as it diverts already strained Ukrainian resources and manpower which would be much more useful elsewhere. Ukraine has lost 1,146 square kilometers since the Kursk counter-offensive.
It was dead on arrival and Ukraine doesn't have the military strength to keep this tiny territory, should push come to shove.
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Ukraine can last a couple of years, it’ll be rough until Europe/others get their act together, but they will survive. Russian cannot go another couple years without help, unfortunately they will likely get that help. Unlocking of frozen assets under US control I expect will be one of the first things. Oil price will be ramped up, etc.
For some context, latest reports are that Ukraine currently has about parity in artillery/drones. Even been talk of exporting drones since their domestic production has skyrocketed. They have around a million strong standing army, haven’t shown signs of desperation yet in recruitment and it is still EXPANDING, not shrinking, with new brigades being put together all the time, with their also growing levels of equipment and vehicles.
They are a different beast to what they were a couple years ago when they were outgunned 10 to one in artillery, etc. They survived then and if it goes back to those levels of mismatch they will survive again and continue to fight.
Hell, even if Zelensky could be persuaded, he’ll have a hell of a challenge to persuade the AFU to capitulate.
That's purely empirical evidence but all my Ukrainian friends and everything that I read/hear from Ukrainian journalists says that the recruitment is absolutely not fine and is by far the biggest and scariest issue that they're facing at the moment. There's a scarcity of new volunteers (which makes sense as everyone who realistically wanted to has already enlisted), the current military personnel that's been at the front lines for years (some even from 2014-ish) is tired and desperate to get replaced by someone (but there isn't anyone to replace them with) and the busification practices are getting worse and worse.
Maybe that's their emotional truth that doesn't correlate well with objective numbers but I haven't really seen any actual numbers that would make me optimistic on the matter. I'm really not sure if Ukraine without the US support has more sustaining power than Russia — I'm talking about the actual breaking point, not about the irreversible economical (let alone political and social) damage that was already done to Russia that will impact it for decades to come.
It can not. Not without the US. Ukraine's economy and military are literally on life support with the US doing most of the heavy lifting.
It absolutely doesn't. Russia currently produces 250,000 rounds a month, three times more than the US and Europe combined. It fires 10,000 rounds a day compared to the 2,000 by Ukraine. Where's exactly the parity you're talking about? Artillery is also the arm that does the most damage in this war, for both sides.
Russia launched more than 2,000 drones strikes in October alone and multiplied its overall drone strikes on Ukraine by 10 compared to last year. Still we can say that Ukraine currently hold its ground, with actually better drones, able to strike at a much longer distance.
Is that why the AFU currently suffers from manpower and ammunition shortage and has massive difficulties to recruit, equip and train new soldiers? Its soldiers suffering from battle exhaustion due to the lack of rotation?
Unless Ukraine is 3D printing soldiers and sending them to the front, this "one million strong" army is to be taken with a metric ton of salt.
Ukraine's current military situation is really dire. The AFU's resisting, but is on the backfoot. The war of attrition, which is clearly Russia's aim, doesn't play in its favor at all. If the US really pulls out, Ukraine will rapidly collapse.
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That's in addition to what the EU are teeing up for Ukraine. There about $200b in frozen Russian assets under EU purview to play with and they have already created a 45m euro loan (backed by frozen Russian assets) to continue arming Ukraine.
So until that all US money runs out and all frozen Russian asset money is depleted (which will take years), I don't expect there will be much leverage for Trump to stop the fighting. Also worth noting that there are 22 Republican senators who voted to fund Ukraine, and most of them will push back against Trump if he goes too hard on striking a deal with Putin to carve up Ukraine in contravention to what actual Ukrainians want.
I expect some of that resistance to shatter now that Trump has not just won the election, but overwhelmingly so. This is fully Trump's party now.
It was Trump's party in 2017 as well. Some of the Senators may want to appease him, but all certainly won't, and since most Dems are already pro-Ukraine, all it will take is a handful of Republicans like Lindsey Graham, Rubio, Cotton (all Ukraine hawks) to push back and Trump will be out of luck.
Surely you don't believe that those 2 situations are in any way similar when it comes to scale?
What are we talking about here ? Trump took over the Republican party then and has done so again now.
His level of control over it was completely different in 2017 than it is now.
Yeah exactly. He was given a mandate and then some this time around not to mention there will more than likely be far fewer reasonable voices around him. Remember when the likes of Bolton of all people were moderating voices ? Yeah that was probably good times in hindsight. The pressure the legislative branch will be under to fall in line will be far greater this time.
Fair point, but its still not as comprehensive in the present as some may lead us to believe. A lot of Republicans still adhere to standard conservative policies. That hasn't changed much from 2017 to now.
Ukraine is done with Trump. He will not support Ukraine with more arms, with more munition and with more parts. Some of them most likely exclusive from existing vehicles and hardware provided by the US
But not only that, I am sure US is providing the best intel that Ukraine can get
Europe can't fill the gap in quantity nor in quality. And is not that with the current situation Ukraine is dominating the battlefield but probably starting to falter
But not only that, I am sure US is providing the best intel that Ukraine can get
Europe can't fill the gap in quantity nor in quality. And is not that with the current situation Ukraine is dominating the battlefield but probably starting to falter
I don't necessarily disagree with anything you say but, tired? Yes of course they are tired, miserable, pissed off, confused and going through hell, but I would point out that is it still a volunteer military, for the vast majority. From my basic knowledge of every war of this nature throughout human history, that's fairly unheard of.
Most Ukrainians are living their lives and carrying on in relative normalcy, because the Ukraine decision makers can afford to let them. I say they are not desperate yet because I envision there are several stages they can still go through before they are close to desperate enough to accept whatever kind of deal Trump & Putin try to force on them, which ultimately means capitulation and subjugation of their country. It's not a war of choice for Ukraine.
The 'actual breaking point' is indeed the question, I suspect you'll be the one letting us know on here if ever there's any signs of that coming.
Is Musk expected to have a position in the next admin?
An official position? I’m not sure it matters but there are rumours.
Unofficially he’s basically co-president.
Unlikely given his day job of owning Tesla, Spacex, and trolling people on Twitter. He will probably be an on call stooge who Trump can summon on command for various things.
not sure who will be commanding whom to be honest.
It does feel like Musk will be right alongside Trump throughout his leadership. Whilst it feels unlikely they'll stick to schedule the moon landing is probably going to be with them two chumming over it as well.
Zelinsky has to find a way to talk to Trump's ego and convince him of a defeat for Ukraine looking bad for the US and for his presidency. "Are you going to be the president that will be remembered for surrendering to a former KGB agent?" Something bombastic that will reach that orange brain of his.
I don't think that is going to work. Its MAGA - which means feck everyone else (apart from Israel).
And of course, we know Trump has a very special relationship with Putin for reasons unbeknown. Trump would rather see all that Ukrainian land surrendered than for the kompromat to be exposed.
If a deal is struck between Ukraine and Russia once Trump (and Musk) take office, do we think Putin will just restock and at a later date invade Ukraine? What is stopping him?
If Russia are "given" the territory they have taken, what is stopping Ukraine from joining NATO as there would technically then be no disputed land, thus allowing entry. Would that not be the bulwark that would stop Russia from taking more?
I know Putin doesn't want NATO countries on his border, but there are others, now including a huge border with Finland.
If Russia are "given" the territory they have taken, what is stopping Ukraine from joining NATO as there would technically then be no disputed land, thus allowing entry. Would that not be the bulwark that would stop Russia from taking more?
I know Putin doesn't want NATO countries on his border, but there are others, now including a huge border with Finland.
Its not going to work out, Trump will make him concede land, to freeze the conflict.
It will only postpone the conflict further down the line, but Trump won't be there to deal with it by then, so he won't care.
Its ironic how policy doesn't actually matter, Obama was naive towards Russia "back in the days", yet the republicans got laughed out of the room when trying to warn him about it, now it is the dems trying to warn republicans about Russia.
This is positive. Hopefully the German candidate can see that there would likely be another wave of refugees from Ukraine should Trump rescind US military aid. European leaders need to realise that they don't want this as refugee crises have upended politics in just about every European country.
The boring answer is — no one knows (as for the potential reinvasion). Rationally Putin has already lost too much on the war that, by his estimation, should’ve lasted a week at the most… but he’s already all-in, rebuilding the entire country in the image of that war, making it the main ideological basis of putinism, it’s hard to undo it. And rational assessments of Putin never work anyway.
As for NATO — assuming that Trump is going to push for negotiations, leaving Ukraine in a position of significant disadvantage, I’d assume that them not joining NATO (at least for some time) would be one of the first points of the deal…
Maybe Trump does something unexpected and, you know, doesn’t throw Ukraine under the bus but I find it unlikely
The boring answer is — no one knows (as for the potential reinvasion). Rationally Putin has already lost too much on the war that, by his estimation, should’ve lasted a week at the most… but he’s already all-in, rebuilding the entire country in the image of that war, making it the main ideological basis of putinism, it’s hard to undo it. And rational assessments of Putin never work anyway.
As for NATO — assuming that Trump is going to push for negotiations, leaving Ukraine in a position of significant disadvantage, I’d assume that them not joining NATO (at least for some time) would be one of the first points of the deal…
Maybe Trump does something unexpected and, you know, doesn’t throw Ukraine under the bus but I find it unlikely
Thanks.
Feels like Putin wins in every sense if that happens. One would think that if Putin gets the land, Ukraine at least get to join NATO to prevent a further invasion. Ukraine cant guarantee any kind of sovereignty for the rest of their land without it.
If Zelenskyy agreed to any deal, especially one where handing over the "disputed" land and not joining NATO, where does that put him politically? What is the consensus in the country?
I’m not a sociological service and I only get second-hand info from Ukraine but while people there are, obviously and understandably, tired of this devastating war, I doubt that many would support that decision. Don’t take my word as a gospel though.
Yet it all depends on Trump’s ultimatum — if it comes. If he’s really going to cut all the support (instead of, say, switching to a full loan system) and Europe doesn’t magically replace all of the missing funding… I fear that Ukraine will have to take it. To be fair there’s still a contingency plan for months to come and Biden is going to approve every possible funding he can before leaving. But long-term it’s not going to be enough — unless Russia will actually break down first somehow. And while there are many cracks, I doubt that it will before Ukraine does, sadly, the gap in available resources is too big*
* although empires and, especially autocracies, often collapse suddenly and almost instantaneously.
Fecking Trump.
By the time he leaves office the Biden administration will have had almost 3 years - 3 YEARS - to put Ukraine in something other than the extremely vulnerable and weak position it is going to be in when he goes. But predictably, what we now have on here is a page of "f*cking Trump!". Not "f*cking Biden, Blinken and Sullivan for having absolutely no strategy". No, it's "f*cking Trump" before we even have a concrete idea of what he's going to do (don't you just love how everyone in the mainstream media is suddenly demanding Trump present a coherent plan for Ukrainian victory having never once demanded it of Biden in THREE effing years? Trump's supposed to have a clear and workable plan before he even takes office while Biden's got away with 3 years of "FOR AS LONG AS IT TAKES! SLAVA UKRAINI!").
How about you all don't conveniently let Biden off the hook just yet. To be leaving Ukraine in such a vulnerable and desperate position (Simbo's delusional insanity notwithstanding) having had almost 3 years to figure out a strategy, with the financial and military backing of the entire Western world behind Ukraine, is kind of shameful, and Zelensky's increasingly annoyed tweets and public statements illustrate that he feels the same. I guess that time when Lloyd Austin smirked and openly lied about presenting a strategy to Congress isn't so funny anymore is it?
All these people (not here on this forum, I mean in the media) now fretting about Ukraine's fate, why are they not asking Biden and Sullivan: "out of interest, what was YOUR plan going forward, if you'd won? Was Kamala going to do the same thing of drip-feeding Ukraine just about what it needed to not collapse for years on end?"
It's incredibly annoying how Biden and Sullivan are going to get away with this. Ukraine's eventual loss needed to be firmly on THEIR record (and Harris', since she's vowed to continue the same 'Bleed Ukraine As Long As We Can' policy). THREE f*cking years and the entirety of the Western economic and military resources only to leave Ukraine's fate in the hands of a bunch of voters from Wisconsin and Michigan. Genius, Joe. Pure genius. But sure, "f*cking Trump" I guess.
But listen, all of you in here crying over the election, consider the silver lining for Ukraine: the World's Dumbest Political Operative (or as Hillary called him, a "once-in-generation intellect") Jake Sullivan will soon be gone, as will Anthony Blinken (playing Rocking in the Free World on his guitar in a Ukrainian bar while the country is being destroyed - but yeah, that clown Trump isn't going to take this issue seriously is he?) and Lloyd Austin. I know it's hard for you to believe this, because you think they're the good guys because they say "slava Ukraini" a lot, but believe me, Ukraine is better off without them.
How about you all don't conveniently let Biden off the hook just yet. To be leaving Ukraine in such a vulnerable and desperate position (Simbo's delusional insanity notwithstanding) having had almost 3 years to figure out a strategy, with the financial and military backing of the entire Western world behind Ukraine, is kind of shameful, and Zelensky's increasingly annoyed tweets and public statements illustrate that he feels the same. I guess that time when Lloyd Austin smirked and openly lied about presenting a strategy to Congress isn't so funny anymore is it?
All these people (not here on this forum, I mean in the media) now fretting about Ukraine's fate, why are they not asking Biden and Sullivan: "out of interest, what was YOUR plan going forward, if you'd won? Was Kamala going to do the same thing of drip-feeding Ukraine just about what it needed to not collapse for years on end?"
It's incredibly annoying how Biden and Sullivan are going to get away with this. Ukraine's eventual loss needed to be firmly on THEIR record (and Harris', since she's vowed to continue the same 'Bleed Ukraine As Long As We Can' policy). THREE f*cking years and the entirety of the Western economic and military resources only to leave Ukraine's fate in the hands of a bunch of voters from Wisconsin and Michigan. Genius, Joe. Pure genius. But sure, "f*cking Trump" I guess.
But listen, all of you in here crying over the election, consider the silver lining for Ukraine: the World's Dumbest Political Operative (or as Hillary called him, a "once-in-generation intellect") Jake Sullivan will soon be gone, as will Anthony Blinken (playing Rocking in the Free World on his guitar in a Ukrainian bar while the country is being destroyed - but yeah, that clown Trump isn't going to take this issue seriously is he?) and Lloyd Austin. I know it's hard for you to believe this, because you think they're the good guys because they say "slava Ukraini" a lot, but believe me, Ukraine is better off without them.
Without direct US or Europe's ground force and actualy boots on the ground, is there any other possibilities?
It's not like they're winning under the Dems, Zelensky has been strung along like a puppet made to dance everytime he needs weapon.
And this war needs to end somehow, if I have to bet is that No more Joining Nato talk or we'll be back attacking you, take some token land and see how it goes 10-20 years after.
Not sure how this no-NATO clause is any different to Budapest memorandum. Russia will rearm themselves to the teeth, instigate conflict and sabre rattle if anyone dares to object. They need more tangible peace than that. Seeing how much weapon flow, in actual war, is played by politics, it's hard to imagine them getting everything that would be agreed upon in any sort of peace talks.
Also, what happens to Kherson and Zaporizhia, as pootin signed them into constitution? They're barely grinding out Donbass, they ain't getting past Dnipro. Crimea is all but gone now, one would assume.
I suggest you look into Rubio's current position.
https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2024/11/6/7483253/
The only one still reading from 2022's "Ukraine is going to defeat Russia" script is Lindsey Graham, and that's because this war is the funniest thing he's ever seen in his life and he wants it to continue for as long as possible. 2 huge blocs of dumb useless Slavs (as he sees both sides) killing each other while his state of South Carolina makes billions from new military contracts is the closest he gets to the human emotion of joy.