Russian invasion of Ukraine | Fewer tweets, more discussion

TMDaines said:
It buries the lede a bit with Russia wanting Donbas and Crimea.
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They will obviously never give back Crimea but I reckon when pushed they may eventually agree on neutrality of Donbas or even ‘give it back’ to Ukraine (doubtful).
 
Frosty said:
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I thought that recognizing the Russian language as official language would be the easiest request to accept, considering that many Ukrainians speak Russian anyway and/or are bilingual.

Giving Dombas region is the most difficult request.
 
Frosty said:
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If this is accurate - and I have big doubts - it would be a huge indication of the military losses suffered by Russia .... to the point where, far from any Russian insistence that Ukraine must be a neutral country, it can join the EU and have its future insurance from further attacks bolstered if needed by troops from several NATO countries.
 
Channel 4 News: Russia Ukraine Conflict - Ukrainian counterattacks retake territory, heading towards Kherson in the south

 
Beans said:
The thefts of over 500 passenger planes is being called the biggest in history.

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It's a weird kind of theft. Obviously a lot of value for the true owners but what is Russia going to do, sell them? They're depreciating assets that require a lot of mechanical upkeep that Russia won't likely be able to maintain.
 
What's the difference between first hand reporting and people telling them directly?

 
sun_tzu said:
I'm guessing they will struggle to get spare parts so it might not be too long till the Airbuses and Boeing's become hard to service
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Not only this, but no company will ever lease aircraft to Russia again as long as Putin's gangsters remain in power.
 
Revan said:
I thought that recognizing the Russian language as official language would be the easiest request to accept, considering that many Ukrainians speak Russian anyway and/or are bilingual.

Giving Dombas region is the most difficult request.
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IF this should be true it is amazing. The status of the Russian language might look like a simple thing on one hand, but its symbolic implications are huge.

Having the same language ties countries together, focusing on different languages will separate them further. Not demanding official status for the Russian language is in a way equivalent to giving up the claim on the country as a whole and accepting that they are not "lost brothers". Together with accepting Ukrainian EU membership this essentially means that Ukraine (at least what remains of it) will be part of the European/Western alliances.
 
Terrible things happen in Mariupol. We have reports from multiple sources. And yet, there are no large scale protests inside Russia! Would you imagine what would happen in London if the British army was doing this today?

From this, I infer that the large majority of Russians support these actions of their government. I really feel stunned that there has been so little protest from Russians, either inside Russia or outside. Why does this happen? Do the majority of Russians consider Ukraine "a fake country" so they have the right to do whatever to it? But even if they believe that, why would anyone accept all this bombardment, the killings, the deportations? I really do not understand this.

I have asked this question before but I got no replies. Are there any Russians that can give us some perspective?
 
My general take is that the West has now moved decisively from seeing Putin's Russia as an unfriendly state, to it now being seen as an enemy state ... one to be undermined, degraded and attacked by all means possible - military, economic, political, cultural, diplomatic - short of direct combat.
 
frostbite said:
Terrible things happen in Mariupol. We have reports from multiple sources. And yet, there are no large scale protests inside Russia! Would you imagine what would happen in London if the British army was doing this today?

From this, I infer that the large majority of Russians support these actions of their government. I really feel stunned that there has been so little protest from Russians, either inside Russia or outside. Why does this happen? Do the majority of Russians consider Ukraine "a fake country" so they have the right to do whatever to it? But even if they believe that, why would anyone accept all this bombardment, the killings, the deportations? I really do not understand this.

I have asked this question before but I got no replies. Are there any Russians that can give us some perspective?
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In the earlier weeks there were protests but I don't recall protests in Russia in the last week? Seemed to have died down.

You have to understand how severe the repression is though.
 
frostbite said:
Terrible things happen in Mariupol. We have reports from multiple sources. And yet, there are no large scale protests inside Russia! Would you imagine what would happen in London if the British army was doing this today?

From this, I infer that the large majority of Russians support these actions of their government. I really feel stunned that there has been so little protest from Russians, either inside Russia or outside. Why does this happen? Do the majority of Russians consider Ukraine "a fake country" so they have the right to do whatever to it? But even if they believe that, why would anyone accept all this bombardment, the killings, the deportations? I really do not understand this.

I have asked this question before but I got no replies. Are there any Russians that can give us some perspective?
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Dude, they get beaten up and charged in court if they protest. They have been trying.

There's a large proportion that do support the war (mostly older people I think), but there's also an equally large proportion who don't support it but are silenced.
 
Spending less than a minute thinking about it, I don't get why paying for Russian gas in rubles would "prop up" the ruble.

Presumably foreign states don't hold rubles and want to buy gas, while Russia wants to sell gas to get more rubles. So either 1) the foreign states use their dollars to buy gas, while Russia then sells their new dollars to buy rubles, or 2) the foreign states use their dollars to buy rubles, and then use their new rubles to buy gas.

We're currently doing 1). If we move to 2), the only thing that really changes is who buys the rubles. Non-rubles will have to be sold to buy rubles either way.
 
frostbite said:
Terrible things happen in Mariupol. We have reports from multiple sources. And yet, there are no large scale protests inside Russia! Would you imagine what would happen in London if the British army was doing this today?

From this, I infer that the large majority of Russians support these actions of their government. I really feel stunned that there has been so little protest from Russians, either inside Russia or outside. Why does this happen? Do the majority of Russians consider Ukraine "a fake country" so they have the right to do whatever to it? But even if they believe that, why would anyone accept all this bombardment, the killings, the deportations? I really do not understand this.

I have asked this question before but I got no replies. Are there any Russians that can give us some perspective?
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The large majority of Russians are simply denied access to information about what it is really going on. The Russian state now controls all the media.
 
frostbite said:
Terrible things happen in Mariupol. We have reports from multiple sources. And yet, there are no large scale protests inside Russia! Would you imagine what would happen in London if the British army was doing this today?

From this, I infer that the large majority of Russians support these actions of their government. I really feel stunned that there has been so little protest from Russians, either inside Russia or outside. Why does this happen? Do the majority of Russians consider Ukraine "a fake country" so they have the right to do whatever to it? But even if they believe that, why would anyone accept all this bombardment, the killings, the deportations? I really do not understand this.

I have asked this question before but I got no replies. Are there any Russians that can give us some perspective?
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Overall, protests inside Russia have totally lost their momentum. That's very grim for the future of the country if the masses don't want to make themselves heard today and on every day forward. We can say a lot about repression, but the point of those protests is to overstretch police capabilities until they (the police) go into burnout or have had enough of this shit from their own government. A form of attrition; that should be the plan.
 
VorZakone said:
In the earlier weeks there were protests but I don't recall protests in Russia in the last week? Seemed to have died down.

You have to understand how severe the repression is though.
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Sure, I understand the repression. But still, they have 10000 deaths of their own soldiers. Now compare this to the deaths of protesters. I know it is not the same, but still deaths are deaths. And then you have all these deaths of Ukrainians, both civilians and military. And all those people that lost their homes. Sorry, but compared to jailing 15000 thousand protesters ... well it seems next to nothing. I am not saying that protesting is easy, but if there were 1 million protesters in Moscow, surely they couldn't jail them all?

Let me add that I haven't seen any large scale protests from Russians in London or New York or SF, either... Sure, there were some protests, but nothing on the scale that I would expect, especially when I read what is happening in Mariupol. It seems to me that the majority of Russians simply don't care.
 
NotThatSoph said:
Spending less than a minute thinking about it, I don't get why paying for Russian gas in rubles would "prop up" the ruble.

Presumably foreign states don't hold rubles and want to buy gas, while Russia wants to sell gas to get more rubles. So either 1) the foreign states use their dollars to buy gas, while Russia then sells their new dollars to buy rubles, or 2) the foreign states use their dollars to buy rubles, and then use their new rubles to buy gas.

We're currently doing 1). If we move to 2), the only thing that really changes is who buys the rubles. Non-rubles will have to be sold to buy rubles either way.
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Your mistake is assuming that Russia buys Rubles with the Dollars/Euros they receive - they don't. They either build cash reserves for a scenario like the current one, or simply use those Dollars/Euros to pay for imports with it. Currently only a small amount of their oil/gas income actually gets converted to Rubles.
 
NotThatSoph said:
Spending less than a minute thinking about it, I don't get why paying for Russian gas in rubles would "prop up" the ruble.

Presumably foreign states don't hold rubles and want to buy gas, while Russia wants to sell gas to get more rubles. So either 1) the foreign states use their dollars to buy gas, while Russia then sells their new dollars to buy rubles, or 2) the foreign states use their dollars to buy rubles, and then use their new rubles to buy gas.

We're currently doing 1). If we move to 2), the only thing that really changes is who buys the rubles. Non-rubles will have to be sold to buy rubles either way.
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Not like that mate. The Russians can't use dollars to buy rubles because then they'll be stuck with rubles that no-one is accepting. They need other countries to buy the rubles
 
stefan92 said:
Your mistake is assuming that Russia buys Rubles with the Dollars/Euros they receive - they don't. They either build cash reserves for a scenario like the current one, or simply use those Dollars/Euros to pay for imports with it. Currently only a small amount of their oil/gas income actually gets converted to Rubles.
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In that case Russia will have to sell the rubles they receive to buy Dollars and Euros, 1) and 2) changes to:

- 1) Foreign states buy their gas with Dollars/Euros. Russia either keeps it, or buys imported goods.
- 2) Foreign states buy Rubles. Russia sells their Rubles to buy Dollars/Euros, theen either keeps them or buys imported goods.

RedTiger said:
Not like that mate. The Russians can't use dollars to buy rubles because then they'll be stuck with rubles that no-one is accepting. They need other countries to buy the rubles
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If people aren't accepting Rubles, why would Russia want Rubles? Why does it matter whether it's Russia or Germany who buys the very exact same Ruble from someone? The same amount of foreign currency is sold, the same amount of Rubles is bought, the same amount of gas is exchanged.
 
NotThatSoph said:
In that case Russia will have to sell the rubles they receive to buy Dollars and Euros, 1) and 2) changes to:

- 1) Foreign states buy their gas with Dollars/Euros. Russia either keeps it, or buys imported goods.
- 2) Foreign states buy Rubles. Russia sells their Rubles to buy Dollars/Euros, theen either keeps them or buys imported goods.



If people aren't accepting Rubles, why would Russia want Rubles? Why does it matter whether it's Russia or Germany who buys the very exact same Ruble from someone? The same amount of foreign currency is sold, the same amount of Rubles is bought, the same amount of gas is exchanged.
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No the amount changes. Russia doesn't need to buy Dollars/Euros with the Rubles they want to get for their oil/gas. They still have big cash reserves (although partially frozen), they won't be able to import much stuff due to the sanctions, and they still accept non-Ruble payments from states they still consider to be friendly, those will get them enough foreign cash to finance the limited imports that will happen.
 
Dr. Dwayne said:
It's a weird kind of theft. Obviously a lot of value for the true owners but what is Russia going to do, sell them? They're depreciating assets that require a lot of mechanical upkeep that Russia won't likely be able to maintain.
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I think they're at least talking about taking everything that any business has left behind that are boycotting. Not much they can do in response, turning McDonald's into Uncle Vlad's and running these planes into the ground are some of the few moves they have.

I have to say selling oil and gas to Europe in rubles only is very clever. But it sounds like Anatoly Chubais fleeing is a sign that is all going to fall apart, he's supposedly the architect of the Russian economy.
 
stefan92 said:
No the amount changes. Russia doesn't need to buy Dollars/Euros with the Rubles they want to get for their oil/gas. They still have big cash reserves (although partially frozen), they won't be able to import much stuff due to the sanctions, and they still accept non-Ruble payments from states they still consider to be friendly, those will get them enough foreign cash to finance the limited imports that will happen.
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I'm moving this to the economics thread, don't want to derail.
 
The BBC reports:

"Russia has deployed mercenaries from the infamous Wagner Group to eastern Ukraine, the UK's Ministry of Defence says.

In its latest operational update, the MoD said that the group is expected to deploy more than 1,000 personnel - including senior leaders of the group - to "undertake combat operations" in Ukraine.

"Due to heavy losses and a largely stalled invasion, Russia has likely been forced to reprioritise Wagner personnel for Ukraine at the expense of operations in Africa and Syria," the MoD added.

The Wagner group is considered one of Russia's most secretive organisations. Officially, it doesn't exist, but up to 10,000 operatives are believed to have taken at least one contract with the group over the last seven years to go to hotspots including Syria, Libya and the Central African Republic."
 
Revan said:
I thought that recognizing the Russian language as official language would be the easiest request to accept, considering that many Ukrainians speak Russian anyway and/or are bilingual.
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In a way, its kind of impossible, as it's not something that can be enforced. Accepting something like that would probably even hasten the abandonment of the language in Ukraine.
 
Having something as an official language goes well beyond the spoken language.

It probably means it has to be taught or offered in school and official docs have to be in that language. Makes it that much easier to Russify Ukraine, instead of what the youth of today is more likely to lean towards which is English and other EU languages.
 
Interesting how Russian propaganda can't even repeat the comment Biden made.

 
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