The US and NATO are directly involved in the war in Ukraine, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Thursday.
“You shouldn’t say that the US and NATO aren’t taking part in this war. You are directly participating in it,” Lavrov said at a press conference.
“And not just by providing weapons but also by training personnel. You are training their military on your territory, on the territories of Britain, Germany, Italy, and other countries,” he added.
Lavrov made the comments while defending Russian strikes on Ukrainian infrastructure, which have left millions of civilians without power and heat as temperatures are dropping. He said that Russia is “disabling” energy infrastructure that allows the US and NATO to “pump Ukraine with deadly weapons to kill Russians”
Lavrov also warned that any conventional war between nuclear-armed powers comes with a huge risk of nuclear escalation. He said that any war between nuclear powers is “unacceptable.”
“Even if someone plans to start it by conventional means, the risk of escalation into a nuclear war will be enormous,” Lavrov added.
President Biden warned in October that the world was closer to “nuclear armageddon” than at any time since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. While there has been an increase in communication between the US and Russia, there’s no sign that Washington is willing to back down on its support for Ukraine, risking an escalation that could one day lead to direct fighting with Moscow.
Russia back to scare tactics. Things must not be going well on the battle front for Russia. When things don’t go right for them or they are afraid of US/ NATO bringing more help to Ukraine, they bring out the nuclear card. Their standard battle cry, “we will start a nuclear war if the West will not allow us to beat up on small countries”.
As they should. I would have nuked Washington and London back in 2014. It would have saved many civilian lives in Donbass. There is no other way to deal with Anglo-American terrorists. You specifically send weapons and ammo to escalate the war. That needs to be punished in the most severe way. Fortunately for you, there are a bunch of pacifists in Kremlin.
In his comments, Lavrov accurately describes how the US is directly involved in the war that is being fought in Ukraine. He also said it is impossible to discuss strategic stability while ignoring what is happening in Ukraine.
BTW. You might want to take a closer look at how things are going on the battle front.
I guess the issue with what Lavrov said is that it is an attempt at redefining what directly involved means. I’ll be the first to stipulate to that the west is:
1) delivering weapons though still limited to tactical ones of limited offensive value
2) training Ukrainian soldiers in western countries
3) repairing Ukrainian equipment in western countries
4) allowing western individuals to volunteer for the Ukrainians (and Russians)
5) allowing western crowd funding for Ukraine (Ukraine)
But that is not being directly involved – and none of it would ever result or should ever result in nuclear arms being used, it would run counter to Russian doctrine so that is why Lavrov saying so is just scare tactics.
Which development on the battlefront should make us think that things are not going pretty badly for the Russians?
The issue with Lavrov was the obvious one of placing the blame for Ukrainian suffering at the feet of Washington where, unlike the Kremlin, its manic quest for hege-money allows no quarter for human sympathy.
That may have been his goal – truth be told I do not know what he intended to achieve – but to blame Washington for a decision taken by Putin i.e. the decision to invade, is going to be difficult to sell in Ukraine as is the idea that Washington and not Moscow is seeking hegemony over Ukraine, finally the idea that there is no quarter for human sympathy on the side of the west/Ukraine is impossible to sell in Ukraine (or the west) given what the Russians are broadcasting themselves:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=10AiNAsCnkw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zClrdGzC2yA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8lkshypC2Rk
“… a decision taken by Putin i.e. the decision to invade … ”
As you must know how preposterously specious this construction is, you’re as clearly incapable of honest discussion.
So did Putin decide not to invade and did some rogue Russian genera start the invasion anyway?
“to blame Washington for a decision taken by Putin i.e. the decision to invade, is going to be difficult to sell in Ukraine”
1/ Since the collapse of the Soviet Union, the US-Russia relations have degenerated into a new Cold War, largely over the US-driven expansion of NATO.
2/ Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine occurred in this three decade geopolitical context.
3/ In this context, Ukraine is largely a US proxy – fighting for its own survival, but, at the same time, the instrument of a US foreign policy with quite different goals.
This is a key point because, while Putin had ‘agency’ in choosing to invade Ukraine, the US had agency too:
agency in expanding NATO, despite 30 yrs of Cold Warrior warnings;
agency in unilaterally pounding the table for NATO to accept Ukraine’s NATO application, despite other NATO member objections;
agency in choosing to refrain from meaningfully supporting Zelensky’s campaign promises to fulfill the Minsk agreements (instead, filling Ukraine w/weapons and military personnel);
agency in lobbying for increasing Ukraine pre-NATO status by making it an Enhanced Opportunity Partner and including it in NATO annual military exercises;
and agency in repeatedly declaring future Ukraine NATO membership – despite now-clear evidence that the US knew – since 2008 – that NATO members were absolutely opposed and would never accept Ukraine as a member.
4/ Upshot?
a/ As even NYT right liberal warhawk Thom Friedman – the man who never met a US invasion he didn’t like – wrote about NATO expansion, “This Is Putin’s War. But America and NATO Aren’t Innocent Bystanders.”
b/ To the considerable degree that, underlying the Russia-Ukraine war, this is a US-Russia conflict, the US has a major responsibility to use all tools to end the bloodshed – vs its ‘military-only-as-long-as-it-takes-anti-diplomacy’ foreign policy.
c/ To the considerable degree that this is a US-Russia conflict, the US should obey the polled will of its citizens to step up diplomacy – vs antidemocratically subordinating US foreign policy to a clutch of neocons, or to what is or is not acceptable to the foreign power of Ukraine.
No blame for us funding and “encouraging” the coup in 2014, which led to the shelling of Donbass for 8 years? We have been arming Kiev for years, knowing full well that Ukraine entrance into NATO was the reddest of red lines for Russia. I would argue that we have wanted this showdown since the end of WWII when General Patton said we should attack the Soviet Union when it was weak, having lost 20+ million people combating NAZI Germany. Which is why I believe he was murdered before he was able to convince enough military leaders.
try to tell anyone in Poland Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Norway or Sweden that the Russians represent no threat at all and that hence NATO should not be or have been allowed to accept them as members – you will find it hard to sell.
Still does not change that most of Russia’s neighbors (at least those to the west) feel very threatned by them.
Good of you to acknowledge that they are only a proxy in the sense that their fight also serves US foreign policy goals.
They along with the rest of the NATO members allowed nations desperate to join to join – as could be seen from the Georgian example not being a member could be dangerous.
If they did the fact that the Ukraine was not admitted shows that this was not likely to happen especially not after 2014 – so no actual threat of Ukraine joining NATO before they had solved their border issues with Russia. Now thanks to Putin’s invasion that might just change.
Do you mean pressure him to do so?
This is I believe post 2014 correct?
Russia also knew that Ukraine could not join so just vapid words from the US.
They are not bystanders at all they help Ukraine! As for them arguing for Ukraine joining NATO the Budapest agreement kind of obliged them to at the very least bring the subject before the partners.
All tools that pushes the Russians out -rewarding wars of territorial conquest would set a most dangerous example – this point cannot be stressed enough – i.e. this war is about far more than Ukraine.
No they should work to prevent the establishment of a new world order where enriching a country by annexing part of a neighbors country is met with a shrug of shoulders.
“try to tell [ex-Warsaw coutries] that the Russians represent no threat at all and that hence NATO should not be or have been allowed to accept them as members – you will find it hard to sell.”
1/ Notice that this reply does not deny my central claims in the passage michael64 responds to – my claims:
a/ that NATO expansion was destructive to post-Soviet US-Russia relations, and
b/ that NATO expansion was strongly US-driven.
2/ Rather this reply states that ex-Warsaw countries’ saw Russia as a threat (which, of course, they did) – with the implication that ex-Warsaw countries’ judgments about security were – or ought to be – determinative in NATO expansion decisions.
3/ But that’s not how NATO works: per NATO’S charter, new applicant acceptance is decided entirely by NATO members, based not on what an applicant wants, but on the criterion of whether all members judge it will support existing member security:
“The notion that NATO’s open door is a sacrosanct principle that we cannot give up is not actually how it’s written in NATO’s founding documents. Article 10 of NATO’s charter actually says that the states that are members of NATO can, by consensus, invite other states to join them if it would improve the alliance’s security. That’s all it says. It doesn’t offer a right for all states to necessarily join this military alliance.”
NYT, 3/18/22, “Ezra Klein Interviews Emma Ashford”
4/ Upshot? “Try to tell” that to an ex-Warsaw country? Try to “sell” that to them? But why should I? Because – as a citizen in a NATO member state – I don’t have to “sell” them anything – because NATO expansion is not based on another country’s perceived needs, and it is not their decision.
But glad we’re clear that you have not denied either that NATO expansion scotched US-Russia relations, nor that expansion was strongly US-driven.
It simply ignores this point – but I’ll happily agree to it though I’d probably use detrimental rather than destructive.
I actually argued that this was not the case i.e. that NTAO admitted other members because these nations were very eager (desperate) to join – so not US driven as such, though US was likely promoting their case for joining to the other members.
Not the argument I made, but I’m very willing to say that I would agree that in a free world if we accept the need for defensive alliances then acknowledging these countries sovereignty and yet not granting them the option to apply for membership of a defensive alliance which will benefit them very much when it comes to foreign investments – seems punitive.
Which as stated I did not argue against – I only argues that they should be allowed to apply.
None of what I have written has in any way contradicted this.
No you do not, however the reason that you have to sell this in ex-Warsaw pact countries and in Ukraine is that these countries will prevent peace if you fail – Ukraine will continue to resist Russia even just with the support of Poland, the Baltic countries, the Scandinavian countries, UK, and an assorted lot of mid European countries who also see Russia as a threat. Will they prevail is a different matter.
I actually did not agree that NATO expanded or that this was strongly US driven, what I did agree to was that NATO admitted new ex-Warsaw pact countries as members when they applied.
But I have little issue with the idea that this had damaging effects on relations with Russia.
On 2: I have not argued against states applying – just clarified the basis for admission is member judgments about security, not what applicants “want.”
After being told it would never be a member, Ukraine recently called for a speedy membership in NATO. Answer was, again, no. Sure Ukraine was desperate. Was that “punitive”? A moot question – members judged it would not – to put it mildly – support member security.
On 4: The question was on the above as the basis for member inclusion – clearly, the reason a handful of prudent NATO members resisted war criminal Bush’s reckless bid for ‘NATO expander immortality’ at the end of his tenure.
But antiwar folks who want negotiation will have to ‘sell’ a restricted NATO purpose to NATO member Poland, say? Because it won’t obey a US-driven negotiated settlement? After refusing to deliver war planes to Ukraine, even with NATO’s blessing, it’s going to break rank to do so if the US/NATO has forged a settlement?
And Ukraine? Without a guaranteed massive arms/economic aid flow, following an imaginary settlement in which it loses some, or even all, control over the east, it’s going to fight despite a negotiated settlement that includes massive western military and reconstruction aid?
You are gonna have to make a heckuva case for the counter-factual of Poland or Ukraine breaking with the US/NATO like that. Ridiculously unrealistic.
A point I never contested, what I did suggest was that all should have the right to apply for membership.
If they used the term never then it would seem punitive, as it denies them the ability to qualify no matter how squeaky clean they they managed to get.
I do not have an issue with NATO denying Ukraine membership when Bush tried to strong arm them.
I think so – first of all I do not think the US would negotiate a deal by itself – it does not have the authority to do so, it can only negotiate the end of US sanctions not EU ones – secondly the Poles nd likely several others are willing to continue the supply of weapons, likely also realizing that they are already in too deep.
Not if NATO did so, because for NATO to do so the Polish government has to vote yes – they will not. The Poles do not want to deliver planes because they do not want to enter the war directly (the government that is – the population is apparently less concerned).
Yes mostly because no settlement will include massive western military and reconstruction aid – it simply could not because all would expect a Munich peace to end where the last one did.
That is because I do not have them breaking with NATO, nor do I expect that the US would even try to force that choice upon them.
abramawicz: “NATO expansion was strongly US-driven”
michael64: “I actually argued that this was not the case i.e. that NTAO admitted other members because these nations were very eager (desperate) to join – so not US driven as such, though US was likely promoting their case for joining to the other members.”
1/ You “argued that” NATO expansion “was not” strongly US-driven, as I claimed?
Unclear. Regardless, fortunately yr reply now clarifies that – if you were claiming ‘ex-Warsaw security drove expansion’ – that does not rule out “US-driven,” since you write “US was likely promoting their case for joining.”
So you you don’t deny it – just say, ‘expansion wasn’t only US-driven.’
2/ But – setting aside the inexcusably ignorant “likely” when making a claim – if the US was “promoting [ex-Warsaws’ security-driven] case for joining, then you did say ex-Warsaw’s “desperation” was or should have been the basis for expansion. ie – that ‘applicant security’ was or should have been a dominant criterion.
3/ Which returns us to the fact – which you accept – that the formal criterion for NATO expansion is member decisions based on members’ own judgments about whether expansion will support member security – not applicant “desperation.”
4/ Of course, because yr admittedly ignorant (“likely”), yr in no position to judge either how “desperate” ex-Warsaws were, or how much US force – or what domestic and foreign policy ends – drove NATO expansion.
Here are some good starting points:
a/ https://www.nato.int/acad/fellow/99-01/mlyniec.pdf (pp29 forward – pointing to pro-NATO but fluctuating support and significant minority opposition in 90s Poland – not “desperation,” as ‘those likely to vote’ on expansion showed)); and
b/ Both the Pentagon and US arms makers, who saw big $$$ in NATO expansion, heavily lobbied Congress and the countries – shaping views of expansion at home and abroad:
NYT,” 6/29/97, “Arms Makers See Bonanza In Selling NATO Expansion;” 3/30/98, “ARMS CONTRACTORS SPEND TO PROMOTE AN EXPANDED NATO”
c/ Clinton’s NATO expansions were largely driven by domestic US electoral politics – to get US ethnic votes, Clinton ignored advisors against expansion.
4/19/22, NewAge, “Clinton’s revisionism on NATO expansion”
d/ When war criminal Bush declared – without warning – at a NATO meeting that the outrageously corrupt, Russia-bordering Ukraine, and Georgia would become NATO members, continental members were in an uproar. But the US damage was done – with ‘membership at a future point’ the ticking time bomb ‘compromise’ wording in the final agreement.
So, ie., to get Ukraine in, the US overrode its own NATO allies.
NYT, “NATO Allies Oppose Bush on Georgia and Ukraine”
I may have misunderstood what you wrote, I read as you saying or implying that I had admitted to NATO expansion being strongly US driven.
Seeing as many others understand US driven as the US coercing these countries to apply, I make the point that they were desperate to join and that the US was only promoting their case to the other NATO members – I have to make that point as one never knows what people put into the term ‘US-driven’.
I explain what the US’s role was using different words to clarify – the US neither coerced nor enticed these nations to join, they only promoted their case once they did apply.
No I do not say that it should have been neither the criterion nor the basis for accepting them as members, only that we having recognized them as sovereign nations should allow them to apply.
If you stop reading things not written into what I write it would probably help – as stated I think they should be allowed to apply – if they qualify then I believe they should be admitted, but I leave that decision up to the members (thus I believe that Sweden and Finland should be allowed to join, that is what I believe on a personal level, but it is the members right to deny them membership even if the qualify).
See this is where you are just wrong I lived in one of those countries shortly after independence and I was paying attention to the popular sentiments at the time – their eagerness/desperation to join was quite unmistakable – it was the center piece in many parties foreign policy programs and they were getting votes based on these programs.
the polls conducted clearly supports my claim, support for joining NATO was at 79% and 75% opposition at 7 and 10% that is from the source you linked – you would have us think that this was not a sincerely held belief that they wanted to join all by themselves????
This did not alter the feeling of a need for security in those populations – I’m fairly sure of this point as I lived in one of those countries a year from the end of 1992 – the feeling of a need to join NATO was already palpable in the very early stages of independence.
Again Clinton or the US’s desire to expand the number of clients to their weapons industry does not in any way change what the people of the newly sovereign countries felt to any significant extend.
No they simply tried to spring a proposal on the allies thus forcing them to take a public stance rather than avoiding having the proposal voted upon by advising it never coming to the vote in backroom discussions – but yes it did cause harm to NATO unity.
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By way of summary, gonna try to go wide angle here on my first claim that NATO expansion was strongly US-driven. It comes back to yr below statement – which I ought to have isolated first:
1/You: “I…argued…NATO admitted other members because these nations were…eager to join.”
Argued? Not really: you stated that ex-Warsaws wanted to join; asserted – without evidence – that “NATO admitted other members” for this reason; and conjectured that the US “likely…promoted” that “case.” [emphasis added]
2/ Cutting to the chase, prob is, the news articles evidence show otherwise regarding the US: show
a/strong US efforts to expand NATO; and
b/ a desire to expand for reasons – according to the articles – entirely different than the “eagerness” of ex-Warsaws: money and domestic electoral politics – although, significantly, Clinton retroactively tried to rewrite his election-driven decision along your ‘eagerness’ lines.
3/ Now, in response to each of those pieces of evidence, you reply, ‘But this does not change the fact that ex-Warsaws wanted to join.’
No, it does not change that fact. But that mere ‘fact’ does not contradict or rebut my claim or my evidence of a US drive for different reasons.
I mean – you could have asserted (without evidence), ‘But ex-Warsaws wanted to join, and this was another reason that also drove NATO expansion.’ But ya don’t even do that.
So what we’re left with is – on the one hand – yr pointing to the fact that many in many ex-Wasaw’s wished to join; and, on the other hand, the enormous institutional and financial power of the US a/ driving expansion b/ for reasons entirely different than being some altruistic mouthpiece for ex-Warsaws’ “eagerness” or ‘aspirations.’
Dunno how to make the ‘expansion was US-driven case clearer, I rest my case with whatever Americans read this…yr welcome to ‘lasties’…
OK so I did not argue as much as I asserted, you however helpfully provided the argument for Poland – is it that you want me to dig up the evidence that there was an about equal grassroots support for the idea of joining in the other countries?
What news articles the one you provided clearly showed that there was a strong desire to join in Poland!
Note that I have never suggested that the US was not interested in these countries joining, all I have done is to say that they were eager/desperate to join – and that this was the primary driver behind their application to join – are you seriously contesting this after yourself having linked an article showing a poll yielding 75% of the poles wishing to join?
It does however change the narrative from a US driven process to a as much applicant nation driven process – as in the US did not interfere or create this desire in the applicant nations it was there from the start.
That is pretty much what I say – I use different words, but reread my comment here and my previous ones and this should be clear.
The idea that the US was altruistic never occurred to me – which is probably why I never suggested it.
Don’t know how to make it clearer that the applicant nations desire to join was the driver – otherwise the US could have promoted their case for joining as long as they wanted and nothing would still have happened.
argh, can’t resist…this time really the last…
1/ “all I have done is to say that they were eager/desperate to join – and that this was the primary driver behind their application to join.”
Driving their application? Oh good – then you don’t deny that – based on info in the newspaper pieces – the money and political capital US-pro-expansion interests spent lobbying US citizens, US congress, and ex-Warsaw’s was for different motives than what you tee-off asserting was the US reason – “case” – for admitting them.
2/ “applicant nations desire to join was the driver”
Cause ‘couldna’ happened if they hadn’t wanted it too’? Conceivably – though not necessarily – that exists in yr brain as an intellectually sound argument vs a facile retort.
But for my purposes – as I have not yet encountered that little semantic gem in discussions w/people on the street I get signatures from each Saturday – calling on NYS legislators to promote a US “drive” to negotiate a settlement vs an ‘arms only’ foreign policy (never run into it even among the sizeable minority who do not wish to sign) – it can be safely ignored.
Don’t have a clue as to what you are reading into what I write here, it should be simple enough – I claim that there was (and still is) a desire to be in/join NATO which was (and is) there irrespective of what US policy or deeds were at the time.
Again jumping to conclusions – I did not state that they could not ever have joined even in spite of the wishes of their populations, merely that they did not – joining took for several of them more than one election cycle and the people would have been free to vote for parties that proposed not joining NATO – they did not.
Could you rephrase this, because English not being my native language I cannot make sense of it, what is your point/claim?
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Re the ‘authority’ of yr East European years, that has some value and even more colorful interest, but for the purposes of public debate and persuasion, I generally avoid pinning arguments on ‘the authority of experience.’
On the Poland text – well obviously it showed high support for NATO, but, as they say, you only find what you look for: the polls also showed a/ varying intensity of support (‘eagerness’) – among the ¾ who supported it – as shown by the lower ‘going to vote for it’ question; and b/ support fell as the practical meaning – cost – became clearer.
In regards to this last, note two things in the NYT pieces (I’ve done a whole lotta spadework supporting my claims, and you’ve not provided jack for yours beyond the anecdotal, so you can look it up vs my quoting it):
a/ how the US “enticed” – yea, that’s the article’s word – Poland with bargain basement weapons prices; and
b/ how Polish public opinion of the time polled as strongly supporting social spending over military spending.
And last – the NATO and social spending issues are also my ‘anecdotal’ memories of the debates in Poland from 1997 forward. I met my Polish wife-to-be in NYC in 1996, we traveled to meet her parents in the eastern Poland city of Jaslo for the first time in winter 1997, and we’ve spent a majority of our public school system summers there since, in Krakow, Jaslo and a few times Warsaw, in the run up to P’s 1999 accession and since, with a wide range of encounters with family, friends, and acquaintances such as my students at the language school in Krakow where I sometimes taught English.
(Oh and did I leave out? My first time in ex-Warsaws was Prague summers 1992-94, while in grad school, working for NYU’s Summer in Prague program while in a relationship w/a Czech woman – though the main issues at time (debated by my girlfriend’s family and friends) were NOT NATO, but Czechoslovakia’s future and then actual split into the Czech lands and poor Slovakia.
So I can play yr ‘I know cuz I wuz there’ card too. But as gratifying as these life experiences were, they just give me a partial window into thinking of that time – plus what I said about anecdotalism in ‘public argumentative discourse.’
Fully accepted at best this would be anecdotal evidence but as it stands it is a mere assertion.
No 79-75 is not a variating support it is about the same (within statistical uncertainty) so 79% in March for it and 75% in June going to vote for it is not a meaningful change.
You provided all the evidence needed for my case so no I did not bother to dig up additional evidence to support my claims – do you need them now? Only asking because there is loads of polls done arriving at about the same result as your Polis one – i.e. on the order of about 7 in 10 if not more wanting to join NATO – that is what I referred to as very eager to join.
You do not get to claim that it was a US led process when the pother side needed to take the initial step to apply and they did so because a significant majority of their population wanted to join – no matter if they were attracted by good offers or not.
Any conclusions from the years spent in eastern Europe? As in did they show you that they were unwilling to join NATO or that they were worrying that doing so would cause them more uncertainty or just anything? Just asking because the story you relate while interesting does not seem to indicate what your experience taught you. And as stated I fully accept that this is as written by me just an assertion, so carries no weight in this debate – the Polis polls you referenced do however.
Poland Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Finland, Norway or Sweden are a threat to World security.
Sure.
Oh… you must be speaking of IsraHell.
I most certainly include them among the nations that should be sanctioned for territorial annexation.
Glad we can see eye-to-eye on something, Michael.
Which development on the battlefront should make us think that things are not going pretty badly for the Russians?
Bakmut…
mic drop
So have they finally taken it after what 5-6 months of trying, and would it be a good replacement for Kherson???
The answer is that it is not taken yet and that it would be a piss poor replacement for Kherson if it is taken.
Kherson is a trap for Ukraine and Bakmut is key to the regime’s defense line, that’s why they spent so much blood holding on to it.
From best I can tell, Russia is going for an encirclement around Bakmut to cut off the 30,000 troops dug in there… This will be Mariupol writ large.
How is Kherson a trap? As for Bakmut it is all well and fine that you claim that it is key, the key point is that it is not taken yet – nor is the troops there in any way cut off – not even the Russians are claiming to have surrounded it let alone taken it – so not the victory it was held out to be at least not yet.
You only get to claim victory when you have achieved something, not at the prospect of maybe being able to do it.
Kherson City is a trap for Ukraine because it is effectively indefensible for their forces with Russian artillery positioned high on the opposite bank of the Dnieper with solutions for virtually any spot in the city and environs dialed in, because the Russians controlled the city for many months. That’s how it’s a trap.
And that’s why Ukraine is evacuating the relatively few civilians who were left after Russia’s evacuation.
Two points:
1) the east bank is lower than Kherson
2) the Russians are withdrawing much of their artillery and other equipment even as we debate
I grant you that point 2 will only be clear to you over the next period of about a month.
Because they cannot supply them with electricity since the Russians destroyed very much of the infrastructure and have as you point out also started shelling the city – not offering the civilians to be evacuated would be close to a war crime as I see it.
The Russians got everyone out who wanted to go. The dead enders who stayed for the photo ops with their Nazi heroes are getting the bums rush now.
the Russians got everyone out who wanted to go, which was not all that many, Kherson had the biggest demonstrations when the Russians took it. The fact that you celebrate that the civilians are now ‘getting the bums rush’ from being shelled by the Russians shows who is the one of us with little sympathy for human life.
This is Adolf, Reporting on behalf of the Kremlin.
Seems like this is latest playbook response from Kremlin supporters (not claiming you are). Every time they surrender land to Ukraine it is because: 1. It’s a trap for Ukraine 2. It didn’t have strategic value 3. We are regrouping to come back stronger, take more land and kill more Ukrainian soldiers.
Ukraine has artillery too and have you studied the terrain on the eastern side of the river? It’s not conducive for proper defensive nor offensive operations.
flat wetlands and drylands. Not enough key terrain for cover and maneuver. Russian and Ukrainian military know this.
It was Ukrainian officials who inserted the notion of a Kherson trap into the discussion.
I didn’t clarify in the post above, because I’ve said it a number of times in recent threads, that the Kherson withdrawal set a trap for Kiev’s forces due to the situation on the ground and because of the terrain itself, not because Russia was engaged in evil-genius manipulation.
There a number of higher-ground locations on the left bank of the river with excellent views of Kherson City. Most aren’t very good places for artillery, but that doesn’t much matter to the Russians. It’s observers who are useful there; artillery can be anywhere within a fairly extensive range.
Yes, Ukraine has artillery too. But it is massively outgunned, has a critical and worsening ammunition shortage and has to operate in an environment where Russia has overwhelming air superiority. It’s a bad scene for Kiev and Kherson City looks like a bad place to try to dig in.
Not all of it. There are US military and intelligence assets inside Ukraine. Try to keep up.
There is no way Kiev could have popped off a couple of Russian generals without just a little help from us.
There is little doubt that the US is supplying the Ukrainians with some intelligence info like they did the UK in the Falklands war.
US intelligence assets are in so many countries that does not mean that they are directly involved in the conflict – there are very likely US intelligence assets inside Russia too.
As for military assets, do you have any evidence that there are any such assets directly involved in the conflict in Ukraine?
Well, if they’re AREN’T, where are billions of Amerikkan taxpayer dollars going?
Most if not all nations are involved in this way in other nations – it is part of what we call ‘diplomacy’.
How about that the combined wealth and militarism of the western regimes support for Ukraine’s brutal zealots has barely changed the line of control lately? How about the uncounted mountain of those zealots now dead?
Well it has changed the line of control fairly significantly – Kherson was liberated less than a month ago.
We do not have the figures for the losses of either party when it comes t number of KIA other than from the opposing side so hardly reliable according to the Ukrainians the Russians are losing twice as many men as they are (I kind of doubt that) but according to the Russians the Ukrainians have lost more equipment in several categories than they had.
In short the only near reliable figures we have is for the equipment lose which can be identified by pictures – and that picture is not favoring the Russians – I would not conclude too much from that however.
The only thing I can tell is that the Ukrainians seem to have a much higher tolerance for losses, as they have no real alternative to fighting as some Russian TV pundits have pointed out, i.e. given the unappealing way they portray their version of victory they should not be surprised that the Ukrainians will fight them hard.
We do not have the figures for the losses of either party
Ursula Van der laden-hose spilled the beans on Ukraine the other day… 100,000 dead on the Nazis!
Read em and weep.
She was forced to walk it back to dead and injured. She’s a bubblehead.
Yeah, and the walking-back dance is less than convincing.
I noticed the Ukies were mad she blabbed but didnt deny it.
Yup. I don’t think anyone has actually denied it.
Her grangpa was a Nazi and her ancestors owned slaves in the old South… Where’s the Woke outrage?
Not a 100.000 dead but a 100.000 dead officers so quite clearly she was misinformed or misspoke. Either way the Ukrainians willingness to fight does not seem to be harmed significantly by their in all likelihood significant losses – you keep forgetting what alternative to fighting they are being offered:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zClrdGzC2yA
Pretty obvious that she misspoke “officers” not 100,000. Gen. Milley gave the same figure on a prior occasion.
Meanwhile Russia has 300,000 fresh troops marching to the front.
Ukraine is doomed.. DOOMED!! 😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂🤣😂
Ukraine would perhaps be doomed if only the Russians could equip and supply these many new troops – the fact that they are still not advancing more than minute distances and in only few places should tell you that the mobilization is not (at least not yet) the gamechanger you make it out to be.
As pointed out the Ukrainians may have a high tolerance for losses so even if the figure of 100.000 dead was true, this would still be less than France lost fighting the Germans in a similar amount of time – and I remind you that the Germans were not going to kill French culture, language and anyone in France not willing to embrace being German.
Which is part of the plan the Ukrainians can see that the Russians are mulling over:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zClrdGzC2yA
There’s only Slavic culture.. The Nazis spore will be eradicated. As will Globalist imperialism.. Or do I repeat myself…
No I believe that this is first time you have come clean about your dreams of ethnic cleansing!
Did you know the Nazi spore in Russia is significantly bigger than Ukraine’s. Did you know Wagner Group has Nazis too?
Keep talking Nazis as if they only exist in Ukraine.
Russians doesn’t care about Donbas Separatists, Azov Nazis nor NATO. They only want the land.
Keep talking Nazis as if they only exist in Ukraine.
No we got em here to, our present Admin being the case in point.
France had the good sense to throw in the towel. Thats why its still around.
The key to the secret was in a similar amount of time – France did not fight Germany for 8 months in WWII, so the figures were from WWI, where France did not throw in the towel – it held out for 4 year’s with this level of losses on average from a population size comparable to that of Ukraine today.
If Ukraine has lost 100K troops and not 100K with KIAs and WIAs combined, this might give you an idea of how determined and willing the Ukrainian Army is. So Ukraine being significantly outnumbered and still able to hold the Russians back and retake land in other fronts shows how bad the Russian Army is and how unlikely is that they will regain any lost terrain.
I would disagree with you and convey that it is the Russia the one DOOMED.
You talk about how “determined and willing” the Ukraine Army is while possibly losing 100,000 troops and trying to gain back land they have lost. And then you say how bad the Russian Army is and how they are DOOMED. It would seem you are either willingly refusing to look at the facts or.. actually, there is no or.
The alternative scenario for Ukraine would be abiding by the elections and agreements they make, and committing to not formally join NATO. Allowing Ukrainians to speak whatever language they want, have a free press, and the right to join political parties they chose would be great too. But I guess all that freedom would just be too oppressive. And we must relentlessly arm against the threat of democracy in Ukraine.
Abiding by the elections – are you suggesting that they should be denied the ability to topple an unpopular government, if so how, moreover how would you make such an agreement with any government and think it could/would stick?
As for abiding with the agreements they make, I think you would have them ask for the Russians to abide by theirs first – and that would take us back to where we started – the Budapest treaty.
Prior to the SMO Ukraine had a free press, and Ukrainians could join whatever political party they wanted.
Ukrainians could always speak whatever language they wanted, but ‘The law made the use of Ukrainian compulsory (totally or within quotas) in more than 30 spheres of public life, including public administration, electoral process, education, science, culture, media, economic and social life, health and care institutions, and activities of political parties.‘
So most of that freedom was in effect before the SMO, and even in democratic states many freedoms are temporarily restricted when war is thrust upon them.
I would argue that the Russians would have a much better chance of getting equal language rights by allowing Ukraine to join EU as one of the criteria to smoothen the process of entering is treating minorities better.
“allowing” Ukraine to join the EU, right. Violent US-backed protesters overthrew Ukraine’s democratically elected leader because he opposed joining the EU. That’s called minority rule, aka oppression. The tail wags the dog named Freedom.
If there had been no elections after the democratically elected government which went back on its promises and therefore was ousted, then sure, but there has been two democratic elections after that government was ousted, so denying what the majority wants now would be oppression.
But just to be clear I think Ukraine should be allowed to apply for membership only subject to a referendum on doing so or not.
Ah great, a direct referendum on it would be fair and clear. If Ukraine is again a country where there is a free press and political parties, but that isn’t a switch that can instantly get turned on and off, martial law to free.
I have not seen evidence that the Ukrainian martial laws cannot be changed like such laws were in e.g. UK post WWII – have you and in that case what?
Official policies may change in an instant, a legacy of years of brutal political repression don’t.
A legacy that is all of 9 months old can as for the language laws they will have to adapt to EU requirements if they want to become a member.
You and I have different definitions of what it means to be directly involved. If your neighbor hired a kid to throw a rock through your window, I’ll bet your definition would change in a hurry.
Ukraine’s troops are finding it increasingly difficult to move using the railroads that run on electricity. In particular, thousands of troops that were massed in Kherson are finding it nearly impossible to reinforce areas near Donetsk. Consequently, Ukraine is losing territory, troops, and vehicles every day on the eastern front. Also, I’ve heard that Russian troop strength is rapidly increasing from 160,000 last October to half a million by mid-December.
But that is not the parallel, a parallel would be: my neighbor attacked and took over large parts of my property and now that neighbor claims that the kid who delivers me rocks to pelt him with is directly involved.
A point I’m prepared to accept.
More than they would otherwise do yes.
OK given the supposed difficulties for the Ukrainians to move troops and other stuff around I guess you think we should expect major Russian advances – I’m rather doubting that, but I accept that perspectives can differ lets see by the end of the year.
Each and every item you adumbrate is a violation of neutrality as defined under international law.
Congratulations, you make a great case against yourself.
I do not think that I’m proposing that the West is neutral or has declared itself to be that – the position of the West in this is about as neutral as the US was in 1940 after the lend lease act was passed.
What’s WRONG with you to believe that your “scorecard” of one through five does not indicate direct involvement?
Amerikkka and NATO are supplying Ukraine with weapons, training and intelligence. What they are NOT supplying are negotiators. Putin has indicated consistently his willingness to negotiate. But our drooling, Depends-clad POTUS insists that it must ONLY be on Ziolensky’s terms.
Is there a more arrogant, ego-driven individual on the planet? His people are freezing, starving and plunged into darkness. Yet he refuses to acknowledge that his actions were the result of the incursion, and that the people of CERTAIN TERRITORIES wish to become part of the Russian Federation. So why would he wish to retain those territories?
ZelBoy could have peace if he wanted it by telling Amerikkka and the EU to stick it where the sun don’t shine. If they still wish to fight Russia, they can do it on their own.
Nothing is wrong with my calculation what is call direct involvement is when we have our personnel fighting as the units we made them into against the enemy – as long as our units are not involved like that we are not directly involved – it should be a reasonably easy and self evident if perhaps not convenient term to understand.
Clearly you’re really disdainful that Russia spends such a tiny amount preparing for war. And in the revolutionary war, we should have been sporting like the redcoats and lined up to die instead of sniping from the trees.
So we’ve established you’re afraid of the truth. That’s a good start 😉
Stating the obvious isn’t a scare tactic. What we really should fear is the trend of attempting to downplay of the real possibility that this could go nuclear. Hard to make aid packages acceptable if you tell the truth.
100% agree. They started pulling that card as early March. Medvedev has led that campaign.
Bullsh*t no matter how many times you repeat it.
Juvenile BS. How old are you?
“The nuclear card” — hmm, guess they won’t play it? Let’s all play Russian roulette with nukes. What could go wrong.
I’m so glad you are being rhetorical… 🙂
Russia is stuck between a rock and a hard place. They wanted the cake and eat it too. They’ll be lucky if they can get couple of cupcakes.
Swap the US for Russia and you make just as much sense if not more. It’s like the gas cap scheme, unwisely intelligent wonks think they can engineer win win for us, lose lose for them scenarios. We all win just peace, or we all lose, simple as that.
False equation. Anyone who’s studied Russian history & culture should recognize the dialectic between mystical North and Mediterranean greed. It were salutary (not to say salvific) to correct the imbalance
-gone on much too long, killed and immiserated too many billions, and now imminently threatens the very survival of the species.
The gas cap scheme is amazing, why didn’t they think of it before? Makes me mad really we could have been paying $22 a barrel for all the years.
Except there wouldn’t be any oil developed. Also, enslaving a population doesn’t end well. EU colonial efforts in other regions eventually failed. EU attempts of enslaving Russia after the fall of the Soviet Union have also failed.
The EU is crumbling. Their manufacturing base is in decline. Natural resources are either depleted or have been undermined by economic policies made by political hacks and incompetent fools.
How so? What exactly is stopping Russia from liberating entire Europe from North American Terrorist Occupation?
The same thing that’s stopping me from bench-pressing 2,000 pounds.
Plus, you’d really need a good multi-ply bench shirt.
Aw, Thomas, you KNOW you can do it if you really try! 😉
Artillery, soldiers, supply chains, tanks, air forces, navies bunch of stuff really.
Enlightened self interest. Russia isn’t stupid. The only reason Russia is in areas claimed by the criminal Ukrainian regime is because it’s on Russia’s border and highly populated by ethnic Russians. The criminal Ukrainian regime along with the bellicose NATO alliance is a threat to the Russian Federation and the people that live in it.
Russia may go as far as the break away Russian dominated part of Moldova.
Five thousand nukes pointing at Moscow?
That’s not a threat. There are twice as many pointing at Washington and London.
And the kind that will reach their targets instead of falling apart like your shuttles.
Very deep analysis. Do you bake, too?
I’m still waiting for that mission accomplish banner.
In other words, Russia never was a threat to Europe and NATO.
Certainly not by any conventional means.
“They wanted the cake and eat it too. They’ll be lucky if they can get couple of cupcakes.”
Uh…tee-hee?
Posted 9 hrs ago? Know about how many Ukrainian and Russian kids have slaughtered each other in Bakhmut since yr little witticism?
Ah-ah! – donnn’t touch that search button. Guess.
Know about how many Ukrainian and Russian kids have slaughtered each other in Bakhmut
A hell of a lot more Ukies than Ruskies I can tell ya that.
This was obvious since the start of the civil war in Ukraine back in 2014. It was Anglo-American grunts who started the war. Right now Russians are mostly killing Anglo-American grunts in Ukraine. I see no reason to allow these pests to destroy Europe. Instead of dealing with Anglo-American puppets in Kiev, Kremlin should have attacked US and England directly. They want war, they should get it.
Yikes! better Germany, France & Italy declare a separate peace. They never wanted this, can’t see where they derive ought but negatives from it, and would probably be very popular. Like Sodom & Gomorrah they just need to find one good man.
They don’t have any choice. Any country occupied by North American Terrorists is just a vassal state with expendable population. The entire idea of North American Terrorist Occupation is to create war in Europe and keep US and England without war.
Yes, it has that smell. The more reason
French have been trying to remove occupational regime for 4 years already and they aren’t getting anywhere. Italians got spirit but Germans… they will always obey and do what they are told.
That’s the nature of all bourgeois regimes. They’re not autonomous agents, 3rd or 4th level at best. On the level of crisis in the war in Ukraine, policy would come down from on high. Europe is in a critical moment economically and militarily, and frozen rigid, not just by winter, but, as you say, the prospect of continental war. It’s not unlikely their Bilderberg lords are sending the message that it’s too high a price for Putin’s head. Scholtz and Maroni are just hack politicians, Macron is an intellectual in his own right (and as you point out has been trying for some time to loosen the grip of Washington) and as such could in this instance be given more latitude, and trusted by his masters to take the lead in crunch time, a time when they are out of sync with their US frat bro’s, …? The wrath of sanctions, champaign boycotts, and “liberty fries’ would descend upon him, but a leaky boat has to abandon excess cargo.
Have you done the math on that? Russia will lose and lose badly or global thermonuclear war which technically would be a tie.
I’m sure the Russians are well aware of our glorious victory over Iraq and Afghanistan and are duly chastened. 😂
You think that would have served as a warning.
I think it would serve as an incentive.
I have. Have you? Russian hypersonic missiles against your antique subs? No contest.
But if you want to go just by the numbers, Russian Federation have more nuclear warheads than US.
It wont be a tie. Your nukes simply wont get to Russia. Pentagon cowards wouldn’t be hiding behind Europeans and developing cowardly biological weapons if they could beat Russia.
I would like to point out that this is an antiwar website and if this is truly how you feel, perhaps there are better places for you to be…
By the time the Russian invades the United States they will be greeted with a ticker tape parade not a volley of cannon.
🇺🇸❤️🇷🇺
>Lavrov made the comments while defending Russian strikes on Ukrainian infrastructure
Ukrainian trains that bring NATO-trained troops, NATO guns and NATO ammunition to the east where they bomb the civilians in Donbass, run mostly on electricity. Cutting off the electricity is a defensive maneuver. And much better than bombing civilians to get your way, like the Biden-paid Kiev regime does. Soon Biden’s thugs will be stopped for good and the city of Donetsk will finally be free from the constant artillery attacks. Even Zelensky admitted in March that the war isn’t new, it has been going on for eight years.
When Washington invaded Iraq, the first thing they did was bomb all the power stations around Baghdad.
When NATO attacked Serbia for the crime of expelling a wave of illegal aliens from Kosovo, after the drug-smuggling UCK guerilla had started burning churches and killing Serbs – including firing at children bathing in a river – they bombed all the bridges, the power stations, all the essential infrastructure. And handed over Serbian Kosovo to the Albanian invaders. General “Sandy” Berger proclaimed, “In today’s Europe there is no place for ethnically pure states.” For him and Madeleine Albright it was a holy anti-White war. They forced destitute Serbian cities to swear fealty to the aggressors in order to get food, and oil to heat the homes in the winter. Finally security guards from these de facto occupied cities were dressed in civilian clothing and sent to attack president Milosevic’s home, as a “citizen protest,” to illegally kidnap him and hand him over to the Hague for a trial about Bosnia. (Where he was put in a small, cold cell, which ruined his health and killed him. After his death he was finally found not guilty; he had never approved of Karadzic’s war crimes in Bosnia and instead tried to stop him.)
So complaining about Russia’s tactics for the defense of Donbass is extreme hypocrisy. The New York Times PRAISED the bombing of Serbia’s infrastructure. And they approve of Biden’s occupation of Syria’s oil fields. Syrians need that oil to heat their homes in the winter.
Bombing the electricity network is not a war crime as you point out but is it the best way to prevent the flow of weapons and soldiers? Would it not have been better to bomb the relatively few bridges that cross the Dnieper?
If they bomb (mainly or even to a significant degree) the civilians in the Donbas – and the Russians still have a significant dominance in artillery, how come that the Russian progress has stalled? How come the Russians had to vacate so much territory in Kharkiv and Kherson oblasts?
Why is it that you believe that the Ukrainians are bombing civilians when you can see the protest when the Russians take a city and the celebrations when the Ukrainians take it back?
What do you mean admitted – this has been the Ukrainian line all the time – i.e. that the separatists in the Donbas were always primarily funded and supported by the Russians so this invasion is just an expansion of the war Russia was already waging in Ukraine.
usual crap disguised as objective commenting. You might be credible if your opposition to the prevailing point here weren’t the polar opposite.
The truth about human events is never completely one-sided. The Russians most certainly sent in people to help their ethnic partners in the East, as has the US on too numerous a count to re-recite in other theaters.
Your adherence to DC’s propaganda makes your comments comically revealing.
My opposition to what prevailing argument? That the US is not directly involved? If so it is not as if I made a secret of it.
Quite apart from it being wrong this is a clear case of a whataboutery argument. The US has not intervened in any conflicts in the last many years to help their ethnic partners – they have intervened without having any ethnic excuse whatsoever. But that the US has done so does not in any way excuse that the Russians did it, moreover it does not excuse that Putin takes this a very crucial step further and annexes Ukrainian territory.
You don’t like “whataboutery” because it exposes hypocrisy and inconsistent thinking.
No I do not like whataboutery because it is an attempt to justify the crimes of Paul by the crimes of Peter – and that is just wrong.
Well, at least with your answer you are admitting to the war crimes of the USA.
I’m not admitting to the war crimes of the US, I’m just acknowledging that they have committed them – for me to admit to them I have to be partially guilty in them – as I’m a Dane and have opposed all the wars that the US foisted upon unwilling nations I do not feel any such guilt to the degree that I feel compelled to ‘admit’.
Better bone up on your Russian, Dutchman. You can start with “spassibo” – it means thanks.
Russia has no designs on the EU. On the other hand, how does one say: “please send oil, gas, aluminum, rare earths, food and fertilizer to us ” in Russian?
Not to worry I’ll be among the first to be ethnically cleansed if they come here.
Well, I am half Danish, and I do admit to the war crimes my country has committed.
As do I – we the Danes that is, did commit what we (the Danes) would consider a war crime in e.g. Afghanistan (and Iraq), by handing over prisoners to the British for interrogation. But how is that relevant here?
As a Dane that supports NATO, you have supported NATO atrocities. The fact that you feel no guilt is telling.
While the DC psychopaths led the way in wars of choice and of aggression, EU sycophants enabled them.
How do you arrive at the conclusion that I support NATO or NATO crimes – is it by my mere existence?
I do support my governments support of Ukraine and I do so because the Russians if allowed to annex territory will set a dangerous example for other nations to follow annexing territory through war and there by strengthening their nations – making war of aggression a net benefit to nations is a very dangerous thing.
The fact that you have not considered this is very telling, as is the idea that you assume things on my behalf.
for me to admit to them I have to be partially guilty in them – as I’m a Dane and have opposed all the wars that the US foisted upon unwilling nations I do not feel any such guilt to the degree that I feel compelled to ‘admit’.”
That’s what I call a short term memory.
As for your claim of national borders? Anything a state does within it’s borders is OK? A government never forfeits its right to rule a populace? Regardless of it’s actions?
Good to know what you stand for. And what you are.
So remind me what is it that I’m forgetting?
Within its internationally recognized borders yes otherwise no.
If that is some kind of order then you got it in one.
Yep. People have no rights, only rulers. Got it. No wonder you support this regime.
Just for laughs, suppose a outside nation overthrows the government of Denmark. That government is recognized by the U.N. as the legitimate government. Then the new government decided it doesn’t like some of the people that live there. They start to round up those that the government doesn’t approve of. Forbid those people the right to have jobs. To worship of not. To have families, to travel freely.
All OK, right? After all, the state, right?
No people have plenty of rights only other nations do not have the right to intervene to safeguard the rights of people on the other side of the border.
This would only happen if the interim government held new democratic elections thereby legitimizing the ousting of the previous government – you know like they did in Ukraine.
That did not happen in Ukraine – the Russians helped organize a separatist movement and them using weapons against the Kyiv government got them taken – so the parallel breaks down if you use non events to justify the actions of the Russians.
No the Ukrainian government proposed laws to outlaw the use of Russian as an official language – not for Russian speakers not to have a job worship have family or travel – if you want to make these assertions you have to provide evidence that this was Ukrainian government policy.
If this had been Ukrainian government policy before Russia helped start a separatist war in the Donbas then they would have been able to get support for sanctions on Ukraine in the UN – they did not make the case and they helped start the insurrection instead.
As indicated you have not made a parallel to what happened in the real world so…
Russia isnt annexing.. Ukraine is seceding.
If that was the process then it would be better, but it is not, not even according to Putin.
That is exactly what occurred. The Donbass republics declared their independence eight years ago. Russia has patiently declined until now to recognize them as a national entity.
Ukraine could have lived up to its agreement in Minsk. Zelensky could have made good on his campaign promises – but OH NOOO! They had to listen to NATO and go to war. A war that’ll annihilate them as a national entity… There’s still time to salvage something of their country but its running out fast.
No first there was a separatist movement then there was a declaration of independence – you got it the wrong way round.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2014_pro-Russian_unrest_in_Ukraine
Well the Ukrainians did not go to war – Putin invaded – so perhaps Putin could have honored the Budapest treaty instead of ruining his economy and killing of his young generation?
I doubt that Putin will salvage anything from this – he is not likely to remain in power if he has to leave Ukraine – we in the west have no incentive to reward wars of territorial conquest as that will only hurt us much worse than even having the Ukrainians losing this war – which by now seems a remote possibility.
You conveniently left out the part about a coup that overthrew a democratically elected government in Kiev that ignited the separatist movement who declared independence that was belatedly recognized by Russia after eight years of Ukrainian duplicity and murder…
That’s what you left out.
I left it out on purpose – as it was from the start of armed resistance a Russian supported affair and as such not a legitimate way to secede – so really no need to cover it again.
In case you are not familiar with the history of Russian involvement, it is a story told best by Igor Girkin one time Minister of Defence of the Donetsk People’s Republic:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Igor_Girkin#Siege_of_Sloviansk
So not me making assertions but a case of the Russians involved admitting to the charges themselves.
Would it not have been better to bomb the relatively few bridges that cross the Dnieper?
The Russians will do exactly that when Ukraine is in full retreat leaving them no options but surrender or drown.
Well that makes very little military sense seeing as the Russians are bleeding soldiers right now to take the territory – bombing the bridges so as to make defeating the troops on the eastern side easier while just preventing them from reconstructing new ones or repairing the old ones would make much more sense.
But I really hope that if the Russians have the ability to destroy them they listen to people like you, who appear to believe that such bridges can be reconstructed so easily that they have to wait until they are on the offensive.
You see Russians bleeding?.. I dont. I see Russia’s 300,000 marching to the front and 100,000 body bags filled with dead Ukraines.
Like to see your sources on that – alone the fact that they needed to recruit 300.000 extra seems to indicate that they had substantial losses – but as I repeatedly say do not trust what the Ukrainians claim regarding Russian losses or what the Russians say about Ukrainian losses.
I disagree with Lavrov. The risk for nuclear war will not be enormous–it already is. We’re just one stupidly obvious false flag away.
Put Joe in a wheelchair while he is wearing his aviator sunglasses and you have Dr. Stangelove.
“We must not allow a mineshaft gap!!”
I laughed out loud!!!
Considering that Russians holding rallies in Moscow to nuke Washington, I’d say the risk is very high. And Kremlin have the legal precedent for a nuclear strike. The imperial puppet regime in Kiev is attacking Russian territory.
To me as a casual observer it seems rather obvious that people demonstrating in favor of nuclear strikes are in desperate need of a straitjacket, a white padded cell and a strict regime of heavy medication. At least until braintransplantation is part of the standard repertoire of medical procedures.
Well, I’m not a casual observer. Most of my family is from Donbass. I grew up in Crimea before moving to US. I will tell you that you can’t wish away and dismiss righteous anger as some obscure form of insanity. Just like J6 protest in Washington, it is an epogenic manifestation of a much larger social consensus. I understand the anger they feel and share to some degree. The only reason why I don’t support them is I like the architecture in Washington DC. It’s a pretty city and I don’t want to see it destroyed because of few pests on Capitol ill. Using a nuke is like using a shotgun to kill few cockroaches. There are better solutions to this infestation.
Well, to a degree I can understand or at least empathize with the anger and the frustration even if I am not personally invested in this mess (I could become though against my will.) But if you find yourself rallying in favor of a nuclear holocaust and you aren’t able to discover on your own what’s wrong with that picture, leaving aside the obvious deathwish it entails, then you really do need professional assistance.
What makes you think I want to harm innocent people? I specifically said I don’t support them and listed the reasons why. Exterminating few hundred parasites in US and England will bring peace and prosperity to the entire planet. It needs to be done and more importantly, to prevent such maggots from growing in the future. And if you really want to bend what I said toward nukes, there wont be a ‘nuclear holacost’. It’s cold war thinking. There is no such thing as ‘mutually assured destruction’ today. Russian Federation holds complete superiority in nuclear arms. If Kremlin decide to burn out this infestation with nukes, the Pentagon cowards have no answer. The Polish missile decisively proved that. Pentagon cowards fear direct confrontation with Russia and only want to use Europe as battle ground.
Even if we were to suppose take your, frankly quite stupid assessment of American nuclear capabilities were true seriously, it wouldn’t matter. There doesn’t need to be an assurance of mutual destruction, there is just the assured complete and utter destruction of the possibility of human inhabitation.
It also isn’t cowardice to avoid a certain path toward nuclear exchange, it is rather a minimal requirement for sanity. To my disappointment it appears too challenging a proposition to grasp for some folk.
So you believe America wont survive after getting hit with few nukes? Japan seem to be doing just fine after that rat dropped nukes on civilian cities.
As for American nuclear capabilities, it’s pitiful. In term of nuclear warheads, delivery vehicles and missile defense. US will not last a week in a full nuclear war with Russia. Pentagon cowards are fully aware of that and desperately trying to project an illusion of strength. Face it. Anglo-American empire is a paper tiger and only capable of hiding behind civilians and cowardly attacks on defenseless nations. It isn’t capable of waging war against capable nations.
A nuclear war between the US and Russia is not about a “few nukes.” It will be a different kind of nukes. It will indeed not last a week for neither Russia or the US. Those parts of the world and (Europe also) will be utterly unrecognizable. But in that phase the mass-death horror hasn’t even started.
The world will not look like anything like post-war Japan, Russian and American cities will not even resemble immediate post war Hiroshima or Nagasaki. There is nothing in history, well maybe the dinosaurs could relay a thing or two. But even that would fall far short.
Do you have any idea of what you’re talking about? Russia have complete nuclear superiority. That means they can hit us and we can’t hit them. All that useless, old cold war era crap will be destroyed in first minutes of war. Even Chinese by themselves with fewer nukes can reduce US to stone age without any risk to them. Hypersonic missiles give an incredible advantage in strategic operations.
Fair enough… A new way to light up the Christmas tree…
The problem with nuclear war is Russians are downwind from Ukraine.
Ghoulish nuclear scientists tracked individual atom bomb test radiation from Nevada through alfalfa hay into milk and baby teeth of infants in Georgia. That distance is three times mid Ukraine to Moscow.
What does Ukraine have to do with nuclear exchange? Ukraine is Russian territory.
People do demonstrate in public to express their feelings of anger, they are not government officials acting behind closed doors and in cahoots with MSM deceiving and lying to the public. The people will pay the price not the profiteers.
https://cpmaine.org/2021/08/29/revelations-of-carters-former-advisor-yes-the-cia-entered-afghanistan-before-the-russians-1998/
That is what government officials do, they are the real criminals.
Well yeah, these people won’t be pushing any buttons attached to stuff pointed at Washington. The point is not that they are evil or criminal, the point is that they are insane. Calling for nuclear strikes on any target, let alone dense conglomerations isn’t excusable by an appeal to being really cross with stuff. It might be excusable by an appeal to sudden onset derangement syndrom.
You might be more inclined to recognize this phenomonology for what it is if Americans were to take the time to travel to Washington to gather and rally to persuade their government to unleash nuclear strikes on Moscow.
Biden was using nuclear war talk indirectly for propaganda reasons, people demonstrating did the same, they carried signs since they don’t control the media. Russian people feel anger like any American in their shoes would.
Biden is the problem, he acts like a child with a tantrum if it does not get its way. If NATO would have stopped providing weapons, the Ukrainians would have recognized their limits and negotiated with Russia, but the US wanted this war, since it is not on their soil and others do the dying. And the war is all about power and money. Iran, Iraq, Libya, Venezuela and Russia have one thing in common, they all have oil the US energy giants want, and the MIC is making huge profits that is why there is no end in sight. Money, money makes the world go round, not freedom and democracy.
PS, just a couple of conventional bombs or some rounds of shrapnel on the Pentagon or the Hill might help the officials to understand what it feels like what they do to others. Jan. 6, compared to war is nothing. Their children do not starve to death, or get killed by bullets or bombs, they don’t know what a drone is, not to mention living in refugee camps not knowing what the future might bring. War is great as long as others get killed for them and their money.
For the US this war is great business, so far the US is the winner, not Ukrainians, they are dying and so are the Russian soldiers.
Look, there is a difference between revenge fantasies and reality. Mentally stable people do have the former but deal with latter.
You seem to think these pests are untouchable. Both Kremlin and Beijing have more than enough strike teams in US to wipe them out quickly and quietly.
The Russian people’s anger is most understandable, the US neocons like Biden/Blinken are making lots of enemies around the globe. The people will pay the price no matter who wins, the profiteers always win and living it up in Monaco among other places.
https://netherlandsnewslive.com/ukrainian-oligarchs-and-politicians-fled-en-masse-to-monaco-from-the-war/380801/
Does this situation concern anyone?… We could find ourselves in a much larger conflict and one that could potentially go nuclear?…. It concerns me.
Not really, the Russians talk tough but they always blink. There were at least two separate instances where local commanders should have unleashed nuclear weapons and didn’t.
Shows they got nerve.
Russia isn’t USSR, johnny. Right now it is entirely different social mindset. You better put a leash on your parasites before something bad happens.
Well, the fate of the planet is in the hands of a TV/movie actor and a president teetering on the verge of senility.
Is there a problem? /s
😉
Nailed it!
It’s almost heart warming that the US/NATO are managing to piss off so many countries at the same time…!
The other day China and Russia held a joint bomber flight. Hoping that rattled the cages in D.C..
And their own member states too!
Well the good news is the US and USSR have survived “direct conflict” as defined by Lavrov at least twice before. USSR supplied North Vietnam and the US did not go after the Soviet supply chain, did not target Soviet supply ships etc. In Afghanistan we returned the favor and supported the religious wackos.
A good unbiased analysis of Putin’s challenge with Crimea.
https://youtu.be/IIE1g8kqIpk
Unbiased analysis from you?… Bwa ha ha ha!
These folks are trolls, here to attempt to hijack the discussion – not to shed any light whatsoever on it.
That’s cool.. I troll too, just better. 😉
Yes, I produced and published this unbiased analysis.
I’ll make sure to post a Pro Putin analysis next time to keep you happy.
Define unbiased.
https://www.rt.com/russia/567542-russia-upgrade-himars-air-defense/
Russian troops get upgrade against HIMARS – RIA
The Russian MOD is disarming NATO (Ukraine was disarmed in March), tank by tank, artillery by artillery, air defense by air defense. What they loose in the Ukraine, they loose for the final NATO global war.
Russia is inflicting a 10:1 kill ratio. According to Ursula von der Leyen over 100,000 Ukrainian officers dead. Probably twice that seriously injured and an estimated 1300 NATO polish officers (mercenaries) killed.
NATO overall has accumulated the following equipment losses;
336 Aircraft, 177 helicopters, 2599 UAV’s, 391 Anti Aircraft systems, 6953 tanks inc. APC’s, 908 multiple rocket launchers, 3648 rocket launchers and 7437 military automotive equipment.
If you really believe this how do you explain the lack of Russian progress?
Uh, you do realise that about 20% of the area claimed by the Ukraine regime isn’t in Ukraine anymore, right?
It is Ukraine in the view of the UN – that is what matters not what the Russians think.
Who cares what the U.N. thinks? Countries decide. People decide.
So you are actually for a chaotic future of wars all over the planet.
No. I’m for people rejecting oppressive governments.
We have chaotic wars all over the planet now. Most of those are the results of attempts by some to dominate and control others. I’m against that.
The false dichotomy you present is the problem. There will be endless wars and chaos if not for nation states and a rules based order. That’s the exact argument used to justify the USA being the police man of the world. Which has led to…..endless wars.
So against Putin!?
No we do not, not by the scale we had before we started sanctioning wars of territorial conquest.
There are fairly many wars, if territorial conquest becomes the new normal there will be a lot more – simply because you make the potential gains of war much greater – is this so hard to understand?
Putin is very popular in the RF. All governments are somewhat oppressive. The RF is better than most. Ukraine is one of the worst in the world.
You think that a government owns it’s people. They are slaves to those that control that government. I believe people own themselves. I believe that people have the right to dissolve the bonds of a government and seek another system of state to govern them.
No Russia is worse than Ukraine the simple measure is that running against Putin is unhealthy – running against the Ukrainian President has at each election led to a new President being elected.
No whatever gave you that idea?
As do I, but there is a path to secession and that path is not through the intervention of foreign governments.
The foreign intervention WAS the 2014 coup. The secession resulted from that coup. You keep on trying to put that cat back in the bag and it isn’t going to work. The emerging ethno state of Ukraine is underway now. This state is increasingly dominated by neo-Nazi types.
Ukraine, as a unified state ended in 2014. The people in Crimea and the Donbas rejected the illegitimate Ukrainian regime THEN. Attempts to put Humpty Dumpty back together again failed. Minsk accords.
The sooner this fact is accepted, the sooner this war and killing will end. Ukraine can still survive if action is taken now. Else Ukraine will be a sad land locked poor and dependent state
Damage to the EU can be limited at this point. If this continues, the EU will be substantially harmed politically and economically.
You and Russia have failed to establish that it was a foreign coup moreover you have failed to establish that that the elections held following the ousting of the legitimate government were not democratic and that the governments after August 2014 were not enjoying public support.
we have proof that the insurrection in the Donbas was Russian supported and initiated with Russian help – that pretty much makes that illegitimate.
So no the international community is not likely to support this kind of Russian interference in the domestic affairs of a neighbor – it would be too destabilizing for the world if they did.
EU knows that it will be harmed either way, and is by now thoroughly convinced that the cost of allowing Russian aggression to be met with success is by far the higher cost.
I happen to believe that they are right – the consequence of allowing wars of territorial conquest to be successful will throw the world into a decades (at least) long era of conflicts and military arms race, not to mention nuclear proliferation.
Intentionally sticking with short supply lines, sticking the US with long supply lines, reducing the amount of territory the US can use our … freedom fighters on, and increasing the number of people that the US is responsible for feeding and heating.
Not to mention the fact that Russia has been crushing it on the diplomatic front. India buys as much stuff as Russia can send to them, trade between India, China, and Russia is in Rubles, Rupees, and Yuan, Saudia Arabia and UAE have turned against the US and pro-Russia, Iran is becoming tight with Russia, and even NATO nation Turkey is aligning more with Russia and less with the US. A very anti-US leader of Pakistan was removed from office – the US insists there is no proof that the US had anything to do with it – and the new guy is aligning with Russia and India and against the US.
Oh yeah – the Russian economy is not crumbling. Russia will move forward when it is ready.
How does this explain the lack of Russian progress?
The Russians have increased their sales to India and China – that primarily based on oil sold at a substantial rebate – if you have links that document Russian export successes that come anywhere near compensating for their export losses then I’d be most interested to see them.
Again evidence of this would be very welcome – because what I hear is that the Russians are themselves admitting that things are not going their way.
Add Latin America to your list.
Yes, Polish merc casualties are probably much higher. They had 1k killed back in July. And there are about 1k dead Anglo-American mercs and so-called ‘instructors’. AFU was ordered to burn the bodies of active service members in order to make it more difficult to id them.
Once again Nato is playing with nuclear fire. Ukraine is not and cannot be part of Nato –understood ?
The weather in Ukraine just turned to freezing and the ground is
firming. Between General Winter and General Sergei “Armageddon”
Surovikin a day of reckoning is coming.
Temperatures for the next few days show temperatures ranging from 18F to 28F degrees. Wind chill is forecast at -1F to 18F for the next few days.
Russian missile strikes have deprived Ukraine of electricity for their electric locomotives so resupply of troops with food and fuel is limited.
Wars are won or lost in the less sexy venue of supply lines and logistics which dictate what armies can do with combat operations.
Yes. An army marches on it’s stomach.
Is it true that there are israeli snipers operating with the Ukranians against the Russians?
I’ve no idea personally, but it would make perfect sense.
IsraHell would love nothing more than to see the establishment of Ziolensky’s “big Israel”.
Oh there are all kind of mercs fighting for the terrorist occupational regimein Ukraine. Russians pop them like flies. There were about 5k of ‘international legion’ mercenaries just in Mariupol alone. Pretty much all of them are now fertilizer.
Wouldn’t it be nice if world leaders would be dosed with truth serum
instead of a vaccine? Many more lives would be saved. The following might result.
***”President Biden bragged in October that the world was closer to “nuclear armageddon” than at any time since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis.”.
“Other US presidents have come close, but only I have been able get THIS close. I give credit to President Obama for for setting the stage for this achievement with the overthrow of the Ukrainian government in that lovely coup he sponsered. I also give thanks to the support of the GOP in this bipartisan effort to get a lot of people killed.”