Ukraine and Russia: Answering common questions and issues

[WhatsGoingOn2022]

Hi, I am starting this thread due to the amount of misinformation and speculation I have seen on the boards around what is happening with Russia's war on Ukraine.

While I am by no means a leading specialist, I have a master's degree focusing on the defence and economics aspect of international relations, I work today in politics and have a lot of links in the area. Anything I can't answer I can at least point you to the people who can-- I naturally follow this incredibly closely.

I thought it might be helpful if myself and others with specific knowledge in this area could help to answer any questions you have, on anything from the war, to sanctions, to Russia's actions, to the fallout.

Hi thank you!

I feel stupid to ask this but what does Putin actually want? The land that is Ukraine?

@KindlyKanga

Hi thank you!

I feel stupid to ask this but what does Putin actually want? The land that is Ukraine?

Hi @KindlyKanga! No problem at all, and not stupid actually.

So--it's potentially a bit of a long one because there are quite a few things he wants. As a very short background though: Putin's plans were for a quick 15 day invasion, overthrow the government, install a Kremlin-friendly government, accept a few sanctions but watch as NATO did nothing, then use Ukraine as a base to launch attacks on other states. Which has all gone tits up, and it's clear now that even if he can take Ukraine, he can't hold it.

Putin has major expansionist plans/imperial ambitions that go beyond Ukraine. Basically, at the core of it he is trying to re-establish the influence of the Soviet Union. This has been a part of his language for decades, but not taken seriously by many outside of the region. Kremlin academics and policymakers in Russia are now openly talking about where they want to go next. This is why states like Kosovo and Ukraine were trying to get NATO membership (as is would mean Russia couldn't invade them without going to war with the US). Finland and Sweden have also been receiving threats from Russia--they are not part of NATO but seriously considering membership now. Worth remembering that the Soviet Union has a history of trying to take them over. States like Belarus and the Chechen Republic have barbaric leaders kept in power by Putin (all of whom are joining in the assault on Ukraine).

Putin openly says now that he does not recognise the existence of Ukraine as a country. Russia has a long history of trying to suppress Ukraine, which is a successful and comparatively liberal state. They supported awful presidents therein 2014 as part of the Euromaidan protests, Ukraine booted out their Putin-linked billionaire president who stole billions from the state and fired on civilians. He fled to Russia and is now in BelarusPutin is allegedly trying to re-impose him on Ukraine. For background: this man Yanukovych is so hated for what he did to Ukraine that the average man on the street would try to kill him with their bare hands.

Putin's ambitions for Europe also sit within a wider context. For decades, Kremlin-linked money has been pumped into Europe and other countries to make them turn a blind eye to his assaults on e.g. Georgia, Syria, Chechnians, Eritrea, whole host of other evil acts. Things like the Chelsea football club issuethis is called 'sports washing'regimes spend this money not out of a love for sport, but to give a friendly face to a brutal regime, and moreover buy the support of citizens in Europe.

Russia however is just one player in thisultimately they are a part of China's plans for the west. Russia is doing now China had planned to do slowly and subtly over decades. China privately told Putin they would back his capture of Ukraine, but he had to wait until after they hosted the Winter Olympicsagain, sports washing. China are now freaked out at how this has shown the whole world the intention behind their investments.

Thank you for this OP I will be following this thread as your last post was really helpful.

In your opinion, how will this end? I don't see putin being taken out, I don't see him backing down either. I think he will take ukraine, the world will say how naughty that was and try to forget about it.

If putin was no more... would the war come to an end?

Is there any chance if ukraine winning this?

Why has putin stop most of social media to the Russian civilians?

How do Russian civilians actually feel about Russia invading ukraine?

Hi OP,
This bit here : Putin's plans were for a quick 15 day invasion, overthrow the government, install a Kremlin-friendly government, accept a few sanctions but watch as NATO did nothing, then use Ukraine as a base to launch attacks on other states.

Has he actually said this? Where do you know this from?

Thanks!

Thank you very much.

@Reluctantadult

Hi OP, This bit here : Putin's plans were for a quick 15 day invasion, overthrow the government, install a Kremlin-friendly government, accept a few sanctions but watch as NATO did nothing, then use Ukraine as a base to launch attacks on other states.

Has he actually said this? Where do you know this from?

Thanks!

I was going to ask this too. Given most commentators on the war can't say for sure what Putin's next move will be, let alone his true long term goals, it is impressive that OP has a hotline to the Kremlin.

@Reluctantadult

Hi OP, This bit here : Putin's plans were for a quick 15 day invasion, overthrow the government, install a Kremlin-friendly government, accept a few sanctions but watch as NATO did nothing, then use Ukraine as a base to launch attacks on other states.

Has he actually said this? Where do you know this from?

Thanks!

Hi @Reluctantadult!! So the source of this is a combination of seized military plans from Russia, Kremlin leaks, western intelligence and analysis by military experts. None of this is from public statements by Putin--he still denies the existence of an invasion.

Before the invasion, he told some key allies like China, Belarus and Syria (Assad). Many of the key generals and commanders were not even told of the plans in advance, and there has been quite a bit of fallout for this amongst military organisations and Kremlin-leaning politicians. However certain military leaders obviously were involved in the planning (many of these strategy documents have been captured, they are on twitter but can't locate at this moment).

Much of the Kremlin were not made aware of this planone key aspect of this is the economic modelling of war and sanctions, which were not done. Apparently they have stopped similar wars previously purely through showing the economic affect. There are some great leaks from this circle around how they have been tasked with preventing economic freefallliterally impossible.

For an example of this, check out a Russian senator: www.express.co.uk/news/world/1575856/russian-senator-troop-death-losses-ukraine-war-lyudmila-narusova-soldier-latest-vn

The Russian army were woefully ill-prepared for the invasionin fact, they were sent in with just 3 days of food rations. Many were not told in advance that they were invading Ukrainemany are actually conscripts, who under Russian law are not even meant to fight. In some cases they were taken to the Ukrainian border and told to sign contracts, before entering to fight. In terms of source for the short war--the best thing for that is an article written by the Kremlin that was published in error announcing their victory, and quickly deleted. You can read that here: www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-60562240

In the last day, Ukraine has succeeded in taking out some seriously high ranking Russian officers, who were sent in to sort out the disaster. Much of this has been a disaster of logistics (e.g. check out this failed plan on tyres): twitter.com/TrentTelenko/status/1499164245250002944

In terms of attacks on further states--this is being advocated in Kremlin policymaking and Kremlin-linked academics. Putin has also sent fighter jets over the border in Sweden, but at this point purely as a threat. If you go deep into Putin and his key academics writings you can find the essential blueprint, there is no single Mein Kampf however.

Hi @ClaudineClare I have no hotline to the Kremlin and I also have no idea what Putin's next move will be. I do howeverlike most people who know this topic in detailhave a very good idea about what is going on and what has been planned. You can too if you check out places like RUSI and the writings of War Studies professors in the UK and Europe. It is about as far from insider knowledge as you can get--follow these academics on social media, read their work, watch them on the news.

How safe is Putin? Is there any possibility of him being "removed" from power?

Hi OP,

I know it's hard for you to say but what do you think the majority opinion is in Russia with regards to Putin? Are typical Russians supporting him? Also what is their feeling on Ukraine?

I know there have been boycotts and sanctions placed on Russia, is this something the Russian people are really worried about? Also today there was an article in the BBC about a racing driver who was sacked by his team because he is Russian. Would you say this is unfair?

Thanks.

So China are in on this?

@Cookiecrumble22

If putin was no more... would the war come to an end?

Is there any chance if ukraine winning this?

Why has putin stop most of social media to the Russian civilians?

How do Russian civilians actually feel about Russia invading ukraine?

To start with the first one: if Putin was no more, would the war come to an end?

That's actually a pretty interesting oneit certainly seems that the impetus for this lies with Putin and a close group of advisors. Over the last few decades we spoke of Russia being an oligarchybasically a group of maybe 100 oligarchs plus a couple of thousand officials under them essentially making all decisions. 10 years ago that was accurate--but Putin has done a good job in recent years of closing this circle further and cutting them out from such direct access. Many do however remain major political actors in their own right.

So I think it would primarily depend on who took over from him, and under what circumstances. Russia will become increasingly ungovernable as the sanctions hit and the economy goes into freefall--it's worth knowing that Putin essentially came to power under a promise to make Russia wealthy. Most of this was concentrated into an upper and middle class, who are now being hit.

What are the chances of Russia invading Poland or one of the Baltic countries?

Hello everyone, we are suspending this thread while we take a look behind the scenes.

I read it will take 500,000 or so soldiers to keep Ukraine suppressed even after Russia “win”. Do you think the way this has gone will make him think twice about expanding further?

Hi all. We received a few reports from users concerned about this thread and the potential for misinformation. Obviously, we can't ever vouch for anyone's credentials but we've no concerns that the OP isn't genuine.

@YetAnotherBeckyMumsnet

Hi all. We received a few reports from users concerned about this thread and the potential for misinformation. Obviously, we can't ever vouch for anyone's credentials but we've no concerns that the OP isn't genuine.

Thank you! For the avoidance of worry I will draft my answers in a less opinionated way and provide more links.

@Cookiecrumble22

If putin was no more... would the war come to an end?

Is there any chance if ukraine winning this?

Why has putin stop most of social media to the Russian civilians?

How do Russian civilians actually feel about Russia invading ukraine?

To take the second one: is there a chance of Ukraine winning this?

If you asked anyone a week ago they would say pretty definitely no. However, now it depends a lot on what you mean by 'winning'.

In some cities Putin is now going for the Aleppo playbook, similar to what he did in Chechnya: google pictures of Grozny bombing--the buildings basically razed to the ground so the city is nothing but a pile of rubble. It's not as much 'winning' the city as wiping it off the face of the earth. Putin did not expect this level of resistance and is now essentially saying that he will wipe Ukraine off the map. His language has changed from 'saving' Ukrainians from Nazis to Ukraine not existing (see today's press conference, where he questions the statehood of Ukraine).

Russia also has chemical weapons, and we know they are happy to use them (ie they did in Syria). They have already used cluster munitions in Ukraine, as well as Thermobaric bombs. There is barely not one part of the rules of war that his regime have not broken--unfortunately it might be naive to even take nuclear fully of the table. That's not to say full nuclear bombs like seen in Japan, there are more targeted nuclear weaponry too. To be absolutely 100% clear here I'm not speaking of 'nuclear holocaust' etc I'm talking of use of targeted specific weaponry in areas of Ukraine. There have also been worrying signs of targeting power plants and damns, but again the panic here is a little overblown and worth looking at in detail, not headline.

However, Ukraine's army are in a quite strong position due to previous training by British army, and they are also being supplied vast amounts of weaponry. Some of it is better than what the Russians have--e.g. check out the success of Turkish Bayraktar drones. Also, Russian troops are abandoning vast amounts of weaponry including even machinery like surface to air with cost prices of 15-25 million dollars plus per item. I think the highest I've seen so far was dollar 65m.

Turkey has also closed off the straits to Russian navy, which is a big development. Ukraine has a tiny navy, they have already scuttled their main ship to avoid it falling into Russian hands.

Also, Ukraine has seen some 60,000 male citizens return in the last week to fight for the country. I don't have the official estimates for foreign fighters to hand but I think there are some 16,000 expected (many are military background with specific specialist skills). Plus we are seeing military from Belarus and Chechnya (who are both officially backing Russia) amongst others defecting to Ukraine. This means a possibility of getting e.g. former US forces who know how to handle special equipment, so we might see them getting better stuff.

Basically, the Russian military has not gone up against modern equipment for a long time and a lot of military commentators suggest the strength of the Russian military has been overblown for years. Check out pieces like this: rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/mysterious-case-missing-russian-air-force and rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/mysterious-case-missing-russian-air-force

There's also 'winning' a country vs holding it. If you google this you can find fascinating articles on the mathematics of how many troops you would need to hold a country, vs the population, which make Ukraine unholdable:
www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/2004/05/09/a-proven-formula-for-how-many-troops-we-need/5c6dbfc9-33f8-4648-bd07-40d244a1daa4/

@Cookiecrumble22

If putin was no more... would the war come to an end?

Is there any chance if ukraine winning this?

Why has putin stop most of social media to the Russian civilians?

How do Russian civilians actually feel about Russia invading ukraine?

To take the question why has Putin stopped most of social media to Russian civilians:

Russia has already shut down what little independent media they have and criminalised calling this a 'war'. It is also now a criminal offence to share 'fake news' (ie actual fact) about the war. BBC got booted out last night, although they are broadcasting now on the dark web and by radio (if anyone needs guidance on how to access, I can share). State media shows only scenes from e.g. Crimea where there is wider sympathy to the them. They don't show the scenes of devastation, or when they do creep through they are talked about as being done by Ukrainians.

Basically, Russia is really working hard to keep control of the narrative, not necessarily to great success. The hashtag 'no war' has been making the rounds, and Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok and others have become hotbeds for sharing information. Ukrainians have done a great job of getting this out there. Youtube as I understand it is still up, Instagram seems to be as I spoke to someone in Moscow today. Facebook and Twitter are both down now.

Controlling social media also stops people organisingwhile there have been some protests in Russia they have not really kicked off, due in part to the difficulty of organisingif you can't advertise when and where, how do you hold a protest?

The Kremlin are trying to clamp down on war images, hence why we see the efforts of Anonymous to hack databases and send these directly to citizens. Also, the project on Google Maps: people have been leaving these images on google maps (and similar) reviews so that Russians can access them.

I hope you are right OP and that Ukraine is unholdable.

1. What do you mean by "use Ukraine as a base to launch attacks on other states." Are you saying Putin intends to take this further than Ukraine? Which states?

1. You mention "China's plans for the West". What do you mean by this? What are these plans?

So informative OP. Thank you. Understand that this is your opinion, but a lot makes sense.

Thank you OP. This is really interesting.

Fascinating, thank you