Ukraine Invasion: Part 19

[MagicFox]

Welcome friends, still going

That's like suggesting we stop the water levels rising by melting all the ice caps.

We in Britain wouldn't accept it either. Would we?!

Yes, I think we would accept it. We are accepting right now, just for a start, atrocities in China, children shredded by starvation in Afghanistan

Tiddy is suggesting that we wouldn’t accept Russia coming into the UK on a special military operation to take it over because Putin didn’t see the UK as a real country. In this scenario, would you think that we’d accept it? Would you accept it (am assuming here that you’re British)?

If not, then why advocate for Ukraine to do so? Either we’d be accepting it here on the same argument/principle ie to save lives or if we wouldn’t, then we can’t judge Ukrainians for not doing so.

@Igotjelly I was too, although you should see the video my delightful FIL sent me this evening of that mad Russian news show saying they would take Poland and turn the USA into radioactive dust. He’s ex military so has a more than logical opinion on what’s happening but sometimes I think he likes to antagonise my anxiety…and then I wonder why I get sucked in by propaganda facepalm it IS scary though.

Yes, peace should be the goal. But why put that on Zelenskyy and the Ukrainians? The ones upsetting up the peace are Putin and the Russians, they could simply fuck off back to their own country and then the war would be over.

It’s not like Zelenskyy is choosing to let women and children be raped and murdered, and soldiers killed. There is no choice - the Russians will kill regardless of whether the Ukrainians fight or not. They need to fight for their land, their people, and their freedom. As I’m sure any of us would choose to do too.

Putin has a goal. He is intent on reaching that goal, whatever it takes. Anyone with a basic understanding of psychology and this type of personality is going to see that peace talks will do jack shit to change his course. He needs to fail. And then there is a chance of peace.

The argument that the responsibility for peace lies with Ukraine makes my blood boil. It’s victim blaming in the extreme.

@strawberriesarenot Russia kept over 100 people in a basement for 30 plus days, 12 died, they slept with corpses, unimaginable horrific conditions.

Yet you want peace with these animals, a reset.

there can be no damage limitation until Putin seeks it and unless he has something to show for his war, he wont stop.

Yes i think he will settle for the Donbas and land corridor because if he doesn't he could end up with nothing at all.

twitter.com/BBCSounds/status/1512169585558048769

BBC Sounds@BBCSounds
Paulius co-founded a website where volunteers cold-call randomly generated Russian phone numbers to talk to them about the war in Ukraine.

He told #BBCUkrainecast how the conversations have changed in the last few weeks.

Hear more on BBC Sounds

This is a really interesting video.

In it, it says that initially when they cold called Russians they would just get abuse. But as things have gone on, they have started to engage more.

@PippinStar

Yes, peace should be the goal. But why put that on Zelenskyy and the Ukrainians? The ones upsetting up the peace are Putin and the Russians, they could simply fuck off back to their own country and then the war would be over.

It’s not like Zelenskyy is choosing to let women and children be raped and murdered, and soldiers killed. There is no choice - the Russians will kill regardless of whether the Ukrainians fight or not. They need to fight for their land, their people, and their freedom. As I’m sure any of us would choose to do too.

Putin has a goal. He is intent on reaching that goal, whatever it takes. Anyone with a basic understanding of psychology and this type of personality is going to see that peace talks will do jack shit to change his course. He needs to fail. And then there is a chance of peace.

The argument that the responsibility for peace lies with Ukraine makes my blood boil. It’s victim blaming in the extreme.

Yes, you are right.

I'm not victim blaming. I said at the outset that Zelensky was doing what was right for Ukraine. I respect him completely, and his people.

Putin's goal seems to be changing. First it was the old Russian empire, then Ukraine, now Dombas and a landbridge.

His goal is only changing because he fucked up and is needing to downgrade his ambition (for now)

They dangled NATO membership to Ukraine when they knew fine well they would never allow it. Ukraine didn't though, and Russia took the bait too

This is resurrecting the ‘poking the bear’ argument… again. Perhaps not intended, but incredibly insensitive to do so after we’re all just hearing about Russian atrocities in Bucha.

Be under no illusions, if Putin had his way the people of Kyiv would be facing what went on in Bucha and Mariupol right about now.

[quote Alexandra2001]@strawberriesarenot Russia kept over 100 people in a basement for 30 plus days, 12 died, they slept with corpses, unimaginable horrific conditions.

Yet you want peace with these animals, a reset.

there can be no damage limitation until Putin seeks it and unless he has something to show for his war, he wont stop.

Yes i think he will settle for the Donbas and land corridor because if he doesn't he could end up with nothing at all.[/quote]
I know. I read it. Foul.

Nothing compared to what we did in Iraq (we Brits have forgiven ourselves so much over the years). But foul.

Just a point:
Upthread it was pointed out that Russian soliders were banned from having mobile phones.

Yet, they have the opportunity to loot them - so if they want one, they will get one.

And we've had multiple reports that Russian soliders have wanted to know how the war was going and so asked ukrainian civilians.

In this context this article is worth thinking about:

www.cbc.ca/news/world/ukraine-osint-war-1.6410037
The smartphone war: Soldiers, civilians and satellites give the world a window onto Russian invasion

Soldiers sharing cellphone video of missile attacks as they happen; residents posting footage of military units occupying their towns in real time and live streaming from bomb shelters; government officials tweeting drone video of destroyed tank columns and downed aircraft.

All amplified over thousands of Telegram channels, Twitter feeds and TikTok accounts around the world.

"People are basically acting as war reporters, but it's by the tens of thousands," said Samuel Bendett, a research analyst and Russia expert at the Center for Naval Analyses in Arlington, Va. "This war is playing out on our smartphones in ways that no other conflicts probably have so far."

It's not that there hasn't been footage from active combat shared on social media before. In Syria and Iraq, for example, ISIS and other rebel groups made ample use of drones and cellphones to trumpet victories on social media. But the difference in this war is that much of the footage is coming from the military.

The whole article is fascinating. And its interesting to think about how Ukraine have been able to flood social media in this way.

The Washington Post has a story on the torture and sadism in Bucha. Beheadings, cigarette burns, a man walking his labrador made to kneel for 40 minutes with a gun to his head before he was shot and killed. I guess if the Russians landed in Folkestone (with the Wagner Group and the Rusichs and the Kadyrovites and the Sparta Battalion) some people would be happy to live under the constant threat of rape and torture or summary execution or deportation to a Russian labour camp as long as we avoid a war.

mobile.twitter.com/PhillipsPOBrien/status/1512053218448183300?t=FQAqzVaZKvdHnyFG58xfmg&s=19

Interesting thread about Russia’s (low) chances of a successful military campaign in the south and east

@PestorPeston

The risk if we fuck Ukraine is we fuck Moldovia we fuck Romania (nice land bridge to Serbia) we fuck everyone else in that corner, maybe even Greece talking land bridges we fuck Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia we fuck Finland, Sweden and Norway Not all at once, maybe every three years he could get more troops trained and just wander into the next country to be greeted by flowers. NATO would fall apart along the way and we could possibly stand as a little bit of Oceania, getting bombed by Eurasia.

OK that is probably rambling on too far. But, where would he stop? It wouldn't be Ukraine.

He would need a pretty large army to do that, significantly greater, more technically updated and with at least 500% more kit than it had before the war started. The Russian army cannot hope to cover all of Ukraine. It is useful to know that many parts are on Google Earth and very well covered at street view level. You can spend an hour on there and gauge a sense of the immenseness of the country and its terrain which would not be easy for Russia to attack and hold long term. (With air cover the Russian army would most probably have been defeated by now.) The occupation would be like Russia or the West in Afghanistan. This is why he has to focus on the Donbas now.

Even if they were to hold Ukraine, it would be any army general's hell to attempt to take Poland and Romania. You have the Carpathians which would be very difficult to occupy.

This war will go on for years in the East of Ukraine and it will be a slow attrition on both sides until it is resolved in some way.

This is where heavy sanctions work and a new cold war starts. Russia will try to rebuild, but will have one hand tied behind its back. Europe will have to get its act together on a coherent defence, working with the US who in turn will also be engaged in an arm's race with China. That in particular will bring new challenges in the cyber and space arena. The UK will do best collaborating its own defence and communications experience with the US and European armies.

@EsmaCannonball

The Washington Post has a story on the torture and sadism in Bucha. Beheadings, cigarette burns, a man walking his labrador made to kneel for 40 minutes with a gun to his head before he was shot and killed. I guess if the Russians landed in Folkestone (with the Wagner Group and the Rusichs and the Kadyrovites and the Sparta Battalion) some people would be happy to live under the constant threat of rape and torture or summary execution or deportation to a Russian labour camp as long as we avoid a war.

Exactly, and I think the situation if Ukraine had surrendered would be infinitely more dangerous. For a start, I think Russia would have carried out atrocities whether they were greeted with flowers or bombs, and surrender would have given them carte blanche to do it across the whole of the country. The raping and killing wouldn't have been prevented, and Ukraine would have lost its sovereignty too.

Meanwhile, many other countries would be living under the constant threat that they would be next. It would have meant that it wasn't squeaky bum time for countries like the UK, France and the US, but that would be temporary, because we'd just be wringing our hands again over whatever Putin decides to do next a few years down the line. And it would be even worse because Russia with control over Ukraine would be more powerful and more emboldened.

[quote YorkshireLondonMiss]@TiddyTidTwo Ha I told you I was naiive. This is why I love these threads because they keep me grounded. Honestly propaganda spins me out because I soak it up - that’s why I tend to steer clear of Twitter nowadays, I only have to read one tweet and I go into a tailspin.

I think generally I understand what’s going on but as a bit of an anxious person, I’m always honing in on the what ifs.[/quote]
I don't think that's naive, it's incredibly alarming to listen to because it's like being sucked into a parallel universe where people don't seem to be afraid of, or even welcome, prospects that should be terrifying. It makes you feel like Putin is capable of absolutely anything, but that's the impression it's supposed to give. It's designed to fuck with people's heads and scare them into not messing with Russia.

Targus the war in the east has already been going on for 8 years. The unstable border is why Ukraine cannot join NATO. At the 2008 Bucharest Summit, the Allies agreed that Georgia and Ukraine will become members of NATO in future. Russia annex Crimea in 2014 and a month later started the war in Donbas.
The only way that Russia could take over Europe is if they were greeted by flowers at each stop.
Seems unlikely to me.
I was taking the piss.

@AlecTrevelyan006

mobile.twitter.com/PhillipsPOBrien/status/1512053218448183300?t=FQAqzVaZKvdHnyFG58xfmg&s=19

Interesting thread about Russia’s (low) chances of a successful military campaign in the south and east

That is interesting:

Phillips P. OBrien @PhillipsPOBrien
On the north end of this area of operations the Russians have deployed 30 BTGs of approx 800-1000 soldiers. They have been in combat for almost six weeks and for all the talk about the importance of seizing Izium, they have advanced about 10 miles in 3 weeks.

So they have at most 24000 tired soldiers to control a large area from Kharkiv to Izium, which is also supposed to drive through determined Ukrainian resistance and create a Donbas pocket while protecting its long supply lines? Good luck.

and

If I was a gambling man, which I’m not, I would wager it’s more likely we see a major Russian military collapse somewhere in the south and east (Kherson?) by May 9 through being overstretched and attritted than a Russian Army having seized Dnipro and surrounded the entire Donbas.

I'm glad someone has said this.

The May 9th deadline seemed near impossible to me. This really does spell it out.

Given that Maripol is still having resistance...

I was aware the war in the East has been going on for years. My point is that it is going to be on a different level now and in the context of my earlier thread the only way Russia can take the Donbas is by significantly over concentrating its forces there. This proves that Russia cannot even attempt to engage in other lands. The transparency of Russian military capability is astonishing. Particularly if you believe as I do that Russia would not use the nuclear option because then it has lost everything and Russia is everything to the Kremlin.

I did not read your post as taking the piss by the way. You seemed to be saying is event A were to happen then outcome B could happen.

It could only happen if the Ukrainians had gone, Hi Rus, have some flowers, our army is now your army, let us help train you in the new effective ways of war. The potential was there.

I know. I read it. Foul.

Nothing compared to what we did in Iraq (we Brits have forgiven ourselves so much over the years). But foul.

Forgive me if I’m misreading this out of context. But are you seriously suggesting that western soldiers in Iraq were committing atrocities on a par with those the Russians are freely engaging in?

I’d like to see evidence, and no doubt there would be plenty of people who can prosecute. I seem to remember some serious allegations being prosecuted.

I respect those who want peace, but sometimes they don’t seem to grasp that there are men in the world who hate and destroy.

@ParsleySageRosemary

I know. I read it. Foul.

Nothing compared to what we did in Iraq (we Brits have forgiven ourselves so much over the years). But foul.

Forgive me if I’m misreading this out of context. But are you seriously suggesting that western soldiers in Iraq were committing atrocities on a par with those the Russians are freely engaging in?

I’d like to see evidence, and no doubt there would be plenty of people who can prosecute. I seem to remember some serious allegations being prosecuted.

I respect those who want peace, but sometimes they don’t seem to grasp that there are men in the world who hate and destroy.

I've read it the same way as you

Astonishing

I know. I read it. Foul.

Nothing compared to what we did in Iraq (we Brits have forgiven ourselves so much over the years). But foul.

Are you trying to imply that British troops razed Iraq to the ground, abused, tortured and killed as many civilians and animals that they could get there hands while raping women and children to death?

I refute the implication that what the Russians have done in Ukraine does should be forgiven because Iraq was worse.

If you really believe that you need to get your head out of your or Putins arse.

Glad it's not just me that read it that way.
I'd say the person who wrote it maybe speaks English as a second language, I'd like to hazard a guess that their first may be, oh, I don't know, Russian.