Armchair General's DonbAss Derailed Discussion Thread (Topics Include History, Traps, and the Ongoing Slavic Civil War plus much much more)
- Thread starter ParadiseLost
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King Arts
Well-known member
I mean you can bring that up anytime a nation invades another, do Israelis think they are the baddies when they shell Palestinians hospital? Do Americans for shelling Iraqi schools?I do wonder if some of the rank and file Russian Troops are beginning to think this.
Floridaman
Well-known member
Thats the one at DC, right? Maybe kinzinger snuck in to take a plane and make that no fly zone he wanted
Yeah the one in maryland
Floridaman
Well-known member
Well that will be interesting, if I recall that is one of the more important bases.
VERY important base.
Floridaman
Well-known member
Right if I recall home of AF 1, and more importantly one of if I recall two bases with fighters actually ready to scramble.
Very much so. IIRC where all the QRF in case of DC being attackled are located.
So everyone appears to want Ukraine to win, but what I don't see is any of the talking heads talking about what happens if Ukraine does "win" the initial fight.
Imagine what would happen if when the US invaded Iraq, the US lost and was forced to pull out. What that would do in terms of domestic politics, domestic perception, and international relations is basically impossible to understate.
So what happens if Russia fails to take over its next door neighbor after trying with a full scale invasion? That isn't domestically survivable for not just Putin but the entire governmental apparatus.
That fact means that Russia can't afford to lose. It doesn't matter what they have to do, how expensive it is, or what weapons & tactics they have to resort to. The political damage from any of it is less than the damage from losing the war.
If you actually want some kind of peace or negotiated settlement, it has to be one that Putin can present domestically as a win.
Honestly, the only "peace" I can see as being viable is Russia taking everything East of the Dnieper. But even that isn't really viable because it would require that the west drop all the sanctions and basically pretend that the whole thing didn't happen, and that Ukraine would accept losing a third to half of their territory.
Imagine what would happen if when the US invaded Iraq, the US lost and was forced to pull out. What that would do in terms of domestic politics, domestic perception, and international relations is basically impossible to understate.
So what happens if Russia fails to take over its next door neighbor after trying with a full scale invasion? That isn't domestically survivable for not just Putin but the entire governmental apparatus.
That fact means that Russia can't afford to lose. It doesn't matter what they have to do, how expensive it is, or what weapons & tactics they have to resort to. The political damage from any of it is less than the damage from losing the war.
If you actually want some kind of peace or negotiated settlement, it has to be one that Putin can present domestically as a win.
Honestly, the only "peace" I can see as being viable is Russia taking everything East of the Dnieper. But even that isn't really viable because it would require that the west drop all the sanctions and basically pretend that the whole thing didn't happen, and that Ukraine would accept losing a third to half of their territory.
He isn't wrong though.
Legally and morally, Ukraine absolutely has the "right" to try and join NATO & the EU. Legally and "morally", Russia is absolutely in the wrong.
Alas, when it comes to nation states the only relevant use of "rights" is the old school definition. You have whatever rights you are willing to fight, die, and kill for and they last so long as you can enforce them.
Russia has decided to dispute Ukraine's "rights" via the traditional method (the dead not having any rights). Whether they will succeed or fail in proving their claim to being "right" is something we will see in the fullness of time.
TheRomanSlayer
Kayabangan, Dugo, at Dangal
How bad will the fallout be if Russia officially loses and Putin is gone? If we're going for a Navalny presidency, he's got a lot of competition from the other controlled opposition parties that tow the Putin line, but appear to oppose him. The CPRF would probably use the failure of Putin to try and boost their credentials once again, to everyone's horror, and the LDPR is probably more of a lame duck as Zhirinovsky is probably becoming more mellowed. It's the real wild cards that are also anti-Navalny that we gotta watch out for.
strunkenwhite
Well-known member
This is the part I have trouble believing. But it's understandable that when facing a scary and unknowable future they'd fall back on a strategy that has served Russia more or less adequately for half a millennium, even if all signs suggest that it won't this time. Because sometimes everybody is wrong and it's the best alternative to accepting a glide path downward from being a world power, no matter how much sense it would make.
Dude, what world are you living in? Everybody were giving Ukraine 72 hours max before the invasion began. Russian eventual victory is not really in doubt (they have a lot of crap to throw at their opponents, Ukraine doesn't, unless the West gets itself more heavily involved), the point is that their performance up till now has been an embarrassment, they are being humiliated in front of the entire world for their extremely crappy military performance.
strunkenwhite
Well-known member
From what little I've heard, Russian domestic propaganda has been selling it as more protection of ethnic Russians at risk from dastardly nazified foreign governments. So if Ukraine agrees to recognize the LPR/DNR and Crimea as "independent" (Russian) and further agree to pre-2014 levels of water supply to Crimea, that could probably IMO be played off as a win, even if the consequence is that the remaining Ukrainian state instantly joins NATO. That merely plays into the siege mentality they've already been selling for the last couple decades.
So if a settlement can be reached (if Putin is willing to settle for anything less than all of Ukraine) I think it's just down to the difference between the territory actually controlled by LPR/DNR on 1/1/2022 and the territory of the entire oblasts they claim. Taking everything to the Dneipr would be asking for an insurgency Russia can ill afford, especially considering the amount of foreign support it would have.
Except that the West would have to dump all the sanctions, concede that territory, and publicly and in writing say that Ukraine isn't ever becoming part of NATO or the EU.
Getting a concession on territory that Russia already effectively owned isn't a "win", especially not at the cost.
And you know that none of the western powers that be would spin it as anything except a Russian loss and humiliations. That those promises both won't be made and wouldn't be worth the paper that they are written on.
Russia grabbing to the Dnieper at least gives them a solid, clear, border to work with. And sealing the territory in question is a LOT easier than trying to do the same to the rest of Ukraine. There would be no entry points that Russia didn't control and letting Ukrainians leave easily would act to reduce a lot of the insurgency potential.
The real problem is that the west (and especially the US) has done what it always does and cast the other side as the absolute enemy that can't possible be given a win. The political damage to western leaders (especially Biden) from allowing Russia to get a "win" is substantial - largely because those same leaders have made it the end of the world.
strunkenwhite
Well-known member
Well, first, no they did not already effectively own the whole Luhansk and Donetsk oblasts:
Second, the water supply issue is a serious problem for Crimea and extremely costly to fix (evidenced by the fact that Russia has yet to come up with a satisfactory solution despite its critical strategic importance [edit: unless you count invading Ukraine, I suppose]).
Third, sanctions could probably be lifted but Ukraine won't want to buy peace for five years until Russia decides to go for another bite. At the price of, what, more than 10% of the country?—Ukraine will want to buy peace permanently.
Fourth, the river isn't worth the cost of holding down that much territory that will see them as tyrants rather than as liberators or even as "new boss same as the old boss". I think it's delusional to believe that border could be really secure against insurgents. As for "letting Ukrainians leave" ... lol.
Lastly, I did after all say "played off as a win". It doesn't have to be actually worth it for Russia to convince enough people that it was worth it that the regime doesn't get overthrown.
And Ukraine joining NATO would let the west play it off as their own win even as Russia walks away with everything its propaganda said it wanted, with lighter sanctions than when it started the trouble.
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PsihoKekec
Swashbuckling Accountant
And it was one of the points where Russia broke with the West. Basically, USA tricked them into voting for the UN resolution, lying that they will abide by the stipulations of the resolution and only enforce the no-fly zone. Of course USA and France immediately went beyond enforcing no-fly zone and started full ground support campaign. When Russia protested this breach of terms, the USA response could be summed up: ''What you gonna do, cry about it?''
If Russia goes down in fire it will take USA down as well. Saying that you don't want the bad consequences of your desires does not absolve you of the bad consequences of your desires.
Communists take over, they are more authoritarian than the current regime and even more hostile to the West.